A Monster Sighting from 2010

A few months back I was doing some research on an old sighting and managed to contact a person who knew of the case for further details. Having helped me add some details to that case, the person told me that they themselves had had a good sighting of the creature back in 2010. I can now bring you the details of this previously unreported sighting.

At around 7:20 in the morning on the 14th June 2010, the witness and their spouse were travelling south about a mile past Urquhart Castle on the A82. At this point a large object described as "clearly visible" was noticed in the water by the driver about 40 feet from the shore. In the witness' own words:

"We almost went off the road with the sheer amazement of the sighting and could not find a layby so we slowed down till we had almost stopped on the main road which I suppose was rather dangerous to say the least." 

Having rolled down the car window, the large object was observed. For about the next two minutes, the couple watched this sight which was described as a

"... very large grey wide back, texture was like an elephant's skin and colour.."

When I asked about size, I was given this reply:

"To give an idea of size it was so wide you could easily park a bus on it."

 

As to its motion, the witness further added:

"It was just kind of idling in the water and then decided to plunge downwards in a rolling motion down in to the water. The wake that followed was absolutely phenomenal, the water took ages to calm down and then all was quite and it was gone."

The witness has requested anonymity for the reason stated:

"This is a true and accurate account witnessed by myself and X  .. we know (it) was the creature but we do not speak of it to avoid ridicule.  Believe me we know what we saw it was awesome and if I could have photographed it the mystery would be over as it would have been the ultimate proof that it does exist."

So concludes a remarkable account given the short distance to the object. I accept the witnesses' trustworthiness but have witheld names due to the obvious fear of being treated like fools. This is a situation which occurs quite frequently with witnesses to strange things in Loch Ness and is quite understandable.

The location can be roughly seen using Google Street View below. I asked if this shot was similar to the witnesses' viewing conditions and I was told it was similar but the foliage was not as dense.

 

Some readers may seek a more "natural" description for what happened. The only one that could be put forward I think is a standing wave from a large boat that had passed previously down the loch. This interpretation has its problems. First, though the term "standing wave" suggests it is stationary, it is in fact moving. An example of one created by the "Jacobite Queen" on Loch Ness can be viewed on the first video clip on the following page from Dick Raynor's website.

In the two minutes the witnesses were watching this "idling" object, a bow wave would have visibly progressed towards the shore and dispersed on breaking up. This object just stayed there until it created its own bow wave when submerging.

So what did our witnesses see that June days nearly three years ago? Something which could accommodate the width of a bus on its back is definitely in "monster" territory and such a photograph would have created a sensation. However, the creature rolled back into the depths and the mystery which is the Loch Ness Monster continues to fascinate and perplex.

 

A Report on the 80th Year of Nessie Symposium

Photo Credit: Alison Rutter

Nessie fans converged on Edinburgh this Saturday past to hear various speakers hold forth on different aspects of the mystery that has held the public attention for years. And it all began when a couple saw something whale like rolling in the loch in April 1933. The headline it generated has since spawned an untold stream of reports, articles, books, photos and films and there is no sign of the Nessie culture abating eighty years on.

The Guardian ran this story on the symposium. But writing this from my own perspective as a speaker and attendee, I hopped on the number 31 bus with my daughter and sister from my home nearby which helpfully dropped us off right beside the symposium venue. The PowerPoint file was duly submitted and the lectures began.

The symposium began with the news that speaker Paul Harrison had to pull out due to health concerns, so we wish him well and a good recovery.

First up was Adrian Shine, curator of the Loch Ness Centre at Drumnadrochit, Loch Ness. Adrian gave an overview of the loch geography, biology and ecology explaining how some of the natural events and objects at Loch Ness can fool people into thinking they are seeing monsters. However, he also postulated the visiting Atlantic Sturgeon as an additional reason why people may be fooled.

Now though I am a more traditional monster "believer", I do agree with Adrian that many sightings can be put down to such phenomena, the unresolved question is how many? I am also glad that he feels these alone are inadequate and that a "special beast" such as the sturgeon is required to complete the whole picture (well, no doubt there is room for more speculation). However, in my case, that "special beast" is something more mysterious than the Sturgeon.

