Guess What? Mysterious Creature Washes Ashore In Wake Of California Storms

This  story is appearing on a lot of news sites and on You Tube.  The animal is not that large and based on the circumstances I would have to say dog -I have not, obviously, examined the carcass!  Bodies bloat and even human corpses that have been in water for some time bloat up horrendously.

I think it's odd that one of these sources have asked a veterinarian for an opinion.  

WHY would an unknown sea creature be a quadruped?  Look -no sign of gills!

Carcasses wash ashore all the time and I find it very sad that in the 21st century people have suddenly decided to use them to make money or entertainment.  No doubt all the conspiracy claims will be appearing -secret US Government genetic engineering blah blah blah!

In my last book I looked at the "Montauk Monster" and all the sensationalist tripe that involved.  Does it matter whether it's a dog or other animal? Bury the poor thing.

A mysterious, hairless creature recently washed ashore on a California beach, stunning residents as it appeared in the wake of brutal storms that battered the coast.

The mystery carcass was discovered on a beach in Santa Barbara, according to the Daily Mail. The brown skinned creature displayed pointed teeth and sharp claws, yet residents were left baffled, unable to identify the strange beast. KEYT reports that the mystery creature was found near a drain washout, in an area where sandy water from the harbor flows out of a dredging pipe, east of Stearns Wharf.

Local residents were perplexed by the mysterious creature, though several offered their take on what the strange animal could be. Several suggested that it might be a bear or a pig, though KEYT anchors noted that the body was small, citing a branch near the carcass to demonstrate its size.

One Santa Barbara resident offered his thoughts on the mystery creature while being interviewed by KEYT.
“I’d say it looks like a combination of a seal and a dog with fangs, dried up, potentially,” he noted.
His friend had a different reaction to the creature, citing the apparent age of the carcass as a factor.

“To me it looks like a… reminiscent of a dinosaur. Like it’s just really old… It’s something you’ve never seen but like a dog, but ancient, you know? It’s old.”

Earlier this year, another mysterious creature was spotted in California, prowling the streets of Norwalk. As the Inquisitr previously reported, the large animal was captured on a security camera, and though residents at first thought it to be a mountain lion, its tail was inconsistent with that species. Experts asserted that the strange creature was more akin to an African lion than a cougar, though the local zoo confirmed that all of their animals were accounted for.

Another unidentified creature, bearing a striking resemblance to the body that washed ashore in Santa Barbara, was found on a beach in San Diego in June of 2012. Josh Menard, a snowboarder from Lake Tahoe, discovered the mystery carcass, which he described as about two feet long. The strange creature’s body had a shape similar to that of a pig, Menard noted, with a fat stomach area. The animal also sported a vicious set of canine teeth, distinctly different than those found on California’s most recent mystery creature.

[Image: KEYT via the Daily Mail]

Read more at http://www.inquisitr.com/1685690/mysterious-creature-washes-ashore-in-wake-of-california-storms/#PBzeXtyCT2KlVUSt.99

More On Those 'Abominable Snowman DNA' tests

This story just will not go away.  DNA tests prove one thing.  More DNA tests by others...well, I think the point is that this is why hair or other material that requires these tests should not be handled by just one lab, no matter how prestigious.

This is what BBC News online had to report http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-30479718

I did delete the image from the Patterson film and reference to hoaxers using Gorilla suits!

Scientists challenge 'Abominable Snowman DNA' results

By Steven McKenzie BBC Scotland Highlands and Islands reporter

 

 

 

 It had been proposed that hairs said to be from the yeti matched the DNA of ancient polar bears

A theory that the mythical yeti is a rare polar bear-brown bear hybrid animal has been challenged.

Last year, Oxford University genetics professor Bryan Sykes revealed the results of DNA tests on hairs said to be from the Abominable Snowman.

The tests matched the samples with the DNA of an ancient polar bear.

But two other scientists have said re-analysis of the same data shows the hairs belong to the Himalayan bear, a sub-species of the brown bear.

The results of the new research by Ceiridwen Edwards and Ross Barnett have been published in the Royal Society journal, Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

Among Dr Edwards' previous work was an attempt to carry out DNA analysis of a sample taken from bones of a polar bear washed into caves in north west Scotland 18,000 years ago.

 

 

A sub species of the brown bear could be behind the Himalayan myth

 

 

According to legend, the yeti is a large and elusive ape-like beast.

For many years experts have been seeking a scientific explanation for the Abominable Snowman.

Prof Sykes, along with other genetics experts, conducted DNA tests on hairs from two unidentified animals, one from Ladakh - in northern India on the west of the Himalayas - and the other from Bhutan, 800 miles (1,285km) further east.

