Finding Bigfoot goes to Loch Ness

The popular "squatching" series, "Finding Bigfoot", headed to the shores of Britain on a recent airing on Animal Planet. I, for one, was curious to know how they got on with the hairless cryptid that inhabits Loch Ness as well as their take on cryptid humanoids in Britain.

The first stop was London and that meant things like Buckingham Palace and, in the case of leader Matt Moneymaker, managing to bump into another car on London's busy streets. Well, perhaps he just mounted a pavement. Like some Nessie or Bigfoot sightings, the details were a bit vague.

Meeting primatologist, Dr. Anna Nekaris, at the appropriately named "Green Man" pub, she discussed the most likely habitats for large primates and the forms of ancient man that once inhabited these isles (namely, Homo Erectus and Neanderthalensis).

One such prime spot appeared to be Harwood Forest in the north of England where our team met Neil Young and an alleged photograph of a hairy hominid he took some years back. It is definitely a blobsquatch and not a lot could be deduced from it. Certainly, it made some Nessie photos as clear as day by comparison. It became evident that Bigfoot hunters have the same issues with getting close to their quarry as we do at Loch Ness.

Nevertheless, the staple night hunt ensued as the team acquired cricket bats instead of baseball bats to do their wood knocking and the thermal cameras scanned the opaque woodlands. Nothing was seen and it was onto their "Town Hall" meeting where they heard some people recount their "squatchy" experiences.

I noted a familiar name in the crowd and that was Adam Bird who, back in 2011, sent me some pics he had grabbed from the Nessie Webcam, you can detour to that article here. Also at that meeting, was a Hamish MacDonald  who invited the team to come further north and investigate the Grey Man of Ben MacDhui and therein lay an excuse to take a detour to Loch Ness.

Matt Moneymaker and Ranae Holland accompanied Adam and his father Paul to Sherwood Forest where they had an experience of knocking and thumping noises in an area alleged to have hosted Bigfoot type sightings. It seems Adam has had a subsequent Bigfoot experience where a footprint and figure were photographed.

Prior to this, the team had visited a 900 year old church with some greenman or wildman carvings inside. Are these carvings a latent memory of ancient encounters between Homo Sapiens and some of his more distant relations? 

Meanwhile, James "Bobo" Fay and Cliff Barackman had arrived in the Cairngorms to check out the Grey Man who reputedly haunts the mountain, Ben MacDhui. Now that may be a better word than "inhabits" since that particular phenomenon seems to have a more ethereal quality to it. Nevertheless, our duo met with the Cairngorm Mountain Rescue Team and their tale of two men they had rescued from a shredded tent with the connotation that something had attacked it (though some have questioned this story).

Now, to my surprise, I noticed a William Cameron amongst the Cairngorm Mountain Rescue Team. Actually he is a marketing man for the Loch Ness area based at the Clansman Hotel by Loch Ness. Methinks he was a plant to draw our dynamic Bigfoot duo closer to Loch Ness. Indeed, it clicked that the aforementioned Hamish MacDonald who mysteriously appeared in England was likely another link in the chain.

What Willie Cameron thought of  the Finding Bigfoot editorial team subtitling some of his Scottish accent, I may never know.  It's not surprising, though, when I was in California some years back, I had a hard time making myself understood to a fast food waitress. My wife eventually had to translate for me.

So, finally, Bobo and Cliff got to Loch Ness and a familiar face was there to greet them - Adrian Shine. They went out on his Deepscan boat and discussed the Loch Ness Monster in the middle of the loch. Cliff thought there was something to the mystery but Bobo was non-committal. Adrian took them through a brief, potted history and the things that can fool observers of the loch such as standing waves, etc.

Though Adrian thought anything unusual he had seen had a natural explanation, there were still some sonar readings that had no ready explanation. Cliff drew the parallel that a proportion of Bigfoot sightings were also explicable in their own way (but clearly this had not affected his belief in the creatures).

Now, I was hoping that the team would go out on the loch and do a Bigfoot-type search with those FLIR thermal cameras that I so covet. But, alas, I was to be disappointed as the hunt for Nessie amounted to no more that Bobo improvising one of his Sasquatch hollers with a kind of heavy breathing outburst!

In fact, Cliff and Bobo did do a night search at Loch Ness with Hamish, but it was up in the hills of nearby Abriachan. The first mistake they made was presuming there was a hairy hominid to look for in that part of the world, I am aware of no such stories from that area south west of Inverness. The second mistake was putting on kilts and going into a forest full of midges. Epic mistake, but we live and learn.

But I was indeed curious to see how their thermal cameras would have performed on the surface of Loch Ness. In fact, I am interested in acquiring such a device for my own research at the loch. The gadget I had in mind can't be that different from the Bigfoot team and is the Flir TS24 Pro (below).

It runs at 240x180 resolution with a 19mm or 65mm lens and can record up to 16Gb on an SD card (after all, I'll need to prove what I saw). It's a mere snip at around £3,500 and if anyone wants to lend me one or even buy one for me, just drop me an email!

The whole team finished with a night search amongst the old caledonian pine forests along the Moray Firth coast a few miles north east of Loch Ness. Deemed the most "squatchy" territory by our team, the most they got out of the hunt was a sound that may well have been an owl.

Finishing off their special trip to the United Kingdom, it was felt that there may have once been a hominid in Britain which inspired the old folk tales of wild men and green men, but even Bobo concluded that there may have been nothing in Britain for maybe centuries.

I, myself, am neutral on whether such bipedal creatures have appeared recently in Britain. I shall leave those arguments to such people as Adam Bird. For me, it's back to the Loch Ness Monster - with the odd glance at the next episode of Finding Bigfoot.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

 

 

Nessletter No.162 now published

Rip Hepple, veteran Loch Ness Monster expert, has published the latest issue of his long running Loch Ness newsletter, "Nessletter" (dated February 2015). The main focus of his newsletter this issue is his time at the Loch Ness Investigation Bureau, with a particularly interesting feature on "night drifting".

 

If you wish to find out more, the subscription rates are: £5 (UK) or $10 (USA) for 12 issues which are published intermittently, not monthly. Send your payment and address details to:

 

R.R.Hepple
7 Huntshieldford
St John's Chapel
Weardale
Co Durham
DL13 1RQ
United Kingdom

 

 

I would point out that an archive of Rip's older newsletters can be found here on Google Drive. Rip's newsletter has been running now for over forty years and has been a valuable source of information and analysis throughout those years. I continue to look forward to his wisdom and analysis.

