Analysis of the Peter MacNab Photograph

Today I look at the next photograph in the series on classic Nessie pictures. Previously I had examined the Hugh Gray picture and hopefully shed some new light on it. The research on that classic continues but today it is the Peter MacNab photograph that has my attention and we are not ashamed to say this is another genuine picture of the Loch Ness Monster. It could be argued that after the Surgeon's Photograph, this is the second most iconic picture of the Loch Ness Monster. With its classic humps creating a wake as they move towards Urquhart Castle, it sums up the mystery of Loch Ness more than any other picture.

THE SIGHTING

Mr. MacNab's account of that day is taken from Nicholas Witchell's "Loch Ness Story" published in 1974.

"I was returning from a holiday in the north with my son and pulled the car up on the road just above Urquhart Castle. It was a calm, warm hazy afternoon. I was all ready to take a shot of Urquhart Castle when my attention was held by a movement in the calm water over to the left. Naturally I thought of the 'Monster' and hurriedly changed over the standard lens of my Exacta (127) camera to a six-inch telephoto.
As I was doing so a quick glance showed that some black or dark enormous water creature was cruising on the surface. Without a tripod and in a great hurry I took the shot. I also took a very quick shot with another camera, a fixed-focus Kodak, before the creature submerged.

My son was busy under the bonnet of the car at the time and when he looked in response to my shouts there were just ripples on the water. Several cars and a bus stopped but they could see nothing and listened to my description with patent disbelief."

Having taken the pictures, Mr. MacNab sat on them for over three years because of the ridicule he says he received when showing them privately to friends. This changed when the Hugh Cockerell photograph was published by the Weekly Scotsman on 16th October 1958. Putting aside fears of ridicule, he was emboldened by the publication of that picture to come forward with his own which was published in the next issue on the 23rd of October. The rest as they say is history.

You may ask where this second photograph is, for as far as I know, it has never been published. Like the second less well known picture of the Surgeon's Photograph duet, it seems to have been lost to the media and consigned to oblivion. Unlike the second Surgeon's Photograph, it seems this picture did not have the fortune to be privately retained for future discovery as Peter MacNab was so frustrated by the ridicule that came his way that he threw it away. We may assume Mr. MacNab also had no print made from it else he would have shown it to subsequent Nessie researchers such as Constance Whyte and Nicholas Witchell.

I made enquiries to the Scotsman newspaper archives about any uncropped version of the first picture and the mysterious second picture but they no longer have any records relating to the story. They suggested that any prints they received would have been returned to Mr. MacNab. If anyone has any information that may lead me to a copy of this second picture or an uncropped version of the first, send me an email to shimei123@yahoo.co.uk.

THE REACTION

The reaction to the picture has been understandably mixed. Whyte, Dinsdale and Witchell regard it as important evidence. Others give it a fleeting mention while sceptics such as Burton and Binns suggest a combination of boat wakes. Roy Mackal rejects it as inadmissable as evidence and as a result Binns and Campbell deferred to his analysis. The most detailed investigation of the photograph was carried out by Roy Mackal in his 1976 book, "The Monsters of Loch Ness". He had asked Mr. MacNab for a copy to include in his book and Mr. MacNab duly obliged. However, instead of the picture ending up in Dr. Mackal's category of "Positive Evidence", it was demoted to "Unacceptable as Evidence" with further details shunted to an appendix.

To summarise Roy Mackal's argument, he compared his copy against what had been published in Constance Whyte's book "More Than A Legend". The two are shown below.

Whyte Version

Mackal Version

The first discrepancy was the presence of a foreground tree in the Whyte version which was absent in his version. The second concerned the reflection of the castle upon the loch in his version. Using the picture below, he demonstrated how the shadow in his copy was skewed from the normal vertical position in the Whyte version. He went back to Peter MacNab with some pertinent questions but says that MacNab was unsure what to say and suggested the difference in the two might be because one was the first photograph he took and the other was the second picture he took with the Kodak camera.



Unsatisfied with all this, Roy Mackal labelled the photograph as not suitable as evidence and moved on. And so it was that Peter MacNab's photograph became marked as dubious. A look around the web will reveal plenty of sites restating Roy Mackal's analysis. Indeed, leading Loch Ness researcher, Tony Harmsworth, cites this analysis as finally removing any doubts he had about this photograph. Let us however take a closer look.

THE PROBLEM

I also read and accepted Roy Mackal's analysis but it is good to go over our old assumptions from time to time. So I had a recent closer look at it and noticed something odd about the version of the picture sent to Roy Mackal. Basically, the castle in the Mackal version is slightly bigger than the one in the Whyte version. Intrigued by this small discrepancy, I started up my standard image editing software package on Windows (this is the same software used for the Hugh Gray analysis). I read in the Whyte version of the picture and then the Mackal version. I then increased the transparency of the Mackal image so as to allow me to drag it over and shrink it to fit the size of the Whyte castle.

The first picture below shows the image overlay process and I ended up with the second picture. What I saw gave me something of a shock. It became immediately apparent that the missing tree problem was not a problem at all. The Mackal version was a zoom-in which was sufficient to exclude the foreground tree. The tree had not been edited out by nefarious means, but rather was just out of view in the new version.





My thoughts then turned as to how this situation could have come about. I had a look around and noted on Dick Raynor's website (see link) that he had also requested a copy from Peter MacNab and the picture he shows is the same as the "Mackal version". So it appears that what Roy Mackal shows is what Roy Mackal got from Mr. MacNab. So any comments would be appreciated on this obscure matter. But in case anyone thinks this is a post aimed at vilifying Roy Mackal then know this - the aim is rather to vindicate Peter MacNab who died some ten years ago and can no longer speak for himself. So in the absence of clarification, this argument against the picture must be dismissed.

