The curious case of the Yeti and the twisted trees…
In 2011John Bindernagel took a trip to the Mount Shoria region of Siberia with other fellow scientists to examine evidence of a yeti. I’m not sure this trip did him any favors on the cryptozoology front, but who wouldn’t want to go looking for a yeti there? Hunters there claimed they found prints, possible hair and something rarely claimed at that time, a nest! Now when I think of a nest they may bed down in I think packed leaves and twigs for comfort, like other wildlife make but add in a big full branch pulled down over them. Assuming they want protection from the elements. Or a cave offering that same protection.
In this case, they found a unusual print and a small sample of grey hair in a cave, but the other proof that was to make up the “indisputable proof” was the twisted tree arches. Now I find arches everywhere, if those are proof then there are so many Bigfoot in New England there is no need to head to Russia!
Bending branches and shaping trees is not a practice just for bigfoot. Native Americans once used this method for navigation, or to mark hidden caches off food or a water source such an underground water source. Are we just labeling these things as bigfoot because as humans we once used them? Looking at these pictures I would think nature made, these in particular don’t look like any kind of special pattern to me.
But if they are found near a possible nest and footprints? That may give them more credibility I suppose.
But it makes me think now about and how we approach these arches here when we find them. If we want to consider one actual documented proof here’s what we need to make sure we are doing. Are we digging there to see if it is marking something underneath, water? Food? Look for a pattern of them and follow it, is it a worn down pathway like animal traffic makes? Is it taking you to what could be a nest or cave?
Here is Bindernagel thought of the trees found in Siberia.
“We didn’t feel like the trees we saw in Siberia had been done by a man or another mammal…. Twisted trees like this have also been observed in North America and they could fit with the theory that bigfoot makes nests, the ones we have looked at are built around trees twisted together into an arch shape,”
Tree twisting, also called splintering, have been claimed as evidence for decades throughout the Pacific Northwest and elsewhere.
Jeff Meldrum was also there to examine the evidence and he stated he suspected the twisted tree branches had been faked. Not only was there obvious evidence of tool-made cuts in the supposedly “Yeti-twisted” branches, but the trees were conveniently located just off a well-traveled trail.
Meldrum, did not sign the group’s statement endorsing “indisputable proof” of the Yeti, and returned to the United States. Was he wrong? I don’t know, but fooling around online I found a how to video to make branch arches in your garden, a bentwood arbor, there are nature artists who create them in the forest, and of course Mother Nature, who create them with the weight of her snow. Etc.
I think this showed us that we need to step up our game, if we see these shapes out there then we need to give the area a good investigation, if Bigfoot made it? Why did he put it there….
Sasysquatchgirl 