Frank Searle Items

There are a few items on Frank Searle that have built up, so I would like to put them under this one article. As ever, anything about the most infamous of monster hunters always generates more than average interest.

Firstly, I got back to Paul Harrison, author of The Encyclopaedia of the Loch Ness Monster, asking about his book on Frank Searle. Some readers may recall a previous article in which it was stated that Paul had tracked down Frank to his home in Fleetwood before he died and conducted a series of interviews. Frank Searle died on the 26th March 2005, having previously spent fifteen years camped at Loch Ness in pursuit of the Monster.

Paul now tells me that the book will be published in August or September this year. It should prove to be a stimulating read! As I have said before, I don't regard any person as 100% evil, nor any other as 100% good. Most of the stuff we read demonises Frank Searle, and some of it will be deserved, but as they say, the victors get to write the history.

On my second point today, Frank Searle certainly gets that kind of treatment in a book called "50 People Who Screwed Up Scotland" by Allan Brown. This is a recent publication, having come out last May.

Amongst these fifty personalities, I found that Frank Searle was entry number 48 after Alex Salmond. If you go to the Amazon entry and click on the book image to "Look Inside", you can find that entry and read what Allan Brown has to say about Frank Searle. I don't think one would learn anything new as a Loch Ness researcher, but you'll get the point about the vilification of Frank Searle.

Finally, and I suppose by way of balance, I have placed one of Frank's books on my Google Drive. It is his 1977 booklet, "The Story of Loch Ness" and you can access it as a PDF document at this link. It will prompt you to enter a password which is "nb2vsm6p". I reviewed that book in a previous article, but you can read it for yourselves now. I see no reason to withhold its distribution as I see no copyright claim on it and I am sure it would be Frank's wish to see it receive a wider readership.

After all, having by then spent eight years at Loch Ness, you would expect some degree of knowledge from the man. Judge for yourself, but I am leaving the main judgement until Paul's book comes out.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

A Piece of Loch Ness History

I note a piece of Loch Ness history is on sale for the mere price of around £450,000. It is the Foyers Lodge just outside of the village of Foyers on the south side of the loch. Holding twelve bedrooms, it has been a hunting lodge, a hotel and a house to let.

But, as I recall, and others may correct me, this was where Tim Dinsdale lodged during the week he captured his famous film footage and I do believe Peter O' Connor was there when he took his controversial photograph down the hill. It was the then proprietor of the lodge, Hugh Rowland, who motored his boat out onto the loch for Tim to film his comparison footage and Hugh claimed his own triangular hump sighting back then.

One previous owner, Buddy MacDougall, also claimed her own sighting of the creature when she said:

We were constantly being asked about the Loch Ness monster and one afternoon, along with two guests, we did see an upturned cabin cruiser sized object out in the bay which sank and then reappeared then sank for good.

Apparently, it even has a ghost and Buddy MacDougall again relates:

The hotel had a very friendly ambiance but quite often we did see a little white dog disappearing under the kitchen table. Also, after pooh poohing Lorna and Mhairi for reports of eerie goings on in their bedroom, I also had a frightening experience when I rushed upstairs one dark night to get something from their room when they were away from home. On opening the door, I was utterly shocked to feel a presence right in front of me. There was nothing there when I switched on the light.

Quite how many have thought they have seen the Monster from the lodge's high vantage point is difficult to tell, but for less than half a million, you can get your own piece of Loch Ness real estate.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

At the Scholarly Research of the Anomalous

The Counting House in Edinburgh hosted a series of speakers this weekend for the Scholarly Research of the Anomalous Conference. Since I live in Edinburgh, I made my way along to take part in proceedings. The event was organised by Gordon Rutter and Charles Paxton, who had previously done the successful "Nessie at 80" event at the same venue in 2013. Gordon organises the regular, monthly meetings of the Edinburgh Fortean Society which I often attend.

DARREN NAISH

First up was Darren Naish, well known author at the popular Tetrapod Zoology blog. He spoke on "The Evolution of Sea Monsters in Terms of What people Report". Darren spoke of the four phases of Sea Serpent cryptozoology, starting with the classic exploratory stage in Victorian time when biologists such as Huxley and Owen would debate living plesiosaurs.

From there is was onto Oudemans and his pinnepedial Megophias and then onto Bernard Heuvalmans' more complex classification system of up to ten variants. Finally, the revised taxonomies of Coleman, Huyghe and Champagne.

But Naish sees us in a post-cryptid cryptozoological period and perhaps in a last phase as these reports are re-analysed. I could see the parallels with the Loch Ness Monster and would disagree with the post-cryptid scenario. But it was an interesting talk nonetheless. 

At the end, I asked Darren if the presumed absence of serpentine megafauna in the seas suggested there was evolutionary pressure against such a morphology. He thought this was the case for mammals and the way endothermic energy is dissipated in such a shape, but not so much for exothermic. Which suggests a gigantic and slender reptile or fish is not impossible, yet nature (from a sceptical point of view) has not seen fit to produce such a beast. Then again, perhaps not.

CHARLES PAXTON

Charles came up next with a familiar theme, the statistical analysis of cryptid sightings. This has been a long running pursuit of Charles' in the sea serpent context and now for the Loch Ness Monster. The problem for analysts such as him is to measure the precision and accuracy of such anecdotal evidence. One can make some estimate of this by comparing the same single eyewitness accounts over different time periods or comparing multiple eyewitness accounts of the same event.

The other is to attempt to set up a controlled environment with known parameters and measure how eyewitnesses make their own estimates of distance, length, height, etc. It turns out Charles had some Edinburgh Forteans go past some witnesses in a Bigfoot-like suit in order to measure their responses!

In terms of the Loch Ness Monster, I later suggested to Charles that he should try and track down the transcripts of the 2005 Channel 5 documentary "Loch Ness Monster: The Ultimate Experiment" where an animatronic plesiosaur was put into Loch Ness for unwitting boat passengers to see. It would be interesting to see if it contained any witness estimates of the object's attributes.