I was up next with a talk on the pre-1933 folklore of the Loch Ness Water Horse. The material was taken mainly from my book though perhaps the "Loch Ness Kelpie" would be more appropriate as the beast of old was so named in nearly two thirds of the literature mentioning strange beasts in Loch Ness. I will be posting material from the talk on this blog in the weeks ahead. In the absence of Paul Harrison, I also added a few slides on 1933 since that was the reason we were here. Mention was made of key sightings (Mackay, Spicers, Gray) as well as the mania that unfolded as monster fever hit the British Isles. One clipping I have talks of the local authorities fretting over the application from 65 bus companies for excursion licenses (and that was just the companies and not the number of buses they hoped to run). This was despite the Loch Ness road being improved and widened. The mania of that time was also shown in a contemporary postcard which showed cars queueing along the loch as far as the eye could see.

Other notable sightings of that time were mentioned such as the curious double hump seen by a Mr. and Mrs. Simpson in late 1933. The painting below was executed by an artist under their direction for the Illustrated London News in May 1934.

After a good lunch, some free rum from the sponsors (Kraken Rum) and Gordon Holmes showing us his interesting video of an object in Loch Ness from 2007, it was onto to the next talk by Tony Harmsworth who was the first curator of the Official Loch Ness Exhibition Centre. He concentrated his talk on the 1970s and 1980s with particular emphasis on the Rines expeditions up to Operation Deepscan in 1987.

Needless to say, he was very critical of the way the Rines expedition had been conducted and the way they handled the material publicly. Of particular interest was the now notorious retouched flipper photograph from 1972 and the so called head and body pictures from 1975. The Operation Deepscan remarks ended on the note of the three mysterious sonar contacts that were obtained at the time which (unlike other contacts) were not there when a follow up boat went back to examine the locations.

What were they? Tony ended with the comment by a marine sonar specialist at the time that they were bigger than sharks but smaller than whales. And there we left that since in Tony's own words, sonar does not conclusively prove anything, a position I hold myself due to the lack of resolution in the sonar data.

However, the unknown contacts still stand and how one interprets them depends much on the beholder. Sonar has been improving over the years and the hope is that as resolution improves, it may yet pick up enough detail of anomalous images to be more decisive in a judgement.

David Martin Jones was next up with a talk on the cultural aspects of Nessie films and how they reflect the times they were made in as well as how they represented the Highlands and Scotland to the world. Emphasis was placed on the 1934 film, "Secret of the Loch" and the 1996 film "Loch Ness" with shorter references to other films including a 20 minute amateur Scottish production which I had no idea existed! I must track it down for a viewing sometime.

Following David was co-organiser Charles Paxton who specialises in statistical analyses of Loch Ness Monster reports. This is an evolving topic as he grows the database of sightings in search of patterns that may be seen in the sightings record. Charles is looking for clues that may help assess the human side of the monster stories and will publish his final conclusions in the months ahead.

The final speaker was co-organiser, Gordon Rutter, who despite being under the weather, manfully strove on with his talk on the photographic evidence for the Loch Ness Monster. Now this can be a contentious area as people have their own "favourites" which they may even hang their beliefs on. Gordon started at the Hugh Gray photograph and was mindful to mention the eel like head that this blog pointed out a couple of years back.

Most of the famous pictures were covered but time did not allow for all to be covered. Most were dismissed as hoax or misinterpretation but the jury was out on the Hugh Gray and Peter MacNab pictures (which I personally accept as genuine).  Some of the others I hope to address before the year is out.

So the symposium came to the final part which was a panel "Question and Answer" session composed of myself, Adrian Shine, Gordon Rutter and Steuart Campbell. In terms of big beast belief, my view held to a resident amphibious-like fish, Adrian a visiting sturgeon, Steuart nothing there and I am not sure about Gordon's views. Below is a picture of us taken from Steve Feltham's facebook page. I am the gormless looking one on the far left.

Questions were varied such as the future of Nessie in terms of research and as a cultural icon of Scotland and beyond. The latter seemed to be safe whilst the former was very much down to the funding of outside bodies. My own take was that we required another "Dinsdale Event" which would once again stir the public interest and move things forward. Such an item would have to be better than what Dinsdale filmed and take evidence to a new level. Whether it will come is a different matter.