But what about the second part of the analysis which concerns the difference in the castle shadows? That there is a difference in shadow angles is not in dispute as this further overlay of Roy Mackal's drawing shows. The difference in shadow angles is about 4 degrees.



However, having discharged Mr. MacNab of suspicion on the first count, it may be this will help us resolve the second count in a manner that does not require conspiracy and deception. If the "Mackal version" was the current complete print that Mr. MacNab had, then the absence of the "tree" bottom strip plus a distortion of the shadow in the same region implies a simpler solution than elaborate hoaxing. We know that Peter MacNab stated to Nicholas Witchell that he threw away the negative of the second photograph and nearly destroyed the negative of the main photograph. Therefore, it is reasonable to theorise that the negative could have sustained some damage to its bottom portion and Peter MacNab later attempted to restore it.

How he did this is not known but nothing suspicious is required to form a conclusion. He may have cut off the bottom strip or he may have created a new zoomed in negative from the original. Meanwhile, a print made from the previously undamaged negative was used in subsequent newspapers and books. However, it is also entirely possible that an even simpler explanation exists which is that the bottom of the negative merely warped due to poor storage conditions. These are all entirely plausible explanations which need no conspiracy to explain them.

This may not convince the hardened sceptic who requires this photograph to be a hoax but nevertheless in this regard the hoax explanation is no longer compelling. Peter MacNab's confusing explanation to Roy Mackal can also now be explained - especially since Roy communicated with him about 20 years after the event and Mr. MacNab was by then over 70 years old and not exactly at the prime of his powers of recollection. Roy Mackal had essentially posed a problem to Peter MacNab that did not exist. It is not surprising then that a confusing question elicited a confusing answer from this confused septuagenarian.

As an aside, I actually found Peter MacNab's suggestion of the second photograph quite encouraging as it suggests the possibility that a copy may yet still be out there somewhere. Note that he said he destroyed the negative but not necessarily any prints made from it. Time may yet prove fruitful in this matter.

But it has to be noted (and Roy Mackal also points this out) that these so called discrepancies are not of the first order because the monster is already on both Whyte and Mackal versions. A warped shadow is no proof of hoaxing as the alleged hoax would have already been perpetrated between a hypothetical photograph of a boat with wake and the now famous Whyte version.

BOATS AND MONSTERS

Which brings us nicely to the next objection that Peter MacNab doctored a photograph of a boat near Urquhart Castle to produce his alleged fraud. The allegations made above were used as a foundation on which to further build this accusation, but now it has to stand on less firm ground. Nevertheless, the accusation stands and so we examine its claims. One technique cited is that a picture with a boat producing a decent sized wake is overlaid with a "Nessie". Thus, the boat image is obscured and the "Monster" appears. The main problem for a hoaxer is to avoid retouching the surrounding waters as this is no trivial task and an expert eye could detect such artifacts. However, using our trusty ruler and Mackal's estimate of the castle height, it is established that the main hump is 2.6 feet high at its maximum and the smaller hump comes in at a top 1.8 feet. This height is too low to overlay an image of the type of big ships that ply their way across the loch.

One may suggest a smaller craft like a dinghy or outboard motor fishing boat but even here the occupant would still be three to four feet above the surface and the large wake in the picture is not produced by such crafts (see picture). There is also the problem that such a 15 foot boat is uniformly higher than the object across its entire bulk (about two feet). The problem of fakery is further compounded in that there is clearly two wakes visible in the photograph - one from the small hump and the other from the main hump - they have different structures. Indeed, I would concur with Peter MacNab's suggestion that there are two creatures in this picture for the two humps are not in perfect alignment.



Finally, suggestions about other matching boat wakes being faintly visible on the loch are irrelevant since it is clear that there is no wake ahead of what may be presumed to be the head of the object.

But I would reiterate a statement made in an earlier post that claiming a Nessie photograph is a fake is a somewhat futile exercise. All Nessie photos are reproducible given enough time and money. However, in the case of the MacNab photograph, it would take a bit more effort. Indeed, it should be pointed out again that Peter MacNab's photograph was published one week after he was prompted to act by the Cockerell picture. Could he have faked the picture in seven days given the additional time required to inform the newspaper and send it off to them in time to prepare for the next edition?

And just to show you what a good job he must have done in "faking" it, Walt Disney produced a documentary in the early 1970s called "Man, Monsters and Mysteries" which actually shows a reproduction of the MacNab photograph (below). It is evident from this picture that even the multiple and professional talents of the Walt Disney special effects team could not reproduce MacNab's photograph to the same degree!



As an aside, when I saw this Disney picture, I thought it was the second MacNab picture because the object is closer to the castle than the first. However, a comparison of the pictures shows that the tree to the left of the castle is substantially bigger in the Disney version which implies this picture was taken years later by Disney when they visited the loch and faked up their own inferior version (presumably because Peter MacNab refused them permission to use his picture in what was a fairly infantile production).

SIZES AND MONSTERS

The final objection concerns the presumed size of the object in the picture. If the object is one creature then it is huge even by normal Nessie standards. A size of 60 to 70 feet would not be out of place. This is too much for some and so is rejected. However, it is clear to me from what I said above that this is in fact two creatures as the humps are out of alignment and the wave structure is different between the two. In that light, the bigger hump is about 30 foot long and the smaller one about 13 feet long which brings the total dimensions of these creatures within the historical record.