The results were then compared with the genomes of other animals stored on a database of all published DNA sequences.

The scientists found that he had a 100% match with a sample from an ancient polar bear jawbone found in Svalbard, Norway, that dates back to between 40,000 and 120,000 years ago - a time when the polar bear and closely-related brown bear were separating as different species.

The species are closely related and are known to interbreed where their territories overlap.

  Experts have sought scientific explanations to the yeti legend

 

The sample from Ladakh came from the mummified remains of a creature shot by a hunter around 40 years ago, while the second sample was in the form of a single hair, found in a bamboo forest by an expedition of filmmakers about 10 years ago.

The samples were subjected to the most advanced tests available.

Prof Sykes said the most likely explanation for the myth was that the animal was a hybrid of polar bears and brown bears.

The research was reported widely by the media last year and, in July this year, published by the Royal Society.

However, following re-analysis of the same data, Dr Edwards and Dr Barnett argue that the hybrid bear does not exist in the Himalayas.

They said the previous research mistakenly matched DNA to an ancient Pleistocene polar bear, instead of a modern polar bear.

In their paper, Dr Edwards and Dr Barnett said their tests identified the hairs as being from a rare type of brown bear.

The scientists said: "The Himalayan bear is a sub-species of the brown bear that lives in the higher reaches of the Himalayas, in remote, mountainous areas of Pakistan, Nepal, Tibet, Bhutan and India.

"Its populations are small and isolated, and it is extremely rare in many parts of its range.

"The common name for these bears in the region is Dzu-teh, a Nepalese term meaning 'cattle bear', and they have long been associated with the myth of the yeti."

Prof Sykes and the other members of the team behind the earlier yeti hairs analysis have acknowledged that there was an error caused by an incomplete search of the DNA database used.

However, they said in a statement: "Importantly, for the thrust of the paper as a whole, the conclusion that these Himalayan 'yeti' samples were certainly not from a hitherto unknown primate is unaffected."

The response added: "We stressed in the original paper that the true identity of this intriguing animal needs to be refined, preferably by sequence data from fresh tissue samples derived from a living specimen where DNA degradation is no longer a concern."

Other hair samples said to belong to the yeti have been scrutinised by experts before.

In 2008, scientists in the US examined hairs given to the BBC which some had claimed were from a yeti.
The scientists concluded that the hairs - obtained from the north-east Indian state of Meghalaya - actually belonged to a species of Himalayan goat known as a Himalayan goral.

Dr Edwards has previously attempted to unlock the secrets of polar bear remains found in Scotland

In 2007, Dr Edwards began a process to extract DNA from what are believed to be the only polar bear remains to be found in Britain.

The skull, of which only a part survives, was discovered at the Bone Caves in Inchnadamph, in Assynt, Sutherland, in 1927.

Prehistoric remains of animals - including an almost complete skeleton of a brown bear - and humans have been uncovered in the caves.

Dr Edwards hoped to shed light on what the polar bear was doing in Assynt 18,000 years ago.
However, DNA had not survived in the bone fragment.

Dr Edwards was also involved in a DNA study of ancient brown bear bones that suggested the maternal ancestors of modern polar bears were from Ireland.

Previously, it was believed that today's polar bears were most closely related to brown bears living on islands off the coast of Alaska.

Attempting To Gather Scientific Evidence For Species Existence Using Non-Lethal Methodology.

This is from a draft paper I put together in 2009.  It was to be part of a paper I had hoped to present to the Eastern Cougar Foundation.   Comments are welcome.

 Above: Melanistic puma.

 Draft

          Attempting To Gather Scientific Evidence For Species

                                     Existence Using

                             Non-Lethal Methodology.

                                                                       

                             TERRY HOOPER-SCHARF

                                  Exotic Animals Register [EAR]

                                   

                                           United Kingdom

Introduction

   

From a very early age I learnt “science demands proof” and that, zoologically speaking, ”the body of evidence” is just that.  A corpse.   Without a corpse to dissect and study we are told that science cannot accept anything as existing.

The Carthaginian, Hanno, encountered a Lowland gorilla [Gorilla g. gorilla] briefly but that was two thousand years ago.  Andrew Battle, in the late 16^th century had encountered Lowland Gorillas and his account of this, as well as encounters with other forms of African wildlife were presented in a book in 1614.

Skulls, parts of skeletons and even skins were brought back to Europe, the UK in particular, but those travellers presenting this evidence were often laughed out of scientific places of learning.

Even though gorillas had been exhibited in travelling menageries –we know that in 1855,Wombwell’s travelling menagerie had a gorilla called “Jenny” on display and there are news reports of gorilla [“an African wild man of the forest”] coming in by ship in 1800,it was not until 1851 that the existence of the gorilla was scientifically accepted and catalogued.