The question of physical evidence was raised and there was a consensus that things that die in Loch Ness tend to go straight down never to rise again. In a piece of possible circular reasoning, I suggested dead Nessies may be cannibalised by other Nessies. Well, food is tight down there!

The subject of food supply was inevitably raised and the view of the panel majority was that there was not enough. I took issue with that pointing out the lack of real data on the total food supply and the equally vague subject of how much food the Nessie biomass requires. The normally quoted figure of 10 tonnes of fish for every tonne of Nessie is in my opinion too pessimistic, but I have covered this topic in a previous article.

So the symposium ended and I would put it down as a success. It was also good to meet people involved in the Loch Ness debate such as Dick Raynor, Tony Harmsworth, Adrian Shine, Steve Feltham, Gordon Holmes, etc. A special mention for enthusiasm must also go to Alexander Lovcanski who came all the way from Serbia for the symposium - and he doesn't even believe in the monster!

Going by the number of newspaper articles published prior to the event and the presence of a Japanese film crew at the event, I hope interest in the creature will be renewed, increased or even started for the first time.

A Twelfth Century Nessie?

 

An interesting headline from the British Library website:

Researchers at the British Library have found sensational evidence for the existence of the Loch Ness Monster. Hidden within the pages of a 12th-century manuscript is not only a description but also a drawing of the beast known to millions as Nessie.

Researchers at the library claimed to have unearthed a manuscript featuring a cleric by the name of Walter of Bingham whose travels to Scotland were recorded in the 12th century manuscript "Itinerarium Scotiae". The faded but now restored picture shows a hapless individual being dragged into the depths of Loch Ness by the monster. The full account can be read at this link. Before Nessie researchers jump up and down, you may want to note the date of the article.

Oddly enough on the same day, another eye opening article appeared on the Gadling travel website claiming that:

Tourism officials at Loch Ness made a shocking revelation today – the Loch Ness Monster is a creation of their marketing department.

"It all started back in the early years of the 20th century," says Nigel Pratt, Public Relations Manager for the Loch Ness Convention and Visitors Bureau. "You have to remember that Scotland was very poor back then. Tourists generally went to vacation hotspots like Blackpool. It was tough to compete. "Highlander" hadn't come out yet so nobody knew the first thing about Scotland. They didn't know their haggis from a hole in the ground."

Note again the date of the publication and the name of the alleged tourist official. One is reminded of the day on April 1st 1972 as told by the Daily Mirror:

On 1 April 1972, newspaper headlines around the world announced the dead body of the Loch Ness Monster had been found. A team of zoologists from Yorkshire's Flamingo Park Zoo, who were at Loch Ness searching for proof of Nessie's existence, had discovered the carcass floating in the water the day before. Initial reports claimed it weighed a ton and a half and was 15½ feet long. Upon inspection, Nessie turned out to be a bull elephant seal.

The zoo's education officer, John Shields, confessed he had been responsible for placing the body in the Loch. The seal had died the week before, and he had shaved off its whiskers, padded its cheeks with stones, and kept it frozen for a week, before dumping it in the Loch. The seal's body was displayed at the Flamingo Park Zoo for a few days before being properly disposed of.

Anyway, back to some serious research ....


POSTSCRIPT

These April Fool Nessie jokes just keep coming: 

Loch Ness Monster Burger suitable for those on vegan diets

Some Worthy Photos of Loch Ness

At the Flickr website, I came across two pools of photos. The first is dedicated to photographs of the loch itself (such as the one above) and is found at this link.

The second pool is Nessie related photos such as things that relate to the story, things that could be mistaken for Nessie and some Photoshop jobs. This pool can be viewed here.

 

An Old Nessie Clipping with a Strange Subplot

Here's an old clipping found by Will, who is a regular reader of this blog as well as a Fortean researcher in his own right. It is taken from the Milwaukee (Wisconsin) Journal of May 7th 1937.

Loch Ness Monster Has a Wife and Children, Abbot Told Pope

EDINBURGH Scotland -The Loch Ness monster is married and has quite a family, Sir David Hunter-Blair, abbot of a monastery on the shores of Scotland's famous lake, says. 