ROGER MUSSON

After lunch, it was Roger Musson of the British Geological Survey in Edinburgh. He spoke on the 1974 Berwyn Mountain UFO case which is dubbed by some as the "British Roswell" as it allegedly involved a crashed flying saucer. Even though this was the only non-cryptid talk, I had an interest in it as a documentary on this case had recently appeared on British TV.

As it turns out, Roger's explanation that the crash noise was actually a magnitude 3.5 earthquake made sense. The interpretation that the lights seen in the area were poachers' car lights and/or meteors was more open to debate. I asked him at the end whether such an earthquake instead could have produced light energy as well as sound energy. I offered that theory with Paul Devereux's Earth Lights theory in mind. Roger did not think so in this case, but was open to it happening in other cases (such as one in Lincoln in 2008).  

BETTINA BILDHAUER

Dr. Bildhauer from St. Andrews University next spoke on "Monsters in Medieval Manuscripts". That world was a world of all manner of strange beasts including unicorns, dragons, basilisks, mermaids, sea serpents, crane headed people and single footed humans. 

We also had an insight into medieval medicine as the four humours of black bile, yellow bile, blood and phlegm were explained and their relation to the Evil Eye of the basilisks and witches. Things got even stranger as this was linked to menstrual cycles. Changed days.

MIKE DASH

I have enjoyed and been informed by Mike's fortean writings over the years, so it was a pleasure to at last meet him and hear his talk on "Our Artist Pictures What the Witness Saw". Mike's talk focused on the various artistic renderings of Fortean phenomena that have been less than accurate in the representation of what the witness saw. Such pictures are almost too numerous to mention and range from the sea serpent drawings of the HMS Daedalus in 1848 to Mike's dealings with artistic depictions for the Fortean Times.

It is an issue I have seen myself in the Loch Ness literature, though original witness testimony and sketches can obviate some of the more dramatic touches of periodical artists. I pointed out to Mike later that embellishment is a two way street and pointed out the case of Maurice Burton and his sceptical 1961 book, "The Elusive Monster".

In that book, Burton, shall we say, reinterpreted one or two photographs as drawings to fit his theories. Moreover, his drawing of a deer which, by coincidence, looks amazingly like the Greta Finlay creature is "interesting".

PANEL Q&A

The day ended with an informative and entertaining Q&A session involving all the speakers. Just to show these people were not all crusty sceptics, they were asked which Fortean phenomena they gave credence to. Darren Naish said out of place cats, Mike Dash had a penchant for poltergeists, Charles Paxton was still open on large, undiscovered creatures in the oceans and I am not sure what Bettina and Roger said.

My only question to the panel was for Roger the seismologist. I recalled reading a book on an earthquake in Inverness at the start of the 20th century and how the author described seeing the waters of Loch Ness boiling like a cauldron. 

Roger said this was in 1901 and was one of the largest recorded earthquakes in Britain. The effect on Loch Ness was perfectly explicable as a giant standing wave shaking the loch as opposed to my expectation of a tidal surge. That must have been a sight to behold.

All in all, it was a good day, and I look forward to the next conference.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

Whales in Scottish Lochs

In my previous article, I referred to a letter which appeared in the Inverness Advertiser on the 3rd January 1854. The writer of the letter, an M. Bankes, asked for opinions on the existence of whales in Scottish lochs. 

The context to that letter turns out to be the famous story of the Loch Na Beiste creature which gained national coverage as the locals attempted to capture the mysterious denizen of this rather small loch in Ross and Cromarty.  Mr. Bankes was the proprietor of the estate in which the loch lay and you can read the story of the hunt here.

A reader requested I reproduce the second letter and I do so here. The first letter is shown first and the second from the same paper dated 14th March 1854. The text is too much for the OCR I use, so hopefully you can read it from the original!

Some were, of course, sceptical of whales and the matter of seals comes up. Mr. Bankes assures them he knows what a seal look likes but in the end he seems favourable to another candidate that sometimes appears in cryptozoology, 160 years on, the Wels Catfish (Silurus Glanis).

Now I am not sure if this creature has ever been observed or captured in Scottish waters, be it rivers or lochs. Perhaps someone can enlighten me, but it appears that Mr. Bankes never caught his presumed catfish.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

A Loch Ness Monster Sighting from 1909

You never know where things can end up. One things leads to another and an obscure item comes to light after decades.

I was doing some research for an article defending Alex Campbell. That is for another day, but in the course of research, I read an article by Alex Campbell from 1962, which tackled the leading sceptic of the day, Maurice Burton.

The article was published in the May 1962 edition of the Scots Magazine and was Campbell's reply to various objections Burton had brought against the idea of a monster in Loch Ness, such as his favoured vegetable mat theory. That article is interesting enough in its own right, but further research turned up something else.

One aspect of Loch Ness Monster research is to look for follow up. So, when an article such as this is published, I always look at subsequent publications to see if any feedback came out of it. The Scots Magazine has a section for readers' letters, so I looked out a few months to see if anything was published. As it turned out, the August issue carried a letter from a Mr. W. Fletcher Stiell who lived in Lincoln. I reproduce that letter below.

I was most interested in the article, "No, Dr Burton!" by Mr A. M. Campbell in your May issue. I can hardly think that Mr Campbell is the Loch Ness water bailiff whom I met in 1909. The bailiff I knew lived in a lochside cottage on the south side of the loch about midway between Inverfarigaig and Dores. He caught me in my student days cross-line fishing with "an otter" on a beautiful  moonlight night. All he did in a gentlemanly tone was to explain the iniquity of my conduct, to confiscate four big peacock flies, which I had dressed myself, and two nice sea-trout. We parted the best of friends.

I fished the loch daily, except Sundays. for two months every summer for twelve years - twenty-four months in all. During this time I only saw the monster once, and that was in August 1909. This was twenty-four years before Mr Campbell first "wrote up" the creature, and I was ignorant of its existence.

Unfortunately I was alone in the boat and had no camera, but for about three minutes I was parallel and only about twenty-five yards from the animal. It was swimming at about ten miles an hour against about a ten-knot wind. This was, of course, faster than I could row, and I was therefore outpaced and I lost sight. However, I cannot picture any weed-mat moving against a breeze at all.

I knew all the gillies at Drumnadrochit personally at that time. They are now all dead, but when I spoke of my experience they failed to comment in any way, so I have since done likewise. I do know that Sandy Ross, the late piermaster at Temple Pier, saw a similar beast on several occasions.

