The Pole Like Nessie Sightings

I would like to address a class of Loch Ness Monster sighting that has proved unusual within the context of a generally unusual phenomenon itself. I am referring to the pole like appearances of the Loch Ness Monster, if indeed that is what they are. 

To clothe this in some familiarity, I refer readers to perhaps the most famous of "pole Nessies" and that was Father Gregory Brusey back on the 14th October 1971. Relating one account of his sighting from his obituary (he died in 2001):

It was a lovely morning, and the sun was warm and the water smooth," he recounted to The New York Times in June 1976. "And with me was a friend, an organist from London. We suddenly noticed a big commotion about 200 yards out in the water, and then a black neck appeared, about eight inches in diameter and seven or eight feet high, followed by a hump. It rose, then dove sideways back into the water. It was not a boat or a log or a fish. It was a different animal.

The sketch below of his sighting is taken from Dinsdale's "Loch Ness Monster". Back in the 1970s and 80s, Gregory Brusey became a kind of star witness for the Loch Ness Monster as any media group would almost resort to him by default for a good, contemporary Nessie story. It appears that he eventually got fed up with all the attention his sighting had birthed (though he stuck to his story).

To compound the curiosity of this type of sighting, Brusey had another sighting back in the 3rd May 1968, but this was of a more expected "horse like head and two large humps". What is it about these "Pole Nessies" that makes them to differ?

Other sightings describing the neck as a "pole", "pillar" or "periscope" throughout the 81 years of Nessie include:

"L.A.R." July 1933
John Cameron August 1933
"J.C." 1934
The Rolands July 1937
Dom Cyril Dieckhoff May 1940
Warden of Altsigh Youth Hostel 1949
Robin MacEwen 1956 
Cambridge University Expedition 1962
Peter Hodge May 1964
Gregory Brusey October 1971 

Richard Jenkyns 1973
Ian McKenzie 1974
Peter and Gwen Smith August 1977
J. Cameron December 1980  
Miles Cato March 1987
Simon Cooke July 1993
Robert Pollack August 2000


This gives us about 17 "pole" sightings from a total of about 200 head and neck sightings which is 8%. Neck sightings overall constitute 18% of the total sightings record. So this class of sightings is rare being only 1% of all eyewitness reports.

The main reason I was prompted to write this article was an email from a Dr. Simon Cooke who was led to tell his tale for the first time having read this blog. The story is told below in his own words.

Dear Mr Watson

I've read with interest your excellent blog on the LN phenomenon and thought you'd be interested to hear of a possible sighting experienced by my wife and myself on a August evening in 1993.

We were on our honeymoon, and staying at a B and B in Dores. Following a meal at the Dores Inn we walked along the beach. This was about 7 in the evening, and very clear and bright. The surface of the loch was very still. When we approached the far end of the beach we noticed what appeared to be a black pole sticking out of the water, which then sank down vertically. It was about a hundred and fifty yards from the shore.

The object continued to rise and fall for about three minutes, each time disappearing and then reappearing in a different place - sometimes to the left by a few feet, sometimes to the right. I knelt down and looked directly across the surface of the water, and could see clearly a small splash as it sank and rose.

Needless to say, we had neither camera nor binoculars (I don't possess a set). We weren't expecting to have what might be a sighting and were both surprised by what we were seeing. We both formed the impression that this was something living, and definitely not a log, although it did look like a telegraph pole rising and falling.

Out of curiosity I subsequently did some research. What we saw looked exactly the same as the object appearing in the Smith film, reproduced on Arthur Clarke's Mysterious World. Nessie or not, this was probably the same phenomenon, in about the same place.

I'm not making any great claims for this, but I thought you'd be interested to hear of it. 

Requesting further details, I was able to ascertain that the object was visible in spells of about 30 seconds with the height of the object varying by as much as five feet. It always submerged in a vertical manner, but they had the impression it turned on its axis as it went down. The date was revised to July 29th 1993 and the sighting lasted 3 to 5 minutes. Nothing else was in view on the loch surface. Simon included some drawings which I include below.

So what non-monster explanations can be suggested for what Simon saw? We will consider their merits here.

1. Jumping Fish

This explanation is best told by regular reader, Simon Dawes, who had this story to tell.

I actually wanted to share with you something that I saw that initially made my heart race but turned out to be a fish. It's something I've never heard mentioned but I saw it at Fort Augustus on the jetty. I was looking at the Loch and in my peripheral vision noticed something come straight up out if the water at a fair speed and drop straight back down.

So I carried on looking and it happened again and this time I had a clear view of what looked like a pole straight up and down about 3-4 feet long, I called my dad over and he watched it happen several more times. He knew that it was just a pike fishing but if he hadn't been there we both know what I would've thought I was looking at!

Pop reckons it's how they fish? Swim with the prey between them and the surface of the water and then shoot up so fast they come out of the water as they grab the prey. It fits what I saw but I've never seen it before or since.

That's a good explanation and will fit some sighting reports. However, the reason I don't think it fits the bill for the Cooke sighting, is that his object stayed above surface for up to thirty seconds.

2. Birds

Clearly, a long necked bird whose body may be obscured by the waves could occasionally submerge and come back up in the kind of intervals and locations mentioned. The problem here is that the object was described as pole like. No bird fits that description.

3. Buoy

There are navigation buoys in that general vicinity which will be tall, erect and of similar height. But they have a large extended body underneath and they do not sink in the manner described. It would not be a very good buoy if it kept sinking out of sight! They are also not black but more green and red to improve visibility to boat traffic.

4. Driftwood

Many branches and other parts of tree debris flow into Loch Ness from its various rivers and streams. It is a fact that some of these can take on a Nessie like appearance. Most will be easily recognised after some inspection. In rough conditions, one such branch protruding from a submerged trunk could give the impression of appearing and disappearing.