Sir David, who claims to have seen the monster several times and to have made a report to the Pope about it, differed with persons who believe the creature is the last survivor of his line.

The abbot, who is 83 but extremely alert. told of sitting on the monastery's boathouse and watching the monster play around in the lake—for 35 minutes.

"With my own eyes." Sir David said, "I saw two shiny black humps and a thick, pointed tail. I did not see the head because the monster evidently was feeding. Those who have seen the head describe it as snakelike, perched on a long and extraordinarily flexible neck.

Why He Appeared

"Finally the monster started for the centre of the lake where he lives at a depth of 75 feet. He travelled fast, churning foam, not unlike a propeller. His tail obviously is used for propulsion, attaining a speed of 15 to 20 miles an hour. You ask why he first appeared in 1933? That year thousands of pounds of dynamite were exploded during the construction of roads.

You can picture the monster, his wife, children and relations becoming most disturbed when tons of granite began crashing into their home at the depth of the lake. He probably said : 'My dear, I can't stand it any longer: I can't rest; I am going up and see what it's all about.' His wife. womanlike, replied: 'Don't go, dear: you've never been up, you don't know what it's like and you may never come back: think of our children.' 

But when the monster rose to the surface and found the sunshine pleasantly warming on his bald head, he enjoyed eating the grass and weeds and leaves which were a welcome change from his diet of shell-fish. That explains his recurring appearances.

Ventured Near Shore

 "He's even ventured toward the shore. A couple driving along the shore road saw him on a hillside and the woman promptly suffered a heart attack. The husband rushed her to the monastery while the monster plunged into the lake.

"You ask where the monster came from? Loch Ness once was part of the North sea, 150,000,000 years ago. When the earth crust shifted, lifting Scotland, he was trapped and unable to leave. I am not suggesting that he is 150,000,000 years old, but that is the age of his family.

"Unquestionably a whole family of them exists now. It would he most difficult to capture them. Nets are useless because of the depth of the lake. Shooting Is useless because the monster would sink. That's a peculiarity about Loch Ness—when anything sinks, it never rises. Drowned bodies are never recovered.

"When I visited the pope, he was most interested and asked: "You yourself witnessed it?' When I affirmed that I had, his holiness said: I will put your picture and a picture of the lake into my book.' He did not doubt. He is far too wise for that."

Sir David is perhaps a bit tongue in cheek and some of his facts are wrong. Any creature would be trapped in Loch Ness no later than 10,000 years ago but then again, what the proto-Loch Ness contained before the last Ice Age commenced is a question even more shrouded in mystery.

Though his sighting is extremely long at 35 minutes, it is not unique. Nevertheless, we are disappointed that he did not run for his camera during this time. Perhaps monks do not carry cameras as part of their vow of poverty!

Also, I don't know why he thinks the monster inhabits the loch  "at a depth of 75 feet", I would like to know the reasoning behind that statement.

But the most mysterious piece (and which I had not noticed till I was typing this) was the account of the Loch Ness Monster being seen on land:

He's even ventured toward the shore. A couple driving along the shore road saw him on a hillside and the woman promptly suffered a heart attack. The husband rushed her to the monastery while the monster plunged into the lake.  

I have no idea what case he is referring to here.  Do we have a new land sighting report here or is the Abbot becoming more associated with Costello than Fort Augustus? I'll give him the benefit of the doubt for we mentioned a land sighting already on this blog which was told by him and the link is here.

But in summary, that story concerned a monk who saw the monster emerge from some woods and enter the waters of the loch. Is this the same story or another one which Blair had picked up from the local raconteurs or monastic experts such as Cyril Dieckhoff? I had placed this monk's story on the flat woodlands beside the Abbey but this mysterious couple saw it on a hillside. Perhaps my suggested spot is wrong but they seem to be two separate stories. Using the clues in the short text, a shore road would most likely be the road on the busier west side approaching Fort Augustus. The road on the other side of Fort Augustus rapidly moves away from the loch and it is soon lost to view.

Secondly, there is plenty of the mentioned "hillside" on the west side of the loch which is now Forestry Commission land. That would imply the couple were heading south from Invermoriston to Fort Augustus when the lady in question saw the horrible sight of the creature moving amongst the trees and perhaps diving back into the loch in front or behind them. Her "heart attack" (or perhaps a panic attack) compelled her husband to drive straight onto the Abbey in the hope of medical facilities.