If the creature is a plesiosaurus, and its appearance was not unlike the pictures I have seen, then there must be some means of reproduction and at least two monsters. Not even a prehistoric beast could live for many centuries, but it could be reproduced unknown under the favourable conditions of Loch Ness.

As an aside, the bailiff at that time was not Alex Campbell, but John Grant. I would point out that the terms "Nessie" and "Loch Ness Monster" were completely unknown back in 1909. In fact, it was another 24 years before such phrases began to feature alongside reports of a strange creature inhabiting this northern lake.

As I have stated before, it is one of the pillars of modern scepticism that the Loch Ness Monster was a media created and media sustained phenomenon beginning in 1933. Before that year, there was nothing but an echoing void. This man's account suggests that theory can be thrown on the garbage heap.

Not that this account is unique. Only last month, we published the account of folklorist and ethnologist, Calum MacLean, who recorded the account of William MacKenzie and his Victorian Loch Ness Monster. Anyone who does not think people were seeing strange things in Loch Ness before 1933 are simply in denial.

SPARE MOMENTS IN AN EASY CHAIR

Keen to find out more about Fletcher Stiell's experience, I searched online. Having an uncommon name made this somewhat easier and I soon found out that he had written a book entitled "Spare Moments in an Easy Chair" published ten years previously in 1952. 

Further searching showed there was only one copy of this book available for sale. It seems his book is rarer than the Loch Ness Monster! Fortunately, the prestigious National Library of Scotland had a copy and I made the short trip to examine it. It turned out Mr. Stiell was a qualified doctor, Licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians and Member of the Royal College of Surgeons. In that regard, he recounts his tales of being a surgeon to World War One soldiers.

It is a small book in which Stiell reminisces on his times, observations and hobbies. To that end, we read him holding forth on a varied range of subjects such as medicine, angling, football, cars, philately, fish, hillwalking, cats, dogs ... and the Loch Ness Monster. A small three page chapter was devoted to Fletcher's experience, which is reproduced below.

 THE LOCH NESS MONSTER

THIS poor beast has for long been a subject of much controversy and scepticism, which has been sustained and rekindled by considerable journalism, much of which has been of a wild and flamboyant character. I have frequently felt inclined to give my own observations on this animal, but have each time avoided the temptation, as I realized that the subject had already become the butt of ridicule. To appreciate fully the presence of this animal in the loch, it is essential to possess some knowledge of the geography and topography of Loch Ness. It is a beautiful loch, in my opinion the most noble expanse of fresh water in Great Britain. It has not, of course, the delicate refinements and variety of such island-studded gems as Loch Morar or Loch Maree, but for sheer size and nobility it is unrivalled. It is twenty-six miles long with an average breadth of well over a mile. It is connected to the sea at a point where the seven-mile long River Ness empties into the Moray Firth. It is this river that furnishes the true explanation of the existence of the Loch Ness monster. 

I am not quite certain of the actual year, but I believe it was during the Summer of 1915, that I first saw a Loch Ness monster. In spite of the fact that, previous to this, I had already spent many happy hours fishing on the loch, I had never witnessed anything abnormal. In this particular Summer there were three continuous days and nights of phenomenal rain, as a result of which the loch rose as least eight feet and of course the River Ness likewise. Immediately following the cessation of the  downpour, I was on the loch in my small rowing-boat, fishing and observing the aftermath of the flood. I saw dead sheep, cows, fowls, etc., which had been brought down the hill streams, and I noticed what I at first thought was a horse in the water, and probably in difficulties.

When I had approached to within about twenty yards of the animal, I observed that it was in no difficulty at all, and that it was swimming easily against a head-wind with its head well clear of the water. It was dark in colour and roughly about fifteen feet in length. Immediately I came to the conclusion that it was what is known as a pilot whale or blackfish, which by accident had become separated from its herd and had found its way up the flooded river into the loch. As soon as the Loch returned to anything approaching normal level the animal would be unable to return to the river, as there is an artificial shallow weir at the junction of loch and river. Moreover, it would appear that it would have difficulty in finding again the one river of exit, when once it had entered an expanse of water the size of Loch Ness.

The pilot whale is quite common in the Northern Atlantic. They are frequently hunted in the Faroe, Shetland and Orkney Islands and I have seen them as far south as Loch Fyne on the west coast of Argyll. It is a timid and harmless creature to man, but of course is naturally destructive to fish-life on which it feeds. It has always been admitted that the Monster has been afraid, and difficult of approach. I much regret that I am unable to recall at what date the daily press began to journalise the creature, but I seem to think that it was quite ten years after my own experience. It is also difficult to estimate the longevity of a whale, but it is known that large animals, e.g. elephants, do enjoy a long span of life and therefore, I think, it is quite probable that this could explain the joyful findings of the journalists in 1925 or thereabouts. 

I am, however, quite satisfied that I have myself seen a large animal, probably a Pilot Whale, in Loch Ness, following a phenomenal flood probably in the year 1915. I saw it on one occasion only, but I have not had the pleasure of seeing much of Loch Ness since 1915. I am satisfied myself that what I saw was not a prehistoric monster and I am strongly inclined to think that the much discussed monster was probably the pilot whale I had seen ten years previously or, at the most, a similar whale, which had entered the loch under similar conditions.

COMPARISONS

It is instructive now to compare the two accounts, separated by about nine years. The book was published in 1952, but given his preface was written in 1951, I think his Loch Ness Monster chapter was also typed out in 1951. Back in those days, talk about the monster was pretty muted. The war was over, but austerity and rationing were still in force and the nation was concentrating on rebuilding the economy and infrastructure.

This is demonstrated by Mr. Stiell's better grasp of Nessie information in his 1962 letter compared to his 1951 book. By then, at least three books had been published on the subject for him to consult. The date of the sighting is also the subject of some uncertainty. The 1962 letter confidently says August 1909 while the 1951 book expresses uncertainty about the summer of 1915. I would tend to the 1909 date as Mr. Stiell appears to have put much more thought into figuring out when this happened.

The author had some skill in interpreting the moods of Loch Ness as he says he fished the loch daily for two months a year for twelve years except Sundays. That adds up to over 600 days on the surface of the loch. I am sure that gave him a considerable degree of experience in interpreting what he was seeing on the surface of the loch.