However, in this case, the loch surface was described as "very still" and the witness has already discounted a log as an explanation. The object also disappeared from view permanently.

5. Hoax

This brings us to another famous "Pole Nessie" sighting from 1977. It was an 8mm cine film of a pole like object taken by Peter and Gwen Smith (pictured below). Eventually, suspicion fell on a group of schoolboys who were nearby at the time and also claimed to have seen the creature while out on a rowing boat. The sceptical hypothesis was that they had rigged up a fence post with an anchor on a rope to fool the Smiths.

Now, as far as I know, no one has admitted to this proposed scenario, and neither has it been proven that the boys had the skills to pull this stunt off. However, the technical feasibility of the fence post trick has been demonstrated by Adrian Shine and was repeated in 2002 by researchers Richard Carter and Dick Raynor.

Could the Cookes have been fooled by a prankster or were inadvertent witnesses to an experiment? It can't be discounted, though some questions have to be asked, such as did Adrian Shine perfect this technique before 1993, can such a pole be moved to varying locations and can a pole be made to rise five feet from the surface?

The 150 yards distance may also be an issue, though it is possible our hypothetical trickster was hiding in the undergrowth beyond the beach to the left of the map above.

6. Monster

So what if the Cookes saw the Loch Ness Monster? It would be another of those strange pole like Nessies which seem to have no head and all neck. Now, I have said it on this blog before, I don't think the head and neck of Nessie is as classical as made out. I mean, I don't think it is a neck but more a proboscis. By that I mean an extended trunk or appendage but not a head.

The corollary to that is that it is boneless and very flexible and malleable in form. It may contain a mouth or sucking part that connects to the oesophagus. It may also have other sensory organs at its extremis. 

The consequence of this is an ability to stretch and tense itself via its musculature into a range of lengths and thicknesses. The pole like structure would be envisaged as its most tense and taut form. Why the creature would assume various proboscis postures is unknown. 

One final thought as regards this and the fossil record. Critics have asked for a precedent for the Loch Ness Monster from the fossil record. The plesiosaur is the obvious candidate but if we have a boneless "neck", I suggest it is less amenable to preservation as fossilisation is more a hard tissue process.

That does not make it impossible for something like an outline to be preserved, but it may be that when we are looking for Nessie precedents, perhaps we should not be so preoccupied with matching long neck vertebrae.

Interesting Sonar Image

Loch Ness researcher, Dick Raynor, posted this on his YouTube account a few days ago. He entitles it "Sonar Anomaly recorded on Castle Cruises tour boat at Urquhart Castle". The anomaly appears towards the end of the scan and the readings suggest it covers about 90 feet in the water but what it could be is open to interpretation. Dick offers no explanation for it on the YouTube page and I don't know if he rescanned the location to see if it was still there or if he has seen similar objects before.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

Skye Water Horses, Sea Serpents and MacRae

I found this old tale of a Water Horse from the island of Skye in my notes. I don't think it made it into my book, "The Water Horses of Loch Ness", so I include it here. It is taken from the 1905 book, "Misty Isle of Skye" by J. A. MacCulloch.

Referring first to page 122.

An open road crosses the moorland from Sleat to Broadford. It runs along the windy seaboard till, at  Knock, it turns inland through the scented moors, by many a ferny den, past Loch nan Dubhrachan, haunted (says romantic superstition) by a water-horse or kelpie.

This is expanded upon in page 239.

We may see traces of them in the water-bulls, water-horses, and kelpies which are said to haunt so many lochs and streams. The two former have the ordinary animal appearance, but are of a vast size, and naturally are very terrifying to the scared beholder. They pursue him, and when they catch him, carry him beneath the waters to satisfy their hunger. Foals and calves of a highly spirited temper are known to owe their male parentage to these demoniac animals. But they could also change their shape, appearing even in human guise, and luring the unwary traveller to the loch-side, where they resumed their awful form when it was too late for him to flee.

The nearer of the two Storr lochs. Loch Fada, is known to be haunted by a water-bull; it was also the haunt of a water-horse, slaughtered with a knife after it had killed a man. Loch nan Dubhrachan, between Isle Ornsay and Knock, was also tenanted by a water-horse. As this latter loch is close to the high road, which here runs through a lonely part of the island, it is not to be wondered at that it is an object of local terror. The water-horse had a penchant for pretty girls, but they did not like his attentions. No young woman would venture near Loch Sgubaidh in Strath (where dwelt a water-horse), lest he should rush out and carry her off.

Rod Mackay in his "Glossary of Gaelic Magic" says that Loch Nan Dubhrachan was a transliteration of the old Gaelic meaning "loch of the black, stretched out one". Alisdair Alpin MacGregor in his 1935 book "Somewhere in Scotland", relates how the loch was actually dragged with a net in 1870 in an attempt to catch the creature behind so many local fears and stories:

Perhaps the most astonishing incident connected with a water-horse was the dragging of a loch in Skye with a view to capturing this evil monster. Between Knock and Isle Oronsay, in the Sleat of Skye, is a loch called Loch nan Dubhrachan. So persistent in the neighbourhood were stories of the manner in which “a beast” inhabiting this loch sought to waylay islanders who dared to pass by at night-time that eventually it was decided to drag the loch with a large net.

This was actually carried out in the year 1870; but the water-horse astutely evaded capture! During the dragging operations, however, the net became entangled with some obstacle under water. This so terrified both spectators and those engaged in dragging the net on opposite sides of the loch that they all fled to their homes, convinced that at long last they had proved the existence of the water-horse.