Well, perhaps, but it is a curious tale which I fear will never be resolved (unless eagle eyed readers have more to add!).

 

To Catch A Monster

 

 

 

Some of you may know that Jeremy Wade's successful TV series "River Monsters" has its season finale coming up and the Loch Ness Monster is the subject of the very last episode. It is fitting that on this 80th anniversary of the modern era of Nessie, Jeremy should select the greatest of all water monsters as his closing theme.

I don't know where the episode production has reached, but if he did succeed in catching the Loch Ness Monster, it will be pretty difficult to keep that under wraps until it airs on May 27th. In fact, eighty years of monster hunting suggests it will be a bit of a stretch to expect Jeremy to land the ultimate River Monster. I believe I know what type of animal he will suggest as an identity for the creature but there is no point in spoiling it for the rest of you and doubtless I will review the episode after it airs.

But the topic here is catching the Loch Ness Monster and that is a real arena for speculation and the final proof that science demands.

Ever since this beast became news in 1933, various attempts have been made to capture it. The first attempts were pretty much of the angling variety as a big hook and a big piece of bait were seen as the obvious way to capture a large water beast. We read this from the Inverness Courier of the 30th May 1933, a mere four weeks after the Mackay sighting which sparked the modern Nessie era:

Loch Ness Monster - an attempt to catch the monster was made at Foyers. A sealed barrel to which was attached 60 yards of strong wire with strong hooks baited with dogfish & skate was put out on the loch. The attempt was unsuccessful ...

After this, there was not much improvement in the technique, though the circus owner, Bertram Mills, was confident enough to erect a cage in anticipation of a capture carrying a £20,000 reward which was never claimed. It seemed people were content to concentrate on the gathering of more indirect evidence via film and photography.

It wasn't until after the Dinsdale film, that forces began to gather and organise in the form of the Loch Ness Investigation Bureau and various other expeditions. A few groups would claim to come armed to the teeth and take out the monster with machine guns and explosives, but others would attempt a more thoughtful approach.

However, it has to be said that talk about capturing the creature remained mainly talk rather than action. Roy Mackal had his biopsy dart which it could be argued would "capture" a piece of the monster but this idea did not take off when its host submarine, the Viperfish, never really got going. One or two smaller conical nets were employed which were 6ft high by 5ft across which barely qualified as monster traps and again nothing was captured. It has to be said though that bigger nets were planned but the Bureau was disbanded in 1972 before any such project got off the ground.

But the Big Kahuna of monster traps was finally employed in 1984. It was the brainchild of the Vladivar Vodka company who saw this as a nice bit of publicity with the Loch Ness Project involved in the deployment of a 60ft by 20ft tube made of fibreglass and plastic. It was lowered into 30 metres of water for a month off the Horseshoe Scree with a suitable amount of fish bait inside.

As you may have guessed, nothing was captured again and it is a matter of debate whether it could have held a 30ft-40ft monster thrashing about inside it. Nevertheless, a trashed cage being lifted out of the loch would have generated no small amount of excitement itself. (You can read more about the Vladivar net and the LNIB attempts at this link).

So the short history of Nessie traps comes to an end. In total, it seems a meagre harvest of attempts to acquire the ultimate proof that scientists demand. In fact, it seems that future attempts would be strangled by red tape and conservation concerns. Fears of harming the local wildlife, introducing foreign species and obstructing the loch as part of the Caledonian canal waterway all but guarantee that there is little prospect of employing these techniques. It also seems that dredging the loch bottom for Nessie carcasses is a non-starter as the sediment at the bottom is regarded as a valuable store of natural history via core samples.

So it seems we have a paradox here. Scientists want a live or dead specimen to confirm the creature's existence but scientists don't want to do that in case of environmental damage! Now you know how to reply when they again demand proof.

So where does that leave us? Must we wait for a carcass to drift ashore by natural means? The truth of the matter is that there has never been a serious attempt to capture the Loch Ness Monster. The critics think it is a waste of time and money, the tourist board don't want their prize asset removed from the loch and the environmentalists don't want a blade of grass touched.