But that the author expresses uncertainty about the date over forty years on is probably no surprise. The matter of eyewitness recall is matter of debate. What is the level of detail that can be relied upon? Gross features such as size and shape give way to smaller items such as skin colour and texture which in turn focus in on minutiae such as eye colour and mouth shape.

There is no hard and fast rule here, especially when memory recall of significant events "burn" into the memory more readily than mundane, everyday events. I will leave the readers to form their own opinion. Having said that, his description turns out to be lacking in the finer details. Extracting the actual descriptions from the two texts:

I noticed what I at first thought was a horse in the water, and probably in difficulties. When I had approached to within about twenty yards of the animal, I observed that it was in no difficulty at all, and that it was swimming easily against a head-wind with its head well clear of the water. It was dark in colour and roughly about fifteen feet in length. Immediately I came to the conclusion that it was what is known as a pilot whale ...

And from the later letter:

Unfortunately I was alone in the boat and had no camera, but for about three minutes I was parallel and only about twenty-five yards from the animal. It was swimming at about ten miles an hour against about a ten-knot wind. This was, of course, faster than I could row, and I was therefore outpaced and I lost sight. However, I cannot picture any weed-mat moving against a breeze at all. ... If the creature is a plesiosaurus, and its appearance was not unlike the pictures I have seen ... 

In terms of accuracy, there is not much between them, mainly because there is not much said. One account says the creature was about 20 yards away, while the other says 25 yards. This is actually very close for a monster encounter, ranking with the closest of the post-1933 era.

Both accounts have the creature swimming against a head wind, which one states as being ten knots, while it swam "easily" at ten miles per hour. It is also is described as looking horse like in appearance with the head well out of the water. At fifteen feet in length and dark, we doubt this length refers to only the head, and rather the back of the creature must have also been visible.

CREATURES

The creature swam out of sight as it sped past our witness and he was left wondering what he had witnessed on the surface of Loch Ness. His impression at the time was that of a pilot whale which persisted into the 1950s. However, once monster fever began to rise after the 1960 Dinsdale film, we read he was now more inclined to consider that the creature was "not unlike" the plesiosaur theory being touted around.

Considering he stated "its head was well clear of the water" yet he managed to see up to fifteen feet of back, one wonder how his proposed pilot whale managed to achieve this contortion (picture below). It is also not clear how this animal could give the initial impression of being a horse in water. Perhaps, Mr. Stiell reconsidered these issues and finally rejected the whale explanation.

This brings us back to the problem of whether a whale could get into Loch Ness. Even the most hardened sceptic would have a hard time accepting that. This is especially reinforced by the fact that no one else seems to have reported the presence of a whale in Loch Ness. The frequent surfacings of this air breather would have easily made the local and even national news.

This was certainly true of the alleged school of porpoises seen in Loch Ness in 1914. However, correspondence of the time was in disagreement about their identity and was incredulous that up to nine porpoise could get into Loch Ness. I agree with that assessment, but do not agree with the view of one modern sceptic that they merely saw bow waves since there was none of that so-called "Nessie expectation" to fool an observer in 1914. For me, this was a sighting of one or more Nessies.

PARADIGMS

But this brought me to thinking how pre-Nessie witnesses would describe strange creatures in Loch Ness. We have this man plumping for a pilot whale, another goes for a number of porpoise. We can also add to this the story of a "huge fish" seen in Loch Ness at the time of an article in 1868. It seems that it wasn't kelpies, sea serpents or even inanimate objects that were candidates for possible explanations, but rather other animals in the region of comparable size.

To that end, a search of the archives produced this letter from the Inverness Advertiser dated 3rd January 1854. The letter of two from an M. Bankes does not refer to Loch Ness but two smaller lochs further north and what our writer calls "the existence of large whales in our Highland lochs". Now whether one accepts the fact of whales in small lochs is secondary here. The main point here is that whatever was being seen was likened to a whale.

CONCLUSION

Whatever Mr. Stiell saw in 1909 (my preferred date), I doubt it was a pilot whale. Unlike our day and age, where the idea of a persistent and unknown monster has joined the ranks of candidates, here the idea of a transient but known sea creature was preferred. The problems with that have been explored above, but future research into this period of time may yield results if one looks for stories of out of place animals in Loch Ness rather than the more enigmatic kelpies and sea serpents.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

Nessie Cartoons Through The Years

I ran an article a while back showing how the general populace and the media perceived the Loch Ness Monster through drawings and satire. I came across some more cartoons recently and have put them on here for comment and display.

Going back to the earliest days of the Nessie phenomenon, the Daily Express published this cartoon on the 14th December 1933, shortly after the first picture of the monster, taken by Hugh Gray, came to the world's attention. Click on the cartoon for a better image. The text of each cartoon is shown under it.

Diver to Nessie, "I can not help you to go, but good advice: stay at the bottom and have fun!"

Whether the artist referred to the Hugh Gray photo to draw his Nessie is arguable, but they do bear some resemblance to each other. The scene of various sceptics and party poopers trying to solve the mystery and consign it to history seems to meet with short shrift by the cartoonist. Whether there was anything in the loch or not, the newspapers wanted the story to run and stuff the naysayers!

The next cartoon is from The Daily Herald, some time in 1933. This is probably the least Nessie-like Nessie I have come across and one wonders where on earth the template for this monster came from. The backdrop to this cartoon was the discussion in Parliament as to what to do with this strange new phenomenon in a remote Scottish loch.

LOCAL RESIDENT: "Ye poor feckless beastie - get oot o' sicht while ye're safe! D'ye no ken the Hoose o' Commons,  Nineteen-thirty-three, has its eye on ye!"

From the Daily Mirror, 5th May 1971. The sign on the left says "Loch Ness Monster, £1,000,000 Reward". In 1971, whisky makers, Cutty Sark, offered an award of one million pounds to anyone who could capture the Loch Ness Monster. However, they began to get cold feet, and so asked Lloyds of London to underwrite the contest. The insurance company initially refused, saying the risk was too great. After being called chickens by the press, Lloyds agreed, on the condition that they got to keep Nessie!

 

"After all, what's a million quid these days."

The Daily Mail published the next cartoon on 3rd April 1972. It came after the police were unwittingly involved in the interception at the Forth Road Bridge of an alleged dead Nessie being taken out of Scotland. To the police's embarrassment, it turned out to be a dead elephant seal and an April Fool's Joke.