Some years ago I visited an old man named John MacRae, who lived in a cottage by the steading within earshot of the Old Manse of Glen Elg, and who, as a boy at Isle Oronsay witnessed the attempt to capture this water-horse. So noisy in spate was the burn at the end of John MacRae’s cottage that at times I used to find conversation with him quite an arduous undertaking, even when the door was shut. But I managed to take down from him, verbatim, the following account of the dragging of Loch nan Dubhrachan:

“I was there myself at the loch between Isle Oronsay and Knock,” said John MacRae, “when they trawled for the each-uisge - for the water-horse like - just in yon loch below the road. It’s called Loch nan Dubhrachan. A cattleman and his wife came to cut rashes to thatch the house. They sat down to take a rest and the man observed a small, black object on the shore of the loch. ‘Look!’ he said to the wife, ‘that will be one of the farmer of Knock’s cows washed ashore, and that was drowned in the loch, or maybe one of the sea-cows they would be seeing in olden times.’

”So he went down. As he neared, the beast swam out with his head below water, putting little waves ashore. You may be sure the people was terrified. They were certain it was the each-uisge. So Lord MacDonald said he would dredge the loch - trawl it like, for the monster. Well, he got all his gillies and gamekeepers out one day with a big net. And they started walking along opposite sides of the loch like, dragging the net after them.

“I saw the thing myself. I was a boy going to school. We got a holiday that day. Well, we were all watching carefully when the net got stuck, and all the gillies got the fear of death on them. So they just dropped the net, and ran back from the loch. I mind the day fine. A while after they commenced again; and after a while the net came away on a sudden. Well, then, they pulled it in like, afraid all the time what would be in the net.

“Is it pike you call them long things?” inquired MacRae, demonstrating an approximate length from the tip of the forefinger of his left hand by placing his right hand sideways on his left arm.

“Pike, I think you call them. Anyway,” he concluded, “there was nothing in the net at the finish but some mud and two small pikes.”

An interesting tale and made that little bit more interesting by the mention of local man, John MacRae. You may recall the near legendary tale of Dr. MacRae and his Loch Ness Monster film. Thanks to the research of Mike Dash, we can now be fairly certain that Dr. MacRae was a Farquhar MacRae who lived from 1855 to 1948, having retired to the small village of Ratagan by Loch Duich. Mike also mentioned that Farquhar had a brother called John.

From our account here, John was a schoolboy in 1870 and so was likely born around 1855-1860. Since Farquhar was born in 1855, that certainly make this John MacRae a contender to be a sibling. Moreover, the interview with Alisdair MacGregor was conducted in 1932 in Glen Elg, about six miles to the west of Ratagan. Unfortunately, 1932 probably predated the Loch Duich film by a few years, so one would presume MacGregor would be unaware of any such film.

SEA SERPENTS 

However, it seems sea monsters stories ran in this family. Is this significant? Probably not, but the family name of MacRae and strange monsters is carried further by the well known account of a sea serpent sighting by the Reverend John MacRae in August 1872.

This John MacRae was church minister of Glenelg and had his sighting about 10 miles as the boat travels from Loch Duich. His testimony may suggest a multi wake aberration, though the behaviour of the object(s) suggests otherwise. Perhaps it was seven otters swimming in a line!

The account and sketch below are taken from A.C.Oudeman's "The Great Sea Serpent".

As we were getting the cutter along with oars we perceived a dark mass about two hundred yards astern of us, to the north. While we were looking at it with our glasses (we had three oil board) another similar black lump rose to the left of the first, leaving an interval between; then an other and an other followed, all in regular order. We did not doubt its being one living creature: it moved slowly across our wake, and disappeared. Presently the first mass, which was evidently the head, reappeared, and was followed by the rising of the other black lumps, as before.

Sometimes three appeared, sometimes four, five, or six, and then sank again. When they rose, the head appeared first, if it had been down, and the lumps rose after it in regular order, beginning always with that, next the head, and rising gently; but when they sank, they sank all together, rather abruptly, sometimes leaving the head visible. It gave the impression of a creature crooking up its back to sun itself. There was no appearance of undulation : when the lumps sank , other lumps did not rise in the intervals between them. The greatest number we counted was seven, making eight with the head, as shown in the sketch N°. 1.

The parts were separated from each other by intervals of about their own length , the head being rather smaller and flatter than the rest , and the nose being very slightly visible above the water; but we did not see the head raised above the surface either this or the next day, nor could we see the eye. We had no means of measuring the length with any accuracy, but taking the distance from the centre of one lump to the centre of the next to be six feet , and it could scarcely be less , the whole length of the portion visible, including the intervals submerged, would be forty-five feet.

Whether Farquhar MacRae knew of this story or was a relation of Rev. John MacRae is not known. What is known is that a small stretch of the East of Scotland had its fair share of monster lore.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

Sonar Hit of Nessie?

A Loch Ness researcher recently put up a link on sonar equipment for Loch Ness. That was interesting enough in itself, but a further link to the story below was more interesting from a monster point of view. To quote:

Using the bottom of the range Bronze FLS, a customer spotted what appeared to be the Loch Ness Monster moving around the loch. Mr Duffin contacted us recently with photos he had taken of his FLS Bronze in deep water at Loch Ness, Urquhart Castle asking what we thought, has he found Nessie?. It looks like a real target or something large - so who knows.....

Approximately 50 ft in length, the object spotted was moving up and down and side to side on the screen of the FLS Bronze. The pictures have been scrutinized by several of our sonar experts and would appear to be that of a genuinely large aquatic beast.

The quality of the sonar is not up to the detail of the latest equipment that can be bought at affordable prices, but what was it that was registered on the sonar that day? A rogue side echo, one of these alleged submersible logs, an algae bloom or a large creature?