Ecological studies of the pelagic area of the loch (in the open water just below the surface) suggest it is not a place for monsters to waste their energy swimming about. In that light, the Vladivar net was probably in the wrong place, though if it was still there 30 years on, one would have an expectation of some Nessie "event" by now. The other consideration is that at 30m down, the total loch volume to that depth is just over 1.5 billion cubic metres. The net occupied about 560 cubic metres and so there was a 1 in 2.7 million chance that the Loch Ness Monster would hit this net first time. The odds go down if a herd of such creatures are constantly swimming around the loch down to 30m for a month.

One creature a metre wide travelling continuously at 5km per hour for 5 hours a day over 30 days will cover a volume trail of about 0.6 million cubic metres. Ten will cover 6 million cubic metres and we assume no overlapping of previous trails. This is 1/240th of the loch volume in question so we give Vladivar a 1 in 250 chance of succeeding which suggests the net had to stay in place for 20 years. In reality, it would be much higher because the creatures do not swim continuously in open water but rather stick to the sides and bottom of the loch.

So how do you catch the Loch Ness Monster without breaking health and safety regulations? I would suggest placing a long net along the bottom of the loch about two metres high. At this depth there is minimal chance of a seal being netted and the net should be big enough to allow fish through. When something is snared in the net which exerts a suitable amount of force equivalent to a one or two tonne creature then a mechanism should automatically raise the net to a predetermined spot (the Vladivar net had a similar principle). Cameras trained along the length of the net can transmit back video pictures, though visibility would be limited due to peat suspension and silt clouds being thrown up as the creature struggled.

 

There would be obvious technical issues. You can't just raise a net to the surface without endangering boats and wildlife further up the water column. The net would need to be of a suitable design for that depth and time spent under the water (years). A group of trained personnel would need to be on standby for an event which may never come yet must act as if it could happen tomorrow. And then there is the final issue of making sure the creature itself is not brought to serious harm.

 

As you can see, there is some serious planning but though one may get this past the authorities (and I would never assume that is a given) the ultimate obstacle is money. The big net of 1984 was funded by a large private company and the search for Nessie has always relied on private individuals and companies donating funds to research. It is unlikely that such funds would ever be forthcoming unless there is a shift in perception about the reality of the Loch Ness Monster. There was that perception in 1984 but not in 2013 thanks to the armies of sceptics that flock around the subject.

 

We can but live in hope.

 

 

 

 

Classic Sightings: Those Strange Humps

Date: Summer 1946
Time: afternoon
Location: Near Whitefield
Witnesses: Robert Wotherspoon, Rev. John Taylor Stark and wives
Type of sighting: Multiple humps and tail in water

It's time for a classic sighting and this one from 67 years ago is interesting from more than one point of view. Our main witness, Robert Wotherspoon, was a man of some means and reputation from the Highlands. According to his obituary in the Glasgow Herald of 28th December 1968, he worked his way up to senior partner for the solicitors McAndrews and Jenkins and during the war he was promoted to commanding officer of the northern region of the Air Training Corps. After the war, he went into business and became managing director of Caledonian Associated Cinemas, a chain of fifty cinemas and also served as the Provost of Inverness between 1954 and 1961.

As a self made millionaire, it seems it would not be in his interest to become the butt of jokes if he ever claimed to have seen Nessie. Nevertheless, he was adamant about what he saw on that clear Summer day. The sighting came into focus for me when I came across a 1957 article about Wotherspoon speaking at a series of business engagements in North America. The clipping below is from the Calgary Herald dated 28th October 1957 followed by a transcript of the story.

Loch Ness Monster Sight Is Described By Scotsman

One of the few men ever to see the Loch Ness Monster arrived in Calgary this weekend and told how it happened. He is Robert Wotherspoon, provost (mayor) of Inverness and vice-chairman of the Scottish Tourist Board.

As managing director of Caledonian Associated Cinemas, owners of 50 theatres throughout Scotland. Mr. Wotherspoon is visiting Canada and the US primarily on business.