RELIABILITY OF THE WITNESS

Now this photograph is put forward as proof that the "reliable character witness" scenario is bunk. After all, if a respected bank manager and local councillor such as Peter MacNab (pictured below) could indulge in such deception then who can you trust? But this is a stance we should seek to defend on the simple premise that those who have much to lose have little to motivate. In other words, there is no equality when it comes to Nessie witnesses (as in any category of witness testimony).

So that assertion may be true if the original premise was true but there is no proof that Mr. MacNab hoaxed the photograph. In fact, looking at his CV, it would have been extremely foolhardy of him to have attempted such a risky endeavour.


So, Peter MacNab had a lot to lose in such a venture. Just previous to the time he claimed to have taken the picture, he had been elected as the President of the Clan MacNab Society. In fact, we'll let extracts from his obituary in The Scotsman for the 17th October 2002 do the talking for us.

Peter Angus Macnab, writer

Born: 1 November, 1903, in Portmahomack, Easter Ross Died: 3 October, 2002, in Ayrshire, aged 98

PETER Macnab was one of Scotland’s oldest active writers and authors, renowned for his unparalleled knowledge of and passion for the island of Mull and its people. This special interest came through in his writings, lectures and broadcasting over the past 70 years and resulted in his becoming probably the most authoritative source of information on the social history and folklore of the island. He is the author of the standard work on Mull and Iona. He also covered a wide range of subjects related to Scotland in addition to local history and was the author of a number of successful books and guides.

He had contributed to a variety of national and international magazines and publications since the Second World War, including The Scotsman. He was probably the longest-serving, as well as the oldest, active contributor to The Scots Magazine, having been associated with it for more than half a century. His last book, Tobermory Teuchtar, a personal account of life in Tobermory and Mull in the early years of the last century, was published when he was 95.

He was actively engaged on another at the time of his last illness, together with a number of articles. Peter Macnab saw his knowledge and writings on Mull as an attempt not merely to remind us of past times and values but also to encourage interest in what Mull and the Highlands and Islands can offer today to visitors. In addition, he stressed the importance of retaining viable communities, which hopefully might retain something of the Gaelic culture - something that his local school had done its best to discourage during his boyhood days.

He joined the Clydesdale Bank and although predominantly based in Glasgow served in numerous positions in the west of Scotland. During the Second World War, when his medical history ruled him out of military service, he travelled to many parts of Scotland on banking duties. Banking never quite fulfilled his restless ambitions, however, and he used his natural ability and restless energies to expand his interests in writing, lecturing, and broadcasting in addition to a range of social interests and hobbies.

He had set up home in West Kilbride in 1930 and he was active in public life for over 70 years in Ayrshire. Retirement from the bank in 1963 was merely an opportunity to expand on his favourite pursuits, including local community work. He was a county councillor for North Ayrshire, a district councillor and a special commissioner; a past captain, long-term committee member and honorary member of West Kilbride Golf Club. He had been an elder of Overton Church, West Kilbride, since 1941 and an office-bearer for many years for various local societies.

He lectured on the history of the Scottish clans and the history of Scottish banking, was a professional guide for the Ministry of Information, a former president of the Clan Macnab Society, a skilled photographer, keen angler, beekeeper, horticulturist, maker of rams’ horn crooks and walking sticks and, not least, a vintage car enthusiast - the family black and primrose Swift, which he nicknamed "Rosinante", was until a few years ago a familiar sight on roads in the west of Scotland and beyond.

Would a man of this breadth and experience risk it all for a practical joke which could blow up in his face if exposed and branded a liar and a thief (if he accepted payment from the newspapers)? I don't think so, the burden of proof lies with the sceptical position here.

CONCLUSION

In the realm of Nessie photographs nothing is clear cut. Accusations are made and defenses are mounted. The case for this photograph is I hope stronger after today. Tony Harmsworth in his analysis of this picture hoped that one day Mr. MacNab would come clean and tell us all how he managed to fool us. He did not volunteer such information because in my opinion he is guiltless in the matter.

At the aforementioned Dick Raynor website, there is a photograph of Mr. MacNab with other Nessie witnesses at the making of a Loch Ness documentary in the early 1980s. Is this an example of brazen cheek after 25 years or a man who simply believed he took a photograph of something mysterious that balmy summer day in 1955?

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

RECENT BLOG POSTS:

Is there enough food for Nessie?

Seven Deadly Sins of Nessie Witnesses

Today, eyewitnesses to the Loch Ness Monster are the untouchables, the flotsam and jetsom of evidence and scepticism. Why is that? Because by a process of logical deduction, it has been proven there cannot possibly be large creatures in Loch Ness. Ergo, not one - not one single person out of the thousands who have claimed to have seen the Loch Ness Monster can possibly be right. The logic is flawless (even if the data and assumptions it is applied to in order to generate that conclusion may not be).

However, scepticism is required to give such people a second glance because they continue to see things and films and photographs continue to turn up in the media. Reality continues to intrude upon the logical arguments which are supposed to redefine reality in a conformist kind of way.

Having read the reactions to various eyewitness accounts over the years, certain trends have become apparent which critics of such people may focus on to discredit what they claimed to have seen.

1. Be able to develop their own photographs. An obvious no-no as it will then be "suggested" that the picture was faked in the darkness of their developing room. The modern equivalent is finding out the witness had PhotoShop installed on their PC.

2. Own a commerical outlet near the loch. An old and cynical chesnut that gets trotted out when Summer approaches. Need some extra trade? Then just make up a Nessie story.

3. Tell jokes about the monster. If you are not deadly serious about the subject then it is clear you are a practical joker who faked it all up for laughs.