In August,1902,Captain von Beringe succeeded in killing two gorillas but recovered only one body which was sent back to Europe and classed as Gorilla gorilla beringei –the Eastern Gorilla.

We have, in the UK, tracks identified by experts specialising in Felids at zoological gardens and even former African trackers running a deer park here, as being leopard [Panthera pardus].  Anyone picking up a field guide to tracks or even accessing the internet today can identify such tracks.  There have been hairs recovered by police after “big cat” incidents that have been DNA tested by two reputable laboratories and the results were Panthera pardus. 

There are also tracks and hairs consistent with the Puma [Puma concolor] and lynx species [Lynx lynx].  There are many very credible witnesses who have seen cats at close proximity [0-20m] and some of these were trained naturalists and one senior lecturer in zoology at a university who was also an expert wildlife consultant.  It is fair to say that there is also good photographic and video footage of non-native species.

We also have photographic records of large cat [puma] attack on horses and a large number of photographs of sheep, deer and other prey animals bearing all the signs of typical large cat kills.  Recordings of puma calls even.

Despite this, some experts say they still want a body as “proof” –a totally pointless exercise unless it is out of curiosity [Red Paper: Felids -unpublished]

It should be unacceptable that, in the 21^st century, science requires a corpse as evidence that a particular animal exists.  We can, with non-injuring ‘traps’ and other means, not to mention remote trail-camera traps, gain enough evidence that a species exists but killing an animal might have dire consequences.  What if a Felid or other animal killed is a female and has young.  Without the mother to provide food those young will die.  And without maternal training to give older cubs hunting skills they will need, those young can become “messy killers”.

And what if the animal killed is, say, the last male or female of the species,or at least last of a breeding pair?  The species is lost.

In the 1970s,there was a great debate, often heated, amongst Hominologists, those looking for the Sasquatch/Bigfoot in the USA and Canada and Almasty in the former USSR[source].  Leading US researcher John Green, along with Grover Krantz, put forward the same old argument “science needs a corpse as proof –so shoot a Bigfoot”.

Dmitri Bayanov, of the  Darwin Museum, Moscow, argued that, if the hominid was a relic primitive man population then shooting one would be homicide and at the time I came out on Mr. Bayanov’s side based on our not knowing how many such hominids there might be, if any, and if the last one of a breeding pair was killed the science might be happy but the species was doomed.

But in the 1970s we never had DNA testing or the other scientific and technical aids that we have today.

What I am putting forward in this paper are ways to gain evidence that science can study and base conclusions on without a body.  The methodology can be applied to most animals whether felid, canid or hominid.  It is based on past experience as a naturalist as well as other training that cannot be specified.

It is in fact an intelligence gathering methodology in which physical traces of a species as well as other visual data are gathered and analysed.  This information should then help decide the basis of how to proceed next.

And we must never forget the "Absence of Evidence" often quoted by what are called the "sceptics". Irving Copi the American philosopher, logician, and university textbook author. wrote:

"In some circumstances it can be safely assumed that if a certain event had occurred, evidence of it could be discovered by qualified investigators. In such circumstances it is perfectly reasonable to take the absence of proof of its occurrence as positive proof of its non-occurrence."

This is something that Carl Sagan once wrote about.  The argument from ignorance for "absence of evidence" isn't necessarily fallacious.  For instance,  that a new, potentially life saving drug poses no long term health risk unless proven otherwise. It might be argued that were such an argument to rely imprudently on the lack of research to promote such a conclusion, it would be considered an informal fallacy- whereas the former can be a persuasive way to shift the burden of proof in an argument or debate. 

 Carl Sagan criticized such "impatience with ambiguity" in cosmologist Martin Rees' maxim, "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence" (Sagan, Carl (1997). The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark (1st ed.). New York: Ballantine. p. 213. ISBN 0-345-40946-9. OCLC 32855551)

To put it in another way: jurors at a trial might be told by the prosecution that a defendant had been heard to say in a heated arguement "I will kill you!"  Ten days later the subject of this outburst was fond dead.  Therefore the defendant did it.  The defendant is known to have had a violent past. The defence would then claim "where is the proof?"

I was once astonished when Sagan, again, stated that there is no evidence that extraterrestrials (in "UFOs") are visiting the Earth -but there is no evidence that extraterrestrials (in "UFO") are not visiting the Earth.

A scientist at whatever level -university big name down to the lowly naturalist- must always keep this in mind in whatever field they are involved in.

 "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence"

 Feed-back is always welcome.

Terry Hooper-Scharf

Bristol

April,2009