But he finds the monster is like an eight-ender in curling or a hole in one at golf. Once it happens to you, everything else seems comparatively unimportant. Expressing surprise at the interest shown in the monster here Mr. Wotherspoon contemplated asking Inverness to send on a postcard showing what the beast looks like. As far as Mr. Wotherspoon is concerned, it (or parts of it) looks like nothing so much as an elephant taking a bath. Two friends, a minister and his wife, were visiting him at the time he saw whatever it was. He decided to take his guests down to see Loch Ness in his car. The Loch is about six miles from Inverness.

"A few miles down the loch, I spotted the monster," Mr Wotherspoon related. "The people in the car were very skeptical. So I stopped and walked to the side of the water. There, right enough, was the monster, about 20 yards out from the shore."

Mr. Wotherspoon recalled that, a few weeks earlier, a circus was in town and he had seen a group of elephants "disporting themselves" in a river. He decided that the first hump of the monster resembled an elephant lying on its side. The size, color and texture were the same.

"There were other humps and spaces between them," Mr. Wotherspoon continued. "I did not see the head. The place where the head would be was under water." Adding to the drama, a salmon leaped high out of the water. At the instant when it fell back in, the humps of the monster straightened out.

Mr Wotherspoon believes the salmon had had it. "obviously swallowed by the monster." At this point, the monster turned toward the centre of the loch and soon Mr Wotherspoon lost sight of it. "As it proceeded through the loch, it created a wash not unlike that of a small fishing boat." he reported. "I estimated its length at slightly more than 60 feet."

He had run to his car to get a camera. But the car had recently been washed and, at that time, the camera had been removed. The minister accompanying Mr. Wotherspoon also saw the monster and verified the discovery. Several imperfect pictures of the monster have been taken since it first was sighted in 1895. The best photo corresponds to what Mr Wotherspoon saw, he said.

Mr Wotherspoon said his current trip is in the nature of a "goodwill mission" to all Scots in Canada. "Particularly, as provost of the capital of the Highlands, I would like all Highlanders to know that we think very kindly of them and wish to convey heartiest greetings to them." he said. "A warm welcome awaits them when they decide to pay a holiday visit home."

I lie reported that the tourist season in Scotland this year had been "phenomenal—the best we have ever had." His main business interest at the moment, Mr. Wotherspoon said, is the development of commercial television in Scotland. Problems of televising in Scotland are similar to those in Western Canada, he said. He is interested in knowing how Canada gets television in to remote areas such as the interior regions of the Rockies.

A few months before his death, Mr. Wotherspoon again related his story to David Cooke with further details for his 1969 book, "The Great Monster Hunt". We learn that he saw three humps in total and the sighting occurred opposite Urquhart Castle. The name of the other male witness was also given as the Reverend John Taylor Stark. He also added that the tail became visible as it moved to the centre of the loch and it pushed up waves 2.5 to 3 feet high.

John Taylor Stark, it turns out, was an influential Baptist minister in Scotland leading the faithful at the Victoria Place Baptist Church in Paisley near Glasgow. He was also President of the Baptist Union of Scotland in 1944-45. Can we conclude that two witnesses such as these were not likely to fabricate such a story? I would, others may not.

Wotherspoon's sighting is remarkable for its proximity of a mere 60 to 70 feet away. Not many other sightings can claim to be closer. Interestingly, he comments that the creature had a hide similar in texture to that of an elephant. He is not the first to mention this but others have mentioned a smoother more polished texture. One would imagine you could not have both but I am not so sure as we look further into this story. 

HUMPS

Looking at the humps, I am struck by the fact that he saw three humps separated by water only a mile down the road from where Lachlan Stuart took his famous three hump photo five years later. Was Wotherspoon's sighting a near copy of what Stuart claimed to have seen? We cannot be sure for Wotherspoon does not say what shape his humps were plus he did not see any head or neck as Stuart claimed.

  

My own feeling is that the humps were more rounded and closer together. I conclude this because of what he says next:

 "Adding to the drama, a salmon leaped high out of the water. At the instant when it fell back in, the humps of the monster straightened out."

This is a statement loaded with implication. We have had other sightings in which the humps have changed shape before the witnesses' eyes but here the action is seemingly accompanied by intent - the proximity of food. The salmon drops into the water and the humps simultaneously straighten.

Fascinating.