4. Be associated with another Loch Ness Monster witness. Two witnesses know each other? Obviously this means a conspiracy, what could be clearer?

5. Diverge from your account in the slightest detail. A mainstay of debunkers. If you can't retell the tale precisely, you must have made it up!

6. Sell your photograph or film to a newspaper or other pecuniary gain. The ultimate sin and final proof that you fabricated it all for the sake of filthy lucre!

7. You have other "crazy" views.  Also claimed to have seen a UFO or perhaps believe Nessie is something paranormal, etc, etc? You are already plunging down the credibility ratings and are probably delusional.

Perhaps you can suggest others. In some respects, a Nessie witness must be as squeaky clean as a politician. Good luck to them!

RECENT BLOG POSTS:

Is there enough food for Nessie?

Is there enough food for Nessie?

It was a few months ago that my son came home from school with a triumphant look on his face. He proclaimed to me that his Biology class had proven that the Loch Ness Monster could not exist based on what he had learned about ecology and food chains. It was not him who deduced this but rather his science teacher that had debunked Nessie during an example study of a certain Highland loch. This just confirms to me that British education is going to the dogs!

So ask a sceptical person (for example, my son) why they don't believe in the Loch Ness Monster and you may get the following answer:

"There is not enough food in Loch Ness to sustain a breeding population of large predators, therefore they cannot exist."

Thus by the application of pure reason and critical thinking, the Loch Ness Monster disappears in a puff of logic. As a bonus, the modern thinker does not even need to consider the thousands of claimed sightings or the photographs, films and sonar contacts. They are irrelevant because logic has dictated that there are not enough fish swimming about the loch to sustain any such monster. Perhaps I should close down this blog and take up caber tossing because there is nothing more to say?

Well I do have something to say. I may not be a biologist with a PhD, but that does not preclude the ability to make some enquiries and challenges. In fact, the issue here is not so much the application of logic and deductive reasoning but rather the data that gets ground through the logic sausage maker. Because it is not just logic that matters here but data which has to be as raw and as refined from human prejudice as is possible. In other "Garbage in, Garbage out" is the watchword here. The logic may be perfect, but that is only half the story.

So for the sake of this article, we assume the exotic creature(s) known as the Loch Ness Monster are 100% dependent on the smaller animals that reside in the loch. We also assume there is a herd of them of varying sizes. So that means we exclude the following scenarios:

1. The Monster does not supplement its diet by making excursions to the sea (via river or underwater passage).

2. The Monster is not a paranormal phenomenon independent of the fish it swims past (or through?).

3. The Monster does not supplement its diet by going on to land to grab some deer or picking off the birds that float on the water. :)
4. The Monster is neither herbivorous or omnivorous.
5. The Monster does not cannibalise its dead.

THE QUANTITY

Now to establish food stock viability, at least two things have to be ascertained:

1. The biomass of the entire potential prey in the loch.
2. The amount of this prey consumed by Nessie predators.

As it turns out, nobody actually knows with precision what either of these numbers are, so like all the researchers before us, we take a journey into guesstimation land. An enquiry to the Ness and Beauly Fisheries Trust elicited the response that there were no reliable estimates for salmon, trout or char. Indeed, their 2008-2010 "Ness System and Fishery Action Plan" said this:

"It is recognised by the Ness & Beauly Fisheries Trust that the lack of data on lacustrine fish populations and in other locations such as the Caledonian Canal currently represents a major gap in knowledge. Similarly, little or no data is currently available with respect to the many small burns that flow into the Inverness and Beauly Firths."

In fact, as we come to this subject, all manner of questions crop up. For instance, what set of food stock figures does one use? Do we use the available data from 1933 when Nessie first hit the world news or as recent as possible or some combination? I say this because due to pollution and over-fishing, fish stocks are lower now than they were in 1933. If, for the sake of argument, we say that the Loch Ness Monster is no longer in the loch due to low food levels, that does not preclude asking whether it was once possible for the loch to sustain a certain number of such creatures. However, this blog does not accept the creature has vacated the premises or that there is too little food. In that light, we will use whatever numbers look reasonable given the murkiness of the subject matter.

ARCTIC CHAR

In terms of actual food supply, the types of aquatic livestock are well known. Swimming openly near the top part of the loch we have char and pike amongst others. At the bottom and at the sides we have eels and then there are the salmon and trout that visit Loch Ness on their seasonal runs. As it turns out, estimates of the varying species numbers is a pretty mixed bag. Using sonar, reasonable estimates can be made for the pelagic fish stock (i.e. those fish which swim in open water).

These are mainly Arctic Char (Salvelinus alpinus) and sonar/trawl studies by Adrian Shine and Tony Martin for the Loch Ness Project estimated a stock of 17 tonnes in 1993 which can be viewed in their paper at this link. Another study by Kubecka, Duncan and Butterworth also in 1993 came up with 24 tonnes. Note these studies have less accurate accounting of fish swimming near the surface, bottom or sides of the loch which are less amenable to sonar.

So those two studies are in reasonable agreement given the uncertainty involved. However, a sonar survey done by D. G. George and I. J. Winfield in 1992 seems to put a fly in the ointment by coming up with an ultra-oligotrophic figure of 0.26 kg/ha for pelagic fish in Loch Ness. I say "ultra" because even Lake Superior which has been described as "the most oligotrophic lake in the world" recently hit 33 year lows of "only" 1.3 kg/ha - a figure five times greater than this study (link). A further search for other oligotrophic lakes failed to find such a low number, except one - the Dead Sea (though that does not preclude the existence of such lakes).