"Ignore it, Hamish McPherson - I'm damned if we'll be taken in again!"

From the Daily Sketch of 11th September 1970. A piece of newspaper lies beside Nessie with the headline, "Sex Potions in Loch to lure Nessie". This was a gift to cartoonists as the Loch Ness Investigation Bureau began to use the ground up reproductive organs of various animals such as eels as bait introduced into the loch. It didn't work.

 

"Ah warned ye if ye went swimmin' ye'd get covered wi' the stuff!"

On the 11th September 1973, The Sun parodied the arrival a few days earlier of a Japanese expedition to find Nessie. Despite having a miniature submarine at their disposal, the search was an unqualified failure as they headed back two months later having found some non-descript bones and recorded a strange noise.

 "Ah so. Honourable Nessie - unable to resist traditional Japanese bait!"

And to finally bring us up to date, here's one of the many cartoons depicting Nessie's view on the recent Scottish Referendum on independence (Daily Mail, 10th September 2014). More cartoons to follow in a future post.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

The Nessie Effect

People love a mystery and they don't get much better than the Loch Ness Monster. So when tourist agency VisitBritain decided on Nessie as their mascot for promoting the Loch Ness area and beyond, it was a no-brainer.

Why that's? Because there is a monster in Loch Ness. Now at this point, sceptics will guffaw and splutter, but the Nessie Effect is one reason why some of their bank accounts are a bit bigger than they might have been.

You see, the large numbers of tourists filing through the exhibition centres and then coughing up for the boat cruises and souvenirs are lining the pockets of people who don't even believe there is a monster in Loch Ness. That must be a real weight on the conscience. It is certainly a weight on their wallets.

Then again, maybe this is all not so hypocritical. After all, some will subject their customers to their sceptical theories once they have them in the middle of the loch and they can't swim away! Do these tourists ever come back once their expectations about the monster are ruined by these people? I think, probably not.

Sure, some will claim tourist numbers are up. I say they could only have gone up after the depths of the Credit Crunch. I also argue the numbers would be higher if people were more positive about the creature they consign to mythology. In other words, the Nessie you will see promoting the cause of filling the coffers, will probably not be too far removed from the green, fluffy tat that inhabits the souvenir shops that line the loch. 

To some extent, I agree with hoaxer, George Edwards - the real Nessie needs to be promoted more. But I don't agree with his methods of doing it via fake photographs. I say, take your stand and argue the case against less than convincing theories from the other side.

Most people will see nothing when they arrive at Loch Ness, some will see something that is readily explainable, others will see the monster in its various degrees of awe-inspiring splendour. Get along there, take in the scenery, enjoy the facilities and don't forget to take the lens cap off if Nessie puts in an appearance!

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

Boat Collision With Nessie?

I caught this article on two alleged collisions between boats and the Loch Ness Monster. The first I did not recall and wonder if anyone knows any more about it? Original article here but reproduced here before it is pulled.

In the second incident, retired truck driver Stanley Roberts has revealed that a holiday cruiser, he owned was immobilised in a tragic collision on the loch near Urqhuart Castle. An elderly man aboard the cruiser suffered a heart attack and died following the incident around 1978, says Mr Roberts, from Lancashire who had rented the boat to the man’s family. Four bolts were stripped from the propshaft  and the propeller was damaged after the boat was pulled from the water at Fort Augustus.

Boatyard workers who then examined the cruiser "found flesh and black skin an inch thick along the propshaft", said Roberts, of St Helens, Lancashire, telling what had happened when he got a phone call from the boatyard telling him there had been an accident. He said, “The workers chiseled the flesh away and threw it into the Caledonian Canal. I said you stupid b-----s. It would have proved that Nessie was here.”

Stan, now 85, is in no doubt that the monster was most likely involved in a drama involving his cruiser. A family renting it collided with an unknown object near Urquhart Castle. "The propeller stopped turning. The family were very alarmed", said Stan. "The old man had a heart attack and seemed to have died. There was no radio on board so they  let off distress flares to get a tow back to Fort Augustus. The grandfather was taken by ambulance to hospital where he was found to be dead."

The rental managers phoned Stan at his home in St Helens to tell him what had happened. "They simply told me there had been an accident. It was only later that I learned more - what had been found on the underside of the boat when they pulled it out of the water." 

Told of the boat drama, Adrian Shine, of the Loch Ness project, said it was “very frustrating". With modern DNA techniques we could have learned a lot about exactly  what had caused the damage." Stan kept the cruiser on the loch for two years. 

I, too, express frustration that none of this black flesh was recovered for further examination. Black skin suggests it was not seals or dolphins, but then again, I don't know whether blackness occurs during subsequent decomposition; but it cannot be discounted that the sceptics' oft required, but seldom seen seal could have been involved.

This seems a new story, but if anyone knows of this case, can they leave a comment. Mr. Roberts then tells of his own personal sighting.

His reason for being convinced that Nessie was involved was partly an  earlier encounter he had himself. "I had just bought the boat and my family were up at Fort Augustus for a two-week trial run. The water was rough but the boat handled really well. That night I couldn't sleep so around 5am I got up to stretch my legs.

"The water was dull silver, flat as a mirror. I looked down the loch towards Foyers and I saw a black dot which I thought might have been a local fisherman. The dot continued to grow taller as it came towards where we were moored. "Then I thought to myself, 'There's no outboard motor!" It was then I realised its head and neck were like polished black leather.

"It gently lowered its head - and not a splash. It was so beautiful, you wouldn't believe it. It was like a nuclear sub going down. The bow wave travelling across the loch, bounced my boat like a cork. My wife was awakened by the commotion. And she told me off for rocking the boat.

The second incident is known to Loch Ness researchers and involves Lt Commander Francis Russell Flint in 1943. With the help of Henry Bauer, these details were forthcoming.

Details only emerged in 1969 when Lt Commander Francis Russell Flint wrote a letter to the Daily Telegraph. Flint said he was in charge of a Navy motor launch travelling from Leith to Swansea with about 20 men on board. Near Fort Augustus travelling at about 25 knots, “There was the most terrific jolt,” he said.  Everybody was knocked back. And then we looked for’ard. And there it was. A very large animal form disappeared in a flurry of water. It was definitely a living creature not debris or  anything like that."