Forthcoming Talk on the Loch Ness Monster

I will be giving a talk on the F. C. Adams photograph at the Edinburgh Fortean Society on Tuesday 9th June at 7:30pm. Whatever you may think of this picture, my talk will reveal new information and analysis concerning it. I will also consider the investigative tools and techniques that encompass such a subject.

Comments should be limited to the talk rather than the nature of the photograph as I will publish the details of the talk after it has been given. The venue for the talk is Downstairs in the Crypt Bar at the Jekyll and Hyde Pub, 112 Hanover Street, EH2 1DR.

A Couple of Clippings from 1933

Cryptid researcher, Paul Cropper, sent me a couple of PDFs from the Dundee Courier from the early days of the Loch Ness Monster in 1933.

The first is dated 23rd May 1933 and this one of the earliest clippings on the subject. As a comparison, the Aldie Mackay story which kick started the Loch Ness Monster story appeared three weeks earlier on the 2nd May in the Inverness Courier.

The text reads:

LOCH NESS MYSTERY "MONSTER" - Once again a sea monster is reported to have been seen on Loch Ness, near lnverfarigaig, where the water reaches a depth of 700 feet. Mr Shaw, of Whitefield, Inverfarigaig, who previously disbelieved that there was a monster, saw it a few days ago, and, calling his son and a friend. they watched it for about ten minutes through a telescope. Photo shows Mr Shaw and his friends, who are keeping a regular look-out in the hope of seeing it again.

The Mister Shaw in question was Alexander Shaw, who was interviewed by Rupert T. Gould for his 1934 book, "The Loch Ness Monster and Others". The relevant testimony is on page 40 and is reproduced below (click on the images to enlarge).

I note that Mr. Shaw is stated to have lived in a house about 150 feet above the loch at Whitefield. I wonder if this is the same house that would later be occupied by Lachlan Stuart, who took his famous monster picture in 1951?

The second clipping is dated 27th December 1933 and concerns the discovery of a pile of bones which has been covered here before. The picture belows add some more facts, though the conclusion is still the same that these bones did not belong to a Loch Ness Monster.

LOCH NESS DISCOVERY - A quantity of bones and teeth of an animal long dead have been found near Urquhart Castle, on Loch Ness-side, by Mr A. O. M'Laren. After consultation with Mr H. E. Peters, curator of Inverness Museum, who expressed the view that the bones do not resemble those of any domestic animal, the bones have been sent to South Kensington Museum for identification. Mr E. Fraser. the custodian of Urquhart Castle, is seen examining the heap of bones.

These bones would have been sent to South Kensington Museum around the same time as the infamous casts of tracks found by Marmaduke Wetherell. Unlike the tracks, nothing more is heard of these bones.

Those Otters Again

Somebody takes a picture of an otter in a Nessie like position and the media come out saying this is a "common cause of Nessie sightings". Dr. Jonathan Wills recently took the above picture of an otter swimming around the port of the town of Lerwick on the Shetland Islands.

After a recent hoo-haa about pesky logs fooling people into seeing plesiosaurs and even the tired earthquake theory again producing a small rumble, it's the turn of the humble and unassuming otter to deceive those incredulous witnesses.

Now there is nothing new about otters and Nessie. Within months of a strange sea monster being reported in the Highland loch in 1933, otters were one of the first explanations to be trotted out in the defence of normality. It's a situation I thought was best summed up in the picture below.

Ever since then, they have occasionally been dragged out of their holts to explain various sightings. I covered one such case in 2012. It was the Harvey-MacDonald land sighting from 1934 in which it was suggested the witnesses mistook a three foot otter for a ten foot monster.

Now, don't get me wrong. People can mistake branches, otters and earthquakes for thirty foot monsters. As I have said before, if they saw the otter at 500 yards for 2 seconds in a fog, then I can entertain the idea that they got it wrong.

At the same time, such a sighting is hardly likely to make it into the Nessie Hall of Fame. In fact, it would be lucky to be recorded for future researchers. Of course, I am exaggerating to make a point. Each case is assessed on its own merits, but the principle still stands, the better the sighting the less talk of otters, please.

If we are going to approach this problem of eyewitness reports with a degree of quantifiability, I remind readers of my formula below and you can read more about it here. Sceptics tend to set W to 0.

I now await some journalist to exclusively reveal how "most Nessie sightings" can be accounted for by boat wakes.

What is the Most Popular Cryptid?

In the last ten years, Google has scanned, digitised and put online more than 30 million books. These proved to be a valuable resource a few years back when I researched my book, "The Water Horses of Loch Ness". 

However, with an estimate 130 million titles in print, the job is a quarter done. This means forgotten and perhaps valuable references to the Loch Ness Monster and its forerunner, the Water Horse, remain undiscovered.

In the meantime, I also put Google Ngrams to use in that book and apply it again here. This is a tool provided by Google for researchers interested in tracking trends of words and phrases in the scanned literature.

Below, I show the occurrences in the printed literature of the terms Bigfoot, Sasquatch, Loch Ness Monster, Nessie, Yeti and Sea Serpent. This is an interactive chart which allows you to highlight individual trends since 1933.

Since certain terms can represent the same cryptid, they are summed to give one representative trend. Here is the equivalent static image below (click on to enlarge) and you can go here for the source.

It is clear that the Bigfoot phenomenon is more than twice as far ahead as Nessie. Bigfoot overtook Nessie in the popularity stakes in the mid 1960s which coincides with the Patterson-Gimlin film. Given Bigfoot is very much more ensconced in the American psyche than the Loch Ness Monster, its superior popularity is more or less guaranteed unless a Nessie film of the same quality of Patterson-Gimlin turns up.