How can this number be more that 10 times smaller than the other two studies? Either all the studies are so speculative that they cannot be reliably used or there is a major difference in someone's methodology. Were the Shine/Kubecka studies less thorough? Reading the scope and depth of the survey in Adrian Shine's paper, I doubt this and even if it were true, I again doubt this would account for a ten fold discrepancy. So in this light I disregard the Winfield study for three reasons (in order of importance):

1. Two other studies produce higher and similar numbers (i.e. outvoted).
2. Adrian Shine's greater experience with sonar and ecology work at Loch Ness.
3. Lack of precedence for such a low number in other oligotrophic lakes.

Therefore, we start our estimate of fish stocks with 17-24 tonnes for char.

EELS

What about the other potential prey for a Loch Ness monster excluded from those studies? Moving onto the benthic (i.e. bottom) dwellers, we have the eels (Anguilla anguilla). It is not known how many eels inhabit the dark depths of Loch Ness. Tim Dinsdale thought there were "millions" of eels in Loch Ness and provided a ready source of nutrition to Nessie. An interesting quote from volume 5 of the Fishing News International in 1966 points to the abundance of eels in Loch Ness:

"HUNGARY is buying large quantities of eels from Scotland for settlement in her lakes and rivers. In 1965 she imported 2,500,000 fry and 800,000 young eels from Loch Ness in a drive to stock her waters to saturation point by 1970."

That adds up to 3,300,000 immature eels from Loch Ness not including adults. That single haul alone exceeded the estimated population of pelagic fish in the studies above (Adrian Shine estimated 2,434,000 in number). If we assume a glass eel weight of 0.3g and a juvenile weight of 4g that adds up to 4 tonnes but adults can grow from between 30g to 30kg. Now the population of pelagic fish would still be heavier but it begs the question as to how many adult eels inhabit Loch Ness. So we need some kind of number and it clearly has to be bigger than the 17-24 tonnes of pelagic fish.

If we speculatively say there are one million eels in Loch Ness with an average weight of 100g then they weigh in at 100 tonnes. This number does not include the fry and elver eels discussed above. But let us lowball it down to 50 tonnes in an attempt to steer a "via media" between Nessie sceptics and believers. If anyone objects that some are not always there due to migration then the 50 tonnes I hope offsets that but, in my opinion 50 tonnes is understating the total eel biomass of Loch Ness.

So the total is now 67-84 tonnes of food for the Loch Ness Monster.

SALMON

Moving onto the littoral (i.e. side) inhabitants, Adrian Shine says this of them in his previously mentioned paper:

"the littoral fish habitat, which is richer than the pelagic ..."

In other words, we can start on the assumption that this group of fish exceed the 17-24 tonnes biomass estimate. However, we run into an accounting problem here since this class of creature may include some of the aforementioned eels. So we have to be wary of double counting. There is also the issue of counting in migratory salmon (Salmo salar) and trout which tend to swim in the sonar blind spots near the surface or close to the shoreline. In that light, we will only concentrate on salmon and trout and ignore the other littoral fish such as char, pike and stickleback.

How many salmon swim through Loch Ness? As some readers may know, these majestic fish are involved in two voyages through Loch Ness. The first is when the adults return to their birth stream to spawn the next generation. The second run involves juvenile salmon who leave their nursery rivers to make the long trip to the Atlantic breeding grounds.

But how many salmon run through Loch Ness each year? One controversial study was done by Roy Mackal for his 1976 book "The Monsters of Loch Ness". In October 1971, Robert Rines' team had placed a camera 30 feet deep in Urquhart Bay near the mouth of the River Enrick as the salmon were heading upriver. It was a single photograph from that camera that Roy Mackal based his study on.

In that snap were visible three salmon from which Mackal extrapolated a total numer based on the cone of river entry, the speed of the salmon and a four day salmon run. This gave a total of 1,700,000 adult salmon entering the river. But that was not all for it did not include the other six main rivers feeding into Loch Ness (Coiltie, Moriston, Oich, Tarff, Foyers and Farigaig) not to mention the 30 other smaller streams which led Mackal to postulate upwards of 13 million adult salmon in Loch Ness. At an average weight of 4lbs for an adult salmon that added up to 66,000 tonnes. Note further that this does not even include the juveniles which subsequently hatched and made their way back downstream which could potentially add up to a further large number of tonnage.

Clearly such numbers are stupendous and were dismissed by A. V. Holden of the Freshwater Fisheries Laboratory in Perthshire (Ref: New Scientist 18-25 December 1975). Holden suggested the total salmon population in Scotland was less than one million based on the assumption that half of all running salmon are caught. Two assumptions, but which one is closer to the truth?

Roy Mackal in his book quotes a salmon run count of 13,000 up the River Beauly in 1967 which is far less than his 1,700,000 for the River Enrick (though it has to pointed out that the counter probably did not catch all the fish going up the river). We would suggest 13,000 is closer to the truth than a number more than 100 times greater than that. A total of 13,000 salmon weighs about 23.5 tonnes and if this is extrapolated to the other six Loch Ness rivers we get a total of about 164 tonnes. But since the Loch Ness rivers look inferior than the Beauly then we will halve that estimate to 82 tonnes which revises our total prey biomass to 149-166 tonnes.

Note this adds up to 39,000 salmon on average which is about 4.5% of the total number of salmon that Mr. Holden suggested enter Scotland's rivers each year. I would note here that Loch Ness is also a pathway for other salmon destined for rivers and streams not flowing into the loch but further down the Great Glen water system such as the River Garry which feeds into Loch Oich. Clearly, these too would be potential prey for a larger creature as they make their way down Loch Ness. It goes without saying that their numbers are unknown as well but clearly Loch Ness is a major conduit for migrating salmon in Scotland.