Flint, who died in 1977, talked about the incident for years, said family members. He told author and broadcaster Nicholas Witchell that he signalled the Admiralty, “Regret to inform your Lordships, damage to starboard bow following collision with Loch Ness Monster. Proceeding at reduced speed to Fort Augustus.”

Flint said the Navy were not impressed with his signal. He got a “bit of a blast” when he returned to base. However Flint was an official war artist and painted a picture of the Loch Ness incident which went on display at a gallery in Leeds. It is not known where the picture is currently.

Sceptical cynics will suggest Flint made up the story to cover up his navigational inadequacies as he hit one of the local rocks. Funny how he kept talking about a monster into retirement ...

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

I Like These ....

Check them out (I'm not on commission).

Upcoming Fortean Conference

Just a heads up on an upcoming conference in Edinburgh next month. Entitled "The Scholarly Research of the Anomalous Conference", it will be held at The Counting House, 36 West Nicholson Street, Edinburgh EH8 9DD on Saturday, 21st February, 2015 from 1130 to 1830. Scheduled speakers and subjects are as follows:

Mike Dash –  Our Artist Pictures What the Witness Saw…

Roger Musson – The Enigmatic Bala Earthquake of 23 January 1974

Darren Naish – The Evolution of Sea Monsters in Terms of What people Report

Theo Paijmans – The Nazi Flying Saucer Mythos

Charles Paxton – Eyewitness Testimony and Bigfoot at the Botanics

At the end of the event there will be a panel session featuring all five speakers and the chairman will be Gordon Rutter.

Tickets cost £20 and include a buffet lunch and can be bought by submitting a Paypal payment to Charles Paxton at cgp2@st-andrews.ac.uk for £20.  No tickets will be issued so bring your Paypal receipt on the day, tickets are also available in person from the organisers, Charles Paxton and Gordon Rutter, and at meetings of the Edinburgh Fortean Society.

More details can be found here. I aim to be there myself and hope to meet up with long time email-acquaintance, Mike Dash. Though it is not an explicitly Nessie conference, there will be overlaps with the lake cryptids which should prove information to that genre.

Leave a comment below if you have any queries about the conference.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

A Photograph from Loch Ness

A strange looking picture has emerged from Loch Ness this week. Taken by author Geoffrey McSkimming from Australia, it appears to show something in the loch as he took a picture of his companion, Sue-Anne Webster.

The trouble is he was not aware of anything at the time which adds to the mystery. Assuming the picture is not a product of the proverbial photoshop, the object does appear to be part of the scene as vegetation obscure part of its form.

However, from a Loch Ness Monster point of view, what might be interpreted as the head is very elongated compared to classic eyewitness descriptions. In fact, it look more like one of the herons occasionally seen at the loch, though even that does not look entirely a perfect fit as the "beak" looks decidely blunt. I certainly do not think it is a defect in the image.

Comments are invited as to what this object might be and the author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

If it is a photoshop job, Jens emailed me to suggest it is a PAPO Plesisosaur model. Okay, perhaps but needs a bit of stretching and editing! You can see the modern issue with coming up with a picture of the Loch Ness Monster that can evade the trap of digital image editing.

Original story:

Australian Adventurers Capture Loch Ness Monster

A pair of Australian adventurers have captured, in a photograph, this incredible image of the Loch Ness monster.

Geoffrey McSkimming, noted adventurer, world-traveller, raconteur and author, best known for the Cairo Jim and Phyllis Wong Mystery series of children’s adventure stories, and companion and fellow adventurer, Sue-Anne Webster, actress and freelance magician extraordinaire, were celebrating Sue-Anne’s birthday on the misty shores of Loch Ness, in Inverness, Scotland, when legendary lost dinosaur Nessie photo-bombed the happy snap.

Geoffrey reports that the pair had no idea the mysterious denizen of the deep was behind them, “Not until after we took the photo…oh my gosh! No! I swear when I took this photo there was nothing in the water.”

“No, there wasn’t when I looked either…she’s a teaser,” added Sue-Anne.

In the tradition of such pictures, the image of Nessie is indistinct, out of focus, blurry. Dour, unimaginative official types have described it as a smeared drop of water on the camera lens.

The creature, agreed by many investigators and scientists to be a prehistoric plesiosaur, a large aquatic dinosaur, probably became trapped in the deep mountain-edged lake in ancient times when it was still open to the ocean. The dinosaur has been given the tentative scientific name Plesiosaur McSkimming-Websterii. Possibly because the fabulous beastie skims through the water with large webbed flippers, and of course the Mc at the beginning merely indicates its Scottish origin. Why do scientists add two i‘s to the end of words to make them scientific? Nobody knows. It’s another mystery.

There are unconfirmed reports that this pair of mystery solving aces will now begin an expedition to the High Himalayas to discover the Abominable Snow Man.

Until then Geoffrey McSkimming’s children’s adventure stories are available in libraries, online and in all good bookstores, and the amazing Sue-Anne Webster is available for magical performances, including her world renowned I Dream Of Jeannie show.

Sewage, Phantoms and Ted Holiday

A recent post on the Zombie Plesiosaur page got me thinking about Ted Holiday's changing views on the Loch Ness Monster. He went from promoting the view that the creature was a large relation of an extinct invertebrate to something he classed as part of the Phantom Menagerie. What was not clear was how that transition panned out.

Holiday wrote three books which charted this change of mind. The Great Orm of Loch Ness from 1968 firmly puts him in the giant worm camp as he expounded on his mega-variation of the small but extinct creature called Tullimonstrum Gregarium. Its discoverer, Francis Tully, is shown below with a fossil to give you an idea of its size.

One or two interesting ideas came out of this theory, such as Holiday's idea that the Loch Ness Monster did not rely on fish as its staple food, but rather sifted through the sludge/mud/silt at the bottom as a source of nutrition. Whether this is a viable means of food for a number of large creatures is not known to me. Nutrient levels in lochs can be quite high, though whether they provide a balanced diet for a healthy monster is debatable.

Indeed, whilst there is talk of diminishing fish supplies in Loch Ness over the decades, a sludge processing monster may have seen an increase in food supply as human activity around the loch increased the amount of human and food waste nutrients being dumped into Loch Ness.