Why the Yeti is so high up is a bit of a mystery since photographs and eyewitness accounts are so thin on the ground. Note that like the Bigfoot, it was an image that triggered an uptrend when Eric Shipton's famous Yeti footprint hit the media in 1951.

Also note that the sea serpent has been a pretty consistent performer since the 1930s and even jousted with the Loch Ness Monster for literature hits throughout 1933 to the mid 1960s when Nessie began an upward trajectory. Apart from a slight dip after the Rines expeditions and the onset of scepticism, the trend for Nessie did not level off until the early 2000s.

Since then literature hits has stayed pretty constant as books and articles on the creature address it from the various levels of myth, legend and reality. One wonders what it will take to initiate a new trend in Loch Ness Monster literature?

However, with three possible books on the publishing horizon this year, the trend look set to at least maintain itself sideways. Try out Google Ngrams yourself to see what trends you can discover.

A Wee Bit of Monster Hunting

I went up to Loch Ness recently for a brief one night stint. The drive up from Edinburgh took three and a half hours amidst changeable weather but there was enough periods of warm and sunny weather to enjoy the loch and its grand vistas.

I normally do not go up on my own, so I took that opportunity to indulge in some good old fashioned monster hunting. By that I mean, just drawing up the car at some quiet spot by the loch with a good view and scanning the troubled waters for its elusive inhabitant. Naturally, the camera and binoculars were at hand. I took this brief video from one of those spots just north of Inverfarigaig on the quieter south shore.

They say calm weather is "Nessie Weather" though whether that is down to the beast or the observer is a matter of opinion. My view tends to the latter, the creature is simply easier to spot on calm waters. I don't think the monster is bothered about the state of the weather above it, being a dweller of darkness. As I watched the dozens of one and two foot breakers continually agitating the waters, I could easily imagine missing a living hump surfacing briefly in a shallow manner.

I sat in my car in a very sedentary manner scanning the loch whilst eating my Pot Noodle and mulling over various matters in my head. After all, to stare at the loch for three hours like some programmed robot is a bit taxing on the physical and mental faculties. Or to put it more bluntly, boredom can set in after a sustained period. That is why it is good to punctuate the session with some other diversions.

In fact, the old met the new that weekend as I moved on from the old technique of watching the loch to collecting the trap cameras I had set up the previous August. There were three in total and they were all still in place when I got to them. Well, not quite. I had one camera strapped around a tree trained on the loch. However, when I got there, it was now pointing along the shoreline, a change of ninety degrees to the north.

I speculated that some wag had played a trick on me and repositioned the camera. That view changed when I opened the camera and water poured out. The camera had not been moved by human force, but by storm force. Then I remembered that some weeks back, Loch Ness had experienced its worst storms in twenty years. The B&B owner had told me of their ferocity and how a fallen oak had narrowly missed their house. Viewers of Steve Feltham's facebook page will also recall how the waters at Dores Bay had nearly reached his home.

Okay, I wasn't too hopeful that I would get anything from this camera, so I went back to the B&B and examined the cameras (whilst watching the Augusta Masters of course).  The dry cameras were okay but had strangely recorded next to nothing, not even swaying bushes and furry animals. The flooded camera totally failed to power up in any way, which came as no surprise. The camera had been about two foot above the ground at its lowest level, but I can quite believe that this still allowed it to be partially submerged during the storms. 

Remarkably, the SD card inside had survived and I had pictures to look at! In all, it had taken a surprising 2100 pictures before the batteries packed in by late October. That was a lot more than normal and most of these were of waves breaking on the shore beneath the camera. In terms of specification, the camera takes a sequence of three pictures on detecting motion out to 15 metres. There is also an infrared sensor which will trigger the same run during the night.

The first picture below was typical of the various images of boats that triggered the camera. Nothing remarkable there, but it gives you an idea of what to expect if a large creature swims by. The canoe below would be comparable in size to a single hump passing by and you can see there is sufficient detail in the picture to offer the hope of an unambiguous picture of a Loch Ness Monster - if it deigns to surface nearby!

Otherwise, a lot of pictures were of the type below - waves crashing into the rocks below.

At night time, the pictures take on a more surreal black and white aspect. Does the picture below depict a young Nessie trying to climb up a nearby rock? Not quite, it is the tail of a small mammal darting past the camera from left to right! I would guess it was a Pine Marten.

What the next picture depicts is not entirely clear to me, but that looks like a paw on the bottom left.

The identity of this creature is more certain - long neck, humped back, it has to be a heron!

The next picture below is a bit more puzzling, what is the object poking out of the water at about 7 o' clock near the centre of the image? Unlike the other triple trigger images, there was only one image of this object. Since there are three rapid sequences of images depicting bright sunshine, I deduce it was the brightness of the sun that triggered the snapshot.

But what was the object? Since it not a large object and its presence was fleeting enough not to trigger another image, my best guess is that this was a fish jumping out of the water.

As you can tell from the next picture, somebody came across the camera. They clearly did not steal it, so I thank them for their civility in keeping it there. This is not the first time, the camera has snapped someone having a look at it, but this is now one time too many, so I think I need to find a more secluded spot!

Overall, no Nessie pictures, but let us put this into context. The coverage of the camera is a notional 350 metres squared. The surface area of Loch Ness is about 56 million square metres meaning the camera is covering less than 0.0006% of the loch.

In fact, I need to rethink how to point cameras at the loch. Two thousand pictures of waves ensured that the unit ran out of power during a run from August to October. However, the camera is meant to run from August to April! I clearly need to position the camera higher to exclude the waves moving in below. Sunsets are also an issue as a bright sun setting on the opposite hillside can trigger quite a few pictures as well. Back to the drawing board.