SEA TROUT

That leaves the final species which are the Sea Trout (Salmo trutta). A recent article dated 23rd September 2011 in the Daily Telegraph showed that a record 110,000 salmon and grisle had been caught in Scottish rivers in 2010 (how many went uncaught is of course an open question). The article also states that 27,704 trout were caught. Now I know the number of salmon anglers may not equal the number of trout anglers but in the absence of better data we'll assume these proportions apply to Loch Ness and that a trout is half the weight of a salmon. This gives a ballpark trout tonnage of about 20 tonnes (164 x 0.25 x 0.5).

PREY AND PREDATOR

Thus the final tonnage of Loch Ness fish is 169-186 tonnes. We'll use the average number which is 177 tonnes.

As you may guess, it is a numbers game but I don't think I have gone for extreme estimations. I would think that even twice this amount is perfectly defensible.

Now that we have an estimated tonnage of fishes, the second question concerns the eating requirements of one or more Loch Ness Monsters. To put it a better way, what is the prey to predator ratio? This ratio will help tell us what tonnage of monster could be expected to live off 177 tonnes of fish.

Adrian Shine wrote another paper which explored the Sturgeon interpretation of some Loch Ness Monster reports. In it he states the following about the 17-24 tonnes of pelagic fish stock and predation upon it:

"... it should be borne in mind that predators upon this biomass should not amount to more than approximately a tenth of the gross weight."

It should be noted that Adrian Shine admits the stated biomass does not include benthic or littoral fish stocks which were not amenable to sonar surveys, but insists that this missing tonnage would not change his conclusion that there is not enough food to feed a herd of Loch Ness Monsters.

However, if we apply his ratio of 0.1 to the 177 tonnes then we get a Nessie tonnage of 17.7 tonnes which some would indeed deem not enough. But is it the case that this ratio should not exceed 0.1? Two studies I found show that this number is not a hard and fast rule. The first study on pike populations said this:

"The studies on the status of the ponds 'balanced or unbalanced' revealed that the predator ­ prey ratio, by weight of balanced ponds was between 1:1.4 to 1:10; 77% of the best 'balanced' populations had ratios of between 1:3 and 1:6. Conversely, 'unbalanced' populations had ratios of between 1:0.06 and 1:63; most unbalanced populations had a relatively small weight of predators in relation to the weight of prey."

Here we have a prey to predator ratio generally between 0.33 and 0.17 or 0.22 on average. Another study is however more telling. In 2009, Thomas Mehner published a paper entitled "A study of 66 European lakes" in which various ecological parameters, including the prey-predator ratios, were estimated. In this study he found quite a range of ratios between 0.061 and even 1.384 (i.e. more predator biomass than prey).

If this range was applied to our Loch Ness discussion, the potential Nessie tonnage could range from 11 tonnes to 245 tonnes. But if we use the author's median ratio of 0.321 then a fish tonnage of 177 tonnes could support about 57 tonnes of Loch Ness Monster.

Now critics may argue that Loch Ness Monsters are not pikes or other temperate lake fish and so these ratios should be used cautiously. I agree, any suggested ratio should be treated cautiously. Is my 0.321 ratio worse than the 0.1 value suggested? I doubt it. Is it better? I'll leave that for you readers to decide.

Incidentally, on the objection that the 0.321 ratio should not be so readily moved from smallish predators to huge ones like Nessie, one thing should be pointed out. Larger animals tend to have lower surface area to volume ratios than smaller animals. This means their rate of heat loss is less than smaller animals. The consequence is that for certain classes of animal, smaller ones have to eat more food per unit body weight than the larger animals. This certainly applies to mammals and possibly other animals too. The outcome of this, I suggest, is that a Loch Ness Monster may have to eat less than its equivalent weight in predatory fish such as pike, salmon and trout. In other words, a ratio of 0.321 may be too low.

THE OBJECTIONS

However, despite proposing these larger numbers, sceptics will still be unimpressed for other reasons. The objections go something like this:

1. The char are too diffuse and small to waste hunting energy on.
2. It is too dark to find the eels at the bottom and sides.
3. If the Monster ate salmon, we would see it break surface more often.

Are these objections sustainable? In the first case, it should be noted that the pelagic fish population are not evenly and diffusely distributed from the top to bottom of the loch's great depth. They in fact tend to be mainly found in the top 30m-40m of the water column. According to my calculations (allowing for areas not surveyed by sonar), for about 2.4 million fish that is one per cube of water measuring something like 7m in height.

Adrian Shine's netting survey yielded mainly char in open water but also some trout and stickleback. The char average weight was about 9g which looks not much of a morsel for the Loch Ness Monster. However, the range of size/weight went up as high as 30cm and over 300g.

But it has to be said that sonar contacts do not regularly show large sonar hits amongst these open water fish. So this is not a regular hunting ground for Nessies except in two speculative circumstances:

1. Sonar blind spots (e.g. within the top few metres and sides).
2. Juvenile Nessies of up to a few feet across which would be "lost" in the fish noise.

That does not preclude such fish being off the menu, however. Fish move around and as the char circulate closer to shore, the benthic dwelling Nessie could pick them off.

The other objection about being unable to see eels in the dark is a straw man argument (or should I say a "straw plesiosaur" as in the populist image of Nessie portrayed above by William Owen?) since it assumes a very simplistic view of a Loch Ness Monster which swims around guided only by its eyes. But Nature has shown us how wonderfully diverse is the sensor array of aquatic creatures. Indeed, how could any nocturnal animal survive otherwise?