There are four main sewage treatments plants around Loch Ness and this is not the type of information you will tend to find in Loch Ness literature, so read on! Not surprisingly, they are centred on the four main population centres at Fort Augustus, Foyers, Drumnadrochit and Dores. So there is a sewage processing plant outside Fort Augustus, located on the opposite side of the River Tarff to the old Abbey building.

I can tell you from personal experience that you tend to smell it before you see it and it would not be the first place on your bucket list. I have occasionally gone between it and the river to get to Borlum Bay and I have yet to see anyone moving around the place.

There will be smaller processing plants such as the controversial one which was dumping semi processed human waste at the Visitor Centre at Urquhart Castle some years back. Loch Ness researcher, Tony Harmsworth, protested against it in years past. Overall, I would guess that at least 1000 cubic metres of processed effluent water is pumped into the loch every day.

Do these extra potential chemicals such as nitrogen and potassium do anything for a sludge sifting monster? Actually, though human activity has increased over the decades, with the attendant increase in waste, the efficiency of processing that waste has improved over the same time (though not in a smooth curve). So, whether extra nutrients have made it into the loch would require someone comparing water samples over the decades.

That prompted a side thought. Loch Ness is an oligotrophic lake being low in nutrients and high in oxygen content. If more effluence is pumped into the loch, then a process of eutrophication begins where the lowest forms of organism feed on this bonanza with the attendant knock on effects for further up the food chain and to more Loch Ness Monsters. One negative side effect is that the increase in the biomass can lead to oxygen levels depleting and some animals suffering asphyxiation.

Well, it was a mere gedankenexperiment, but Nessie has been reported for centuries, so it does not seem to matter how much of the smelly stuff ends up in Loch Ness.

But, Ted viewed sludge filtering as a viable proposition and cast doubt on any eyewitness accounts about feeding on fish. Now, if there is one thing that should be avoided, it is changing the data to fit the theory. Of course, individual cases can be disputed, but to consign a whole class of sightings to the bin because they don't fit your theory is more in keeping with the tactics of a sceptic.

But, on reflection, Ted did have a point as I cannot recall an eyewitness report where the Loch Ness Monster is seen eating a fish. We have reports, such as the recently posted article on John MacLean, where the creature is observed to be moving its head and neck in a way that suggests eating whilst in an area known for higher fish numbers.

But, then again, John MacLean does not mention seeing any fish in the act of being consumed. It is a matter of inference when fish are seen to jump about and the monster is seen to act in an energetic way about them. So, perhaps not so much a case of changing the data but re-examining that particular aspect of the sightings database.

Five years later, Ted Holiday was gravitating in the direction of the paranormal in his second book, The Dragon and the Disc. When he actually began to have second thoughts is not clear, but the odd, quirky things he thought were happening at Loch Ness were the catalyst.

So, where did his Tullimonstrum Gregarium fit into this new scheme? In his chapter, "What is a Dragon?", he reminds readers that he proposed a gigantic form of the Tullimonstrum in his previous book. He then says "my views on this have changed only in minor details". So, paranormal happenings come in but it remains a very biological creature.

Curiously, he likens the creature in the Lachlan Stuart photograph to a multi humped creature drawn on a prehistoric mound called the Knowth disc barrow in County Meath, Ireland. The disc barrow is said to be shaped in the same manner as the archetypal flying saucer and this gives you an idea of how Holiday attempted to synthesise these two "cults" into one recurring theme.

Whilst in the domain of dragons and discs, Holiday mentions a conversation with the paranormalist, John Keel. Holiday says that Keel had warned him to:

Proceed with great caution in your Loch Ness work. We are caught up in a series of games which must be played by 'their' rules. Anyone who tries to invent his own rules, or break the basic patterns, soon loses his mind or even his life.

Six years later, Ted Holiday was dead at the premature age of 59. The cause was natural enough being a heart attack but one can't help wondering if Holiday believed his days were numbered, having had a smaller heart attack the year before.

Do Loch Ness researchers live shorter lives or only those who are engaged in work too "close" to the truth? What about those like myself who seek biological explanations or those who simply seek to dismiss the whole thing as hysteria?

I would not have thought cryptozoologists live short lives. Roy Mackal lived to 84 years and I can think of others who are or were similarly aged (such as Loch Ness paranormalist, Winifred Cary). Indeed, John Keel himself lived for 79 years. Doubtless, there are those who died prematurely, but nothing to suggest anything beyond the norm. The conclusion is that Ted Holiday was just unlucky in the number of years allotted to him.

Did any lose their minds, as Keel suggested? That is a bit harder to determine and no doubt some will readily and cynically suggest anyone who is not a sceptic has lost some or all of their mind. But, I am not aware of any who became clinically and mentally ill (though statistically there must be some).

But moving on, by the time he wrote the manuscript in the late 70s for his third work, "The Goblin Universe", the change was complete. In Appendix A, he tells us that the question of whether these phantom creatures are biological or not is one of the big mysteries of our time. He then states he believes they are not biological. So there you have it, the transition is completed in the third and final book (which was published posthumously by Colin Wilson in 1986).

But was that the end of the transition? In Colin Wilson's introduction to "The Goblin Universe",  he tells us that Holiday sent the transcript to him in 1977. Wilson enthusiastically wrote to him and told him he would recommend it to his publisher. However, no reply was forthcoming for months.

Then Holiday unexpectedly wrote to Wilson saying he was dissatisfied with the book, was scrapping it and was writing a new one. Wilson obtained the transcript of the fourth book after Holiday's death and was disappointed to find it was a more generic book on lake monsters lacking the "daring range and sweep" of the Goblin book.

Having compared his own paranormal research to that of Holiday, Colin Wilson concluded that Holiday had not abandoned his belief in a paranormal Loch Ness Monster, but rather he had abandoned his objective to find and "present an unanswerable case for the Goblin Universe". For that reason, he gave up on the book. Sadly, both men are now dead and the whereabouts of Holiday's fourth and final book is unknown.

We all go through changes of opinion in our lives. Most since the 1980s have been to the sceptical side. Holiday's change was by no means unique in his day as there was a noticeable shift to a paranormal paradigm from the late 1960s into the early 1980s across various phenomena.

His was not a change, though, that was borne out of jumping on a bandwagon. He genuinely believed he had experienced things at Loch Ness that went beyond the mere biological or coincidental. Since his death, no one has seriously taken up that particular mantle and I think Loch Ness research is that little bit poorer for its absence and, come to think if it, his absence.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com