AN INTERESTING STORY

Another venerable part of the tradition of monster hunting is talking to witnesses and other people around the loch.  As I was coming back up from the shores around Altsigh, I got into a conversation with a local man who had lived in the area for over six years. After exchanging the usual pleasantries, it became apparent the local was a keen angler and so I eventually asked the inevitable question about the Monster of Loch Ness.

Now, our man was sceptical of such a beast and likened it to believing in Santa Claus; however, he told a tale. Armed with torch and rod, he had gone out alone into the darkness to do some night fishing by the Altsigh.  It was during this nocturnal angling that something unexpected happened.

In his own words, he related how he heard a tremendous splash nearby accompanied by a "roar". At that point he belted up the slope and got as far from shore as he could. He demonstrated this "roar" to me and for all the world it sound like something guttural which I could not quite liken to in the animal world. It was a bit like gargling without water, if you know what I mean.

Despite all this, he offered an explanation for his experience. Since he could not clearly make out the form of the object near him, he concluded in the cold light of day, that it had been a deer which had come off the hills to swim across the loch. He explained that sometimes deer do this when shooting parties hunt them (although there was no shooting going on at that time of night). he had gone back to the shore and satisfied himself that he had found the tracks of the offending animal.

As I pondered that story in my mind, his wife came up and joined the conversation. On mentioning this strange incident, she pointed out that he suffered heart palpitations for over a week afterwards. I could understand that happening, whether it was deer or not, but then she reminded him that he had told her that the dark form had reached above his own head height!

I eventually said my goodbyes to them but immediately evaluated what he had told me. I didn't doubt that deer would on rare occasions go for a swim across Loch Ness, but the idea of deer tracks nagged in my mind. I had just come up from the beach in question and it is a mainly pebbled affair flanked by an incline of trees, bushes and grass. So I was wondering how a deer could leave tracks in that context.

No doubt there are some areas where an imprint may be left (such as around the Youth Hostel), but nevertheless, if I had pressed him more, I would have asked how he knew those were the tracks of his presumed deer and why he had not heard the sound of hoof on pebble behind him beforehand. But, I will leave it at that, having recorded the story while it was still fresh in the memory.

MORE PICTURES

Meantime, the dashcam attached to the windscreen of the car continued to operate around the loch. Here is a clip of the run from Dores to Inverfarigaig. It is somewhere along this stretch of road that the Spicers had their famous view of an unknown creature lumbering from their left, only to disappear into the foliage on the other side.

Sunday morning began very wet as I left the Bed and Breakfast and I wondered whether it was worth doing anything else. But the sun was not long in coming out for a final stint of good weather and so (as mentioned above) I headed to Altsigh were two sightings of note occurred.

The first was the land sighting by Alfred Cruickshank in 1923 and I will return to that in a future article. The second was the close up sighting by John MacLean in 1938 where the Altsigh burn flows into the loch. I clambered down the bank near the Youth Hostel and made my way to the estuary to take some pictures for the MacLean article, but I also add them here.

The first picture is looking up towards the Altsigh burn from the loch.

The next view is of a small spit of land bisecting the river to the right and the loch to the left. It is not known whether this spit existed in 1938, but I could imagine John MacLean standing there casting his fishing line as a creature beyond his expectations surfaced only sixty feet from him.

And, finally, looking across the loch from this small shingle beach.

After exploring this region and just generally watching the loch under the warmth of the sun, it was time to head back south to Edinburgh. I hope to be back in May. In the meantime, I include another dashcam footage as I headed out of the village of Foyers heading south. It was along this stretch of the road that the curious case of Lt. Col. Fordyce happened.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

A Follow Up to the MacRae Film

Copyright: Süddeutscher Verlag

Loch Ness Monster researcher, Ulrich Magin, emailed me with a three hump photograph that has been on his files for years. While it is of interest in its own right, he wondered if it could have a link to the legendary MacRae film that was recently discussed on this blog? I reproduce the picture above with Ulrich's email below. 

You might be aware of me as a person that has commented upon the monster from time to time. I have read your column on the McRae film, and just possibly I have a clue. I am not very sure myself. There has always been an alleged Nessie photo widely used in German sources that appeared to be a still from it (or, if you want, a photo created in imitation of the alleged film). It might also be something completely different, and perhaps you know it. I enclose photos of two reproductions,

photo A from: Elke Kahlert (ed): Die Urwelt lebt. dtv, Munich 1972, p. 31

photo B from: Helmut Höfling: UFOs, Urwelt, Ungeheuer. Ensslin, Reutlingen 1980, p.280

Both give as copyright holder Süddeutscher Verlag, Munich. At the time (ca 1980), I contacted that publisher, never to receive an answer. Some magazine reproductions were better than the enclosed photos, and you could just discern an almond/slit-like eye in the conical head at the left, to the left of the pointed, frill-like ears.

The photo (and it might be a still from an early SF film I am unaware of, etc.), however, contains many elements of the description: "three humps, together with the neck and head, are clearly visible. The neck is held low over the water and seems to be writhing to and fro. During the sequence, a bird flies down and lands on a stone in the foreground, which helps to give scale to the picture.

The Orm's head appears to be bluntly conical in profile - rather like half a rugger ball, to quote Mr Dallas. On the crest of the head are two hornlike sense-organs. Starting between these, and running down the neck, is a bristly mane. Mr Dallas said that this mane reminded him of baleen; it is stiff yet flexible and the texture seemed to him fibrous rather than hairy. Slit-like eyes can be made out on the head but they are not very distinct."

Clearly visible on the photo (it is the same in both books, no variation in the waves) are large, regular, very unlikely scales on the humps, which have not been commented upon by Holiday.