But to name a few strategies. We have sharks with snouts which can pick up changes in local electric fields. They also have skin which can detect varying salinity levels. We have the sturgeon with vibration sensitive pits on its head. And of course there is the good old fashioned sense of smell.

As to hunting strategy, why the requirement for the Loch Ness Monster to be continuously moving? Why can't it employ a strategy similar to that of the Angel Shark which lies dormant for potentially days under silt in darkness before its keen senses detect its prey and it rises to seize them (see video below)? Let's get away from two dimensional thinking about the Loch Ness Monster and look beyond the stereoypes.

Finally, there is the objection that if Nessie hunted salmon, it would be seen surfacing more often. This argument is again based on the presumption that Nessie must hunt in a certain way. It is true that salmon swim in the top 10ft-20ft (though spent salmon (kelts) have been detected at up to 200ft depth - Dinsdale) but a Loch Ness Monster with a six foot maximum diameter at a depth of only four feet as measured at the midpoint of its maximum girth is unlikely to be visible above.

In my opinion, the Loch Ness Monster is a secretive predator in the manner of the Angel Shark which remains hidden from its prey until it is time to strike. How it exactly achieves this is an open question and depends on your view of Loch Ness Monster behaviour and morphology. This could be achieved by lying on rock outcrops underwater and striking out with its long neck (certainly in the Duncan MacDonald case, the creature was observed sitting on an underwater ledge - see link). Furthermore, this covert predation may also explain why it generally stays secretive to observers. The trade-off between high and low mobility in the matter of predation in a generally dark environment seems to have swung towards a mainly inert creature (though at times the creature can move rapidly if driven to do so).

THE HERD

And so we have about 57 tonnes of Loch Ness Monster. If there are indeed multiple creatures (as sightings data indicates) then how many are there?

Estimates varying according to opinions on how to maintain a diverse and healthy group. But again without an ID on Nessie, it is guesswork. However, a number I have heard sometimes suggested is 10 to 20 creatures (Adrian Shine in his sturgeon paper suggests an absolute minimum of ten).

Twenty animals gives an average of 2.85 tonnes per creature. Given the 30ft to 40ft estimates of witnesses and assuming 1/3 is tail, 1/3 is spheroidal body and the final 1/3 is long neck, we get something around four tonnes. But then again, not all Loch Ness Monsters are equal in size and weight. Using the analogy of other herd animals, we could have a trio of maximum sized bulls, some smaller females and a number of juveniles going down to sub-tonne levels. So, speculating here, we could have three bulls of four tonnes each, six females of two tonnes each and ten juveniles of a tonne and under which gives us 19 animals adding up to only 34 tonnes out of the maximum 57 tonnes we have postulated. You can plug in your own numbers here and come to your own conclusions.

CONCLUSIONS

Estimating food stock viability for the Loch Ness Monster is a numbers game. In this brief study we have used some assumptions, used what hard numbers we found and lowballed in a few circumstances. As a result we have come up with viable numbers for sustaining a number of large multi-tonne creatures.

Others may use different assumptions, different numbers and lowball/highball their calculations. You may say there are errors in my assumptions. My reply is that the whole process is about assumptions and the media hype about science proving there is not enough food for Nessie is itself "not enough".

On the contrary and in my opinion, there is enough food in Loch Ness to viably sustain a number of large and unknown creatures.

Long Necked Seals?

An interesting piece from the New Scientist (original article here):

"Despite centuries of alleged sightings, no Loch Ness monsters or sea serpents have ever been found. But in the 1600s, the specimen of a curious long-necked creature emerged that could explain where such aquatic tall tales may have originated - if only it hadn't been mislaid.

In the late 17th century, the botanist Nehemiah Grew published a catalogue of oddities held by the Royal Society in London. The book, called Musaeum regalis societatis, contains the first scientific description of a skin belonging to an unusual seal. He writes: "Wherein he principally differs, is the length of his neck; for, from his nose-end to his fore-feet, and from thence to his tail, are the same measure." By contrast, most seal necks are only about a half the length of their lower body. In 1751, Grew's description was cited by James Parsons in the Royal Society journal Philosophical Transactions (vol 47, p 109). Parsons included it in his list of known species.

Nobody has seen the skin since, and no further specimens have emerged. Could long-necked seals really exist? The idea persists but is now relegated to cryptozoology, the search for semi-mythical species. Cryptozoologists argue that many legendary creatures have actually existed and point to the colossal squid or king cheetah as examples."

While I do not personally ascribe to Nessie being a long necked pinniped, it is a theory with a venerable tradition and still held by an unknown number of advocates today (I believe Peter Costello at one point held to it).

The problem is the infrequency of appearances for a mammal which should surface often to take on air. There is also the small matter of the seal's penchant for coming ashore to do some basking. Now I don't doubt there are ways around this. For example, evolutionary theory dictates that scarce resources employed in wasteful ways are candidates to be naturally selected away. Thus, when an animal approaches the surface, it is only needful to employ energy to expose the required air intake orifices. In other words, only the nostrils need be exposed and not the entire neck.

It is also entirely possible this is a form of pinniped that does not take to shore much. But for me the behaviour of Nessie points away from a primary air breather (though since it has been seen on land, some form of air respiration is employable).

The Skrimsl

When I saw this recent video (or link here) of a strange object near the Lagarflot, Iceland, the word "skrimsl" came back to my mind after many years.

The Skrimsl is the reputed inhabitant of that lake and others in Iceland with a reputation going back to Norse times. The werewolf expert, Sabine Baring Gould, even got involved in them when he visited Iceland in 1860. He obtained a description of an odd 46 foot beast which one of the witnesses drew (below).