I have stated on this blog before that the Loch Ness Monster is more an opportunistic predator than one which roams the loch in pursuit of prey. The diffuseness of the food stock demands that patrolling the loch is not an energy efficient procedure. There is food enough in the loch but it must be caught in a better way. In a previous article I suggested a ploy similar to the Angel Shark where the creature lies in wait ready to grab its passing prey (see clip at end of said article).

Furthermore, the retractable appendage (which may or may not be a neck) which I also discussed in this article could shoot out in a manner conjusive to this tactic. Shooting out an appendage to capture prey is a common energy saving tactic employed in the animal world. Frogs and chameleons have employed their tongues successfully in this venture before we ever arrived on the scene of time.

  


So, imagine the scene under the water as Robert Wotherspoon observes the salmon re-enter the water and the humps straightening. The monster's neck/appendage shoots out to grab the salmon and a cause or effect of this is that the humps straighten out. Does the appendage extending cause the humps to straighten or does the humps straightening cause the appendage to extend? That is an area of some speculation.

One line of thought is that the humps are buoyancy devices which allows the creature's humps to stand so far out of the water or at varying other depths below the surface. Other animals employ inflatable sacs for various purposes - courtship display, defense or mock attack. The gas used can be air or some other gas with a different density, indeed it is also possible that the loch's water could also fill the sacs.

How this affects appendage extension/retraction is unclear but is worthy of further thought. Different animals employ different techniques. The chameleon uses a form of coiled collagen to further propel the tongue. The frog uses muscle fibres at right angles to each other. What the Loch Ness Monster uses may be gas or water based.

Another seeming contradiction may be answered here and that is the reports of  smooth and rough skinned monsters. It may be objected that swimming animals tend to have smooth skins so as to reduce drag underwater and that is true. But we have already suggested that the monster is not given to frequent motion (though it can up its speed if required on rare occassions).

However, our inflatable hump scenario can perhaps answer this in that when the humps are fully inflated with gas, air or water) then the skin  "fills out" to give our oft reported smooth skin and when deflated it contracts and takes on a more wrinkly appearance. Perhaps, but in the world of the Loch Ness Monster there is plenty of room for speculation and a bit of lateral thinking.

HISTORY 

One further point that this case obliquely refers to and that is the antiquity of the Loch Ness Monster. You may have noted that the author of the Calgary Herald article states that:

"Several imperfect pictures of the monster have been taken since it first was sighted in 1895."

Now the modern era of Nessie began in 1933, so where did the reporter get this date of 1895? The most obvious answer, given the context, was from Mr. Wotherspoon himself during his Nessie talk. Where did he get the date from? I would suggest from local sources back in Scotland. 

This theory is backed up by what Mr. Wotherspoon added as a postscript to his talk with David Cooke in 1968. He said that he arrived at the loch "over forty years ago" and it was shortly after that that he began to hear stories about the monster.  

The aforementioned obituary from 1968 mentions that Mr. Wotherspoon arrived at Inverness in 1921. From that we conclude that he was aware of a creature in Loch Ness twelve years before it became international news in 1933.

Given the connections that Robert Wotherspoon had as a local businessman and his love for fishing and hunting (stated in Cooke's book), it is no surprise that if there was gossip of something strange in Loch Ness, he would be a prime candidate to find out.

Why he should state 1895 is not clear as there is no claimed sighting for that year. One clue is from a letter to the Times in 1933 from the Duke of Portland:

“I should like to say that when I became in 1895 ... the tenant of the salmon angling in Loch Oich and the River Garry, the forester, the hotel keeper and the fishing ghillies used to often talk about a ‘horrible great beastie’ as they called it which appeared in Loch Ness.”

Had the local men recently seen something which prompted such discussions? There is no further information to make a judgement. The subject is further energised but not concluded by rumors rathers than facts as the Loch Ness literature talks of a Glasgow newspaper which mentioned the monster in 1896 and there is the curious case of UFO researcher John Keel finding an article on the Loch Ness Monster in an 1896 Atlanta newspaper. Again, neither of these articles has been found but one wonders if these four allusions to something happening around 1895-96 carries a kernel of truth? Only further research and digging into the archives may reveal an answer and if we do find anything, it will be reported on this blog.