By the way, there are a number of "authentic" Loch Ness monster photos that are only ever published in German media, and may have their origin here rather than in Scotland. Possibly this is one of them. Kahlert's book was first published in 1970, close to Holiday's account. It might be a German forgery. It might be a still from a SF film. It might be a still of the McRae film - who knows.

I would add that I do not recall ever seeing this photo. I agree with Ulrich that we really can't take this photograph further on our own. He has done the work at the time trying to track down further information. There is no background to indicate it was taken at Loch Ness and we know nothing about the photographer or his supposed encounter.

In that light, it could be anything from a staged hoax (such as this one from Germany) to a still from the MacRae film. I would only add that it was my presumption that the creature in the Macrae film displayed a longer neck. Anyway, if anyone has further information on this photo, send an email or add a comment below.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

A 1934 Picture of Nessie?

My apologies first of all for not blogging this picture sooner. I have been sitting on this for months ever since I photocopied the newspaper article in Glasgow (I don't think the story is available online). Fellow cryptozoologist, Scott Mardis, came across a very cropped version of the picture during his research which prompted me into action.

The picture was taken on the 10th June 1934, but the identity of the photographer is not known. My excuse for delaying was to go to Loch Ness to line up the hill contours to establish the general location, but I will assume it was taken at Loch Ness near Fort Augustus. The account of how the picture was taken was also printed (see below and click to enlarge).

However, the picture is not new to the general Nessie literature. Peter Costello, in his 1974 book, In Search of Lake Monsters, reproduces a drawing of the picture. Based on the shallowness of the hump, he does not assign great evidential value to it.

Roy Mackal also mentions it without reproducing it in his book, The Monsters of Loch Ness, and, like Costello, consigns it to the inconclusive category. Maurice Burton also includes it in his sceptical book, The Elusive Monster, as does Witchell in his The Loch Ness Story, but none show the photograph. Today is your chance to see the original article.

Looking at the picture itself, it is not of great quality and there may even be retouching going on by the picture staff (a practise that was applied across all manner of newspaper photographs in those days). However, the sea serpent researcher, A. C. Oudemans, had reproduced the picture in a 1934 dutch article (below) which improves the quality but is cropped in extremis. Certainly, this picture shows the object to be a dark object consistent with the witness description (as a side note, I have been intending to translate this article for months, bear with me).

If this is a picture of the Loch Ness Monster, then we are looking at it in its double hump aspect. The problem is the relative shallowness of the hump which opens it up to sceptical interpretations of boat wakes. The photograph below taken over forty years ago by the Loch Ness Investigation gives you some idea of the problem.

We have also have the controversy over bow wave pictures in the recent David Elder video and again the shallowness of the phenomena opens it up to such interpretations.

If you believe there is a large creature in Loch Ness, then it is reasonable to expect shallow hump photos. In my own view, the creature is a water breather and so any breaking of the surface is largely accidental and there is no instinctive behaviour behind it. So how does one distinguish a barely breaking hump from a bow wave?

Well, there is one way to quantify this and that is to calculate the height to length ratio of the phenomenon in the given image. Applying this to our various images above we get the following numbers (I have added error estimates since uncertainty is part and parcel of such investigations).

Daily Express 0.05 +/- 0.006

LNI wake        0.034 +/- 0.006

Elder picture   0.031 +/- 0.006

It is to be noted that the 1934 object is 47% greater in its ratio than the next highest. Obviously, this is not an exhaustive list, but the question has to be asked, how high can this ratio be for natural bow waves? If the object in question goes above such a limit, do we discard bow waves as an explanation in this case? At this point in time, the best number is 0.034 for the LNI wake.

Another point which tends to argue against a bow wave is the fact that there seems to be no other waves in the picture. You will note that the two example pictures of wakes display this extended nature, but there is not so much indication of this in the Express picture. The caveat to be applied there is that the quality of the picture mitigates against a full analysis.

So what is it? A bow wave or something else? If somebody can find a bow wave picture with a ratio that approaches the Daily Express object, leave a comment below.

POSTSCRIPT: One possible location for the photograph may correspond to the view below which was taken two or three miles out of Fort Augustus on the A82.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

Nessie for Scotland's National Animal

The unicorn is apparently Scotland's national animal; but should it be changed to the Loch Ness Monster? Tourist agency, VisitScotland, think so and have set up a petition calling for the change.

I have already signed the petition, I ask other Nessie fans to do likewise!

A campaign has been sparked to have Nessie usurp the Unicorn as Scotland’s national animal.

Scotland’s National Animal is currently the unicorn – a legacy from William I’s decision to use the mythical creature on his coat of arms.

The campaign, launched today at the VisitScotland expo 2015, led by Inverness cruise company Loch Ness by Jacobite and is calling on the public to support essie’s quest to be formally recognised as a more relevant National Animal of Scotland, or at least as the National Monster.

The first sighting of the Loch’s oldest inhabitant dates back to 565AD, and the age-old question that she may or may not still roam the Highland waters is worth millions to Scottish tourism annually.

Just this week internet giant Google launched its own quest to survey the waters of the great Monster, making the need for a National status even more time critical.

It is now hoped that the public will get behind Scotland’s most famous mythical creature, by signing a petition which will be presented to the Scottish Government in an effort to secure Nessie a rightful place in the country’s legacy.

Freda Newton of Loch Ness by Jacobite said: “We have been running tours of Loch Ness for 40 years now, with many of our visitors coming to search for, or at least catch a glimpse of one of the world’s most famous monster.

“Nessie is an icon and an asset. There is no doubt she attracts hundreds of tourists to Scotland every year and she deserves recognition. If not as our National Animal, then at least she should be awarded the title of Scotland’s National Monster.”