I enjoyed reading about it back in the 1970s as a kid when Peter Costello recounted the tale in his book "In Search of Lake Monsters". What this video shows is intriguing but I am sure multi-interpretations will be suggested across the Internet in the weeks ahead. It was taken by a Hjort Kjerúlf but some suggest already it is debris which has frozen solid on the river.

Google Translate is less than perfect in its rendition:

Skeptical believe, however, netadræsa was blown into the water and frozen solid. So when the river began to forge their hlykkjaðist "worm" on the river.

Any Icelanders reading this who can translate?

UPDATE - I think netadræsa refers to a fishing net. Also, the owner of the film is not claiming it is anything - but certainly no hoax on his part. It is also amazing how the world media has picked up on this but has also called it something like "The Loch Ness Monster in Iceland". It is always curious but understandable how anything mysterious in a lake is labelled "The Loch Ness Monster in ..." but then again those four words are a global and instantly recognisable brand name (under no one's trademark!).

An Interesting Photograph

I am currently working on a larger article, but this came in and had "must blog" written all over it. It is a picture taken of something on Loch Ness, perhaps north of Invermoriston.

Is it a hoax? Is it a log or some ducks swimming past?

Perhaps it is some otters playing in a line while the leader performs a dive in a neck like manner?

Is it in fact a photo of Nessie? One clue, it is not a hoax.

UPDATE

So after various suggestions have been offered, it turns out, it is not the Loch Ness Monster but neither is it a hoax. It is the model monster made for the film "The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes" released in 1970. I thank Paul Cropper who runs a website on the Yowie for spotting this clipping from that well known cryptozoological journal, The Australian Women's Weekly of the 25th August 1971. A Jean Constable included this shot in her write-up about a trip to Scotland with her husband. They had just left Invermoriston when she spotted "Nessie" and urged her incredulous husband to double back. Astonished, he began snapping pictures but then they eventually saw the boat pulling the beast and the game was up. Nevertheless, it's a great picture for the Loch Ness Story archives. Below are two close up pictures of this wonderful prop but it is also very interesting to see it in "Nessie Sighting" mode.



The photograph at the bottom of this blog shows Holmes and Watson encountering the "monster" as the film reaches its climax. However, the "beast" in our photograph is not the "beast" in the film for it sank without trace in Loch Ness and lies somewhere at the bottom of the loch to this day (well I suspect after forty years it is now a very ragged wireframe). Two accounts here sum up the loss of the prop.

From TCM:

The production was a troubled one, full of technical snafus like having to reshoot the entire Loch Ness sequence (the real location was too difficult to properly light among other problems). Leading lady Genevieve Page recalled in Charlotte Chandler's biography, Nobody's Perfect: Billy Wilder, "When we lost our Loch Ness monster, he wasn't too concerned, even though he was also the producer. He was more concerned about how the man who made it felt when all his work sank to the bottom of the Loch Ness. He went over and comforted him." She was referring to special effects man Wally Veevers's elaborate "monster," which worked beautifully until they gave it a test run in the Loch Ness. After its failure, Wilder decided to shoot it in miniature in the studio."

From IMBD:

Originally, the scenes featuring the Loch Ness Monster were intended to be filmed in the actual Loch. A life-size prop was built which had several Nessie-like humps used to disguise floatation devices. The humps were removed, however, at Billy Wilder's request. Unfortunately, during a test run in Loch Ness, the Monster-prop sank and was never recovered. A second prop (just the head and neck) was built, but was only filmed inside a studio tank.

So the prop in the film was a head and neck only. What this photograph shows is the full monty head, neck and two humps being towed in a test run. In fact, it could be surmised that Wilder's instruction to remove the humps which aided buoyancy precipitated the loss. No doubt there are one or two tales yet to be told about this resident of Loch Ness.

What I would have found very interesting is the question of what would have happened if this picture had been given more publicity. Would the sceptics of the time have merely offered the usual deer, bird, otter, logs explanations with no real critical thinking? Clearly, they would have been as wrong as the believers who may have seen this as prime evidence!

An interesting catch near Loch Ness

I found a couple of old clippings from 1934 which show that anything above a certain size found in that region of Scotland was up as a likely candidate for the Loch Ness Monster. So it was that this interesting photograph was published by The West Australian on the 29th June 1934 (click to enlarge).

The text reads:

"A strange sea creature caught by a fisherman in Moray Firth (Scotland). An opinion is held that it may have found its way into the firth from Loch Ness. The creature is 13ft long and about 1ft in diameter at its widest part."

A big beastie indeed for those parts of Scotland and the Singapore Free Press took up the story as well on the 13th June 1934 with this story (click image to read enlarged text). You may have also noticed by these foreign newspapers how much interest Nessie was generating worldwide!

The rather stiff looking nature of the beast is explained by the article's reference to the body being kept in an ice shed. A Mr. Cooper offered the slightly strained suggestion that the Surgeon's Photograph could be explained by this creature being caught in the act of diving with only its tail visible. This reminds us of a similar diving otter theory for the same photograph. However, as to its identity, an expert in the article suggests the oarfish (picture below).

I don't think that quite fits the bill as the head looks different in shape. However, a likely candidate is perhaps the conger eel though whether the eel can reach such a big size is a matter for debate. I mentioned on a previous post how eels up to 7 feet have been caught around the area but this one is nearly twice as long! One therefore presumes it was caught out in deeper water.

What do readers think?

RECENT BLOG POSTS:

The man who saw Nessie underwater
New witness corroborates 2011 sighting