To help raise awareness of Nessie’s plea, a new Twitter account has been set up to give the Loch Ness Monster her own voice, as she outlines her manifesto for change. 

@RealNessie is spearheading the campaign – reaching out to people online to support her cause.

The campaign has already received support from The Monster Raving Loony Party who have vowed to make Nessie Scotland’s National Animal and a protected species.

A Couple of Items

If you use the Internet, you probably already know about Google putting up a picture for Nessie's 81st "birthday". Well, it's actually the 81st anniversary of the Surgeon's Photo, you can read about my 80th anniversary piece here.

There is also a special link to do their StreetView version of a trip under the waters of Loch Ness. My browser seized up when I tried it, Firefox just gets worse with age. On another browser, you get a cool trip down to the depths, but the distance from light to dark is brief due to the peat stained waters. Enjoy the trip.

When I watched Google's promo video, I was under the impression that the cruise boats at the Loch Ness Centre were used for the job. It turns out that Marcus Atkinson's boats were also (if not exclusively) used to do the 3D camera jobs, photos here.  Good job, lads!

While I am here, the BBC's Secret Britain is running an episode called Hidden Highlands of Scotland tomorrow. They will include an item on Mhorag, the monster of Loch Morar. I am not sure if Nessie features, but it's nice to see her sister get some airtime for a change.

The program runs on Wednesday 22nd April at 2100 on BBC One and you can watch it on iPlayer afterwards.

POSTSCRIPT: The Mhorag documentary can be viewed internationally at this YouTube link.


The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com

Denys Tucker, Nessie and the Powers That Be

Scott Mardis had posted on the Natural History Museum's treatment of Dr. Denys Tucker and his belief in the Loch Ness Monster. You can see his post here.

By coincidence, the Independent newspaper has now published a story on his dismissal based on records released under the Freedom of Information Act. You can read that here. Was he fired because he believed in the Loch Ness Monster or for more mundane reasons? Despite being a qualified zoologist, will sceptics still dismiss his claimed sighting of a large creature in Loch Ness? Of course, they will.

The Daily Mail is also running the story here as are the Mirror.

It to be added that Dr. Tucker had a march on the other scientists for he claimed a sighting of the Loch Ness Monster. That account is reproduced below in his letter to the New Scientist dated 27th October 1960. Click on the images and then right click for "View Image" (depending on your browser). Or you can view the original letter and replies from Maurice Burton, Constance Whyte and others at this link.

So you see, when the monster hoves into your view, things change. You are still a scientist, but you are now a scientist who has seen something inexplicable. Perhaps some of the highly trained sceptics who view this article can tell us what this professional marine zoologist saw in Loch Ness that day in 1959. To quote: 

"I, a professional marine zoologist of respectable experience, did see a large hump travelling across flat calm water between Inchnacardoch and Glendoe on 22nd March 1959, and do quite unashamedly assert it belonged to an unknown animal."

Dr Denys Tucker is not a name familiar to us today, but 56 years ago he was an eminent zoologist at the Natural History Museum whose star was very much in the ascendancy. Their youngest researcher by a decade, he was an expert in fish who was praised by his colleagues - until he claimed to have seen the Loch Ness monster, leading to him being sacked. Now new papers released under the Freedom of Information Act reveal details of his seven-year legal battle to be reinstated, including attempts to sue the Archbishop of Canterbury. 

Dr Tucker began his academic career after serving in the Second World War as a pilot, joining the Natural History Museum in 1949 as a scientific officer in department of zoology. He rose quickly to the rank of senior in 1951, and then principal scientific officer by 1957. A favourite of senior academics, his bosses once said: 'Most people who know him would agree that in intelligence he is to be classed with a few of our most brilliant colleagues.'

However, all that changed in 1959 when, after a trip to Scotland, he claimed to have seen an 'unnamed animal' breach the surface of Loch Ness. He wrote a letter to New Scientist magazine saying that the creature could only have been an Elasmosaurus, a subspecies of long-necked dinosaurs that roamed the earth 80 million years ago. Announcing his findings to the public, he concluded: 'I am quite satisfied that we have in Loch Ness one of the most exciting and important findings of British zoology today.'

While his announcement certainly fired the public imagination, and sparked three decades of academic research into the loch, his superiors at the museum were less than impressed. According to documents seen by The Independent, Dr Tucker was asked whether his new interest in Nessie was a 'suitable topic' for a lead researcher to be involved with. Questions began to be asked about his previous work and his shadowy disciplinary record, which allegedly included speculating about the sex lives of colleagues, and waving a pistol at a superior.

The final straw came in 1960 as Dr. Morrison-Scott was appointed the new director of the Natural History Museum, and decided that Dr Tucker had to go. The sudden dismissal so shocked Dr Tucker that he decided to launch a legal campaign to be reinstated which included suing the trustees of the museum in person.

While today that would mean dragging a bunch of academics into court, back in 1960 it meant launching cases against Archbishop Lord Fisher, then head of the Church of England, Harry Hylton-Foster, then Speaker of the House of Commons, two viscounts, and a marquess. This caused deep consternation in the corridors of power, with officials keen to shut the case down, worrying that if he won they would be stopped from firing a civil servant ever again.

Despite determined efforts by the government to keep senior figures out of the witness box, the case made it all the way to the Court of Appeal, before finally being tossed out. Dr Tucker never held an academic post again, and remained convinced that the establishment were involved in an attempt to cover up his findings at Loch Ness. Following the collapse of his court case he settled in Wimbledon, writing reviews and papers, before moving to France, where he died in 2009.

The author can be contacted at lochnesskelpie@gmail.com