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North America’s 'Loch Ness Monster' Spotted Again
Live Science ^ | today | Joe Nickell

Posted on 03/07/2006 10:49:06 AM PST by GreenFreeper

Dubbed “North America’s Loch Ness Monster,” the purported leviathan of Lake Champlain, “Champ,” has just resurfaced. On Feb. 22, 2006, Good Morning America aired exclusive video footage of “something” just below the surface of the water, possibly the lake’s fabled creature.

A pair of Vermont men, Dick Affolter and his 34-year-old stepson, Pete Bodette, had made the digital recordings the previous summer while salmon fishing. ABC consulted two retired FBI forensic image analysts, who concluded that the video appeared authentic, although they could not say what it depicted.

The incident added to a long list of Champ sightings, which have described a chameleonesque creature that is black, gray, brown, moss green, reddish bronze or other colors, and is between 10 and 187 feet long, with multiple humps or coils as well as horns or a mane or glowing eyes or “jaws like an alligator”—or none of those features.

Such sightings may be due to large fish like sturgeon, schools of fish, and other marine creatures. For example, otters, swimming in a line, can mimic a single long, serpentine creature moving in an undulating fashion. Other Champ suspects include wind slicks, boat wakes, driftwood, long-necked birds, and many other possibilities. A contributing factor is “expectant attention,” the tendency of people who, expecting to see something, are misled by anything resembling it.

Although many people believe that Lake Champlain may host a dinosaur-era creature, that is unlikely in the extreme since is the lake was formed only some 10,000 years ago.

Furthemore, a single creature could not live for centuries, nor could it reproduce itself, so there would have to be a breeding population for the species to have continued to the present. And—if there were indeed multiple plesiosaurs, zeuglodons, or other leviathans—over time a beached carcass or other certain trace of one would surely present itself. What's Down There?

The sightings could be explained by several otters, such as this one, swimming together...

... Or maybe people are seeing a longnose gar.

Image Credits: USFWS (top); Ohio Department of Natural Resources (lower)

Nevertheless, the two fishermen insisted they had seen something strange. Bodette stated that the creature was “as big around as my thigh.” Affolter admitted neither of them ever saw the entire body, although they estimated the length at 10 to 15 feet. In a report on the video, the Burlington Free Press observed (Aug. 18, 2005), “In one frame it almost looks as if the head of an alligator-like animal breaks the surface. . . .”

The newspaper noted that the Champ legend dated from 1609 when French explorer Samuel de Champlain described a creature the Native Americans called Chaousarou. In his journal, Champlain wrote that the species was reputed to range up to 10 feet long and that he had personally seen some half that length and “as big as my thigh”—words subsequently echoed by eyewitness Bodette. Champlain noted that Chaousarou resembled a pike with an exceedingly long snout and “dangerous teeth”—certainly alligator-like features. In short, Champlain’s description seemingly tallies with the creature the Vermont fishermen encountered.

The apparent match is instructive: the explorer was almost certainly describing a longnose gar, one of the Ganoidei subclass, which includes sturgeons and other varieties.

Although the video is insufficient for a positive identification, the men’s description does permit this tentative solution to the mystery. For four centuries gar have been astonishing people on Lake Champlain. During one of my investigative trips to the lake I interviewed a fisherman who had just witnessed a friend hook a longnose gar that—he insisted—was “monster” sized, measuring about 6 feet 4 inches long. He called this “the real Champ,” and dubbed it, appropriately, “Gar-gantua.”


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: champ; champy; cryptobiology; cryptozoology; ecoping; environment; lakechamplain; lochness; wildlife
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1 posted on 03/07/2006 10:49:10 AM PST by GreenFreeper
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To: GreenFreeper

"Although many people believe that Lake Champlain may host a dinosaur-era creature, that is unlikely in the extreme since is the lake was formed only some 10,000 years ago."

lol


2 posted on 03/07/2006 10:51:01 AM PST by Bingo Jerry (Bing-freaking-go!)
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To: blam; Carry_Okie; Chanticleer; ClearCase_guy; cogitator; CollegeRepublican; ...
ECO-PING

FReepmail me to be added or removed to the ECO-PING list!

Interesting day for sea creatures!

3 posted on 03/07/2006 10:51:04 AM PST by GreenFreeper (Not blind opposition to progress, but opposition to blind progress)
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To: GreenFreeper
" which have described a chameleonesque creature that is black, gray, brown, moss green, reddish bronze or other colors, and is between 10 and 187 feet long, with multiple humps or coils as well as horns or a mane or glowing eyes or “jaws like an alligator”—or none of those features. "

I hope none of these witnesses ever have to go and testify what they saw in court!

4 posted on 03/07/2006 10:51:43 AM PST by Abathar (Proudly catching hell for posting without reading since 2004)
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To: GreenFreeper
Here's another pic, captured at just the right moment:


5 posted on 03/07/2006 10:51:55 AM PST by RockinRight (Attention RNC...we're the party of Reagan, not FDR...)
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To: RockinRight

We're going to need a bigger boat.


6 posted on 03/07/2006 10:52:35 AM PST by Toto_for_breakfast
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To: RockinRight

Hey! Hey! Some of us are eating!


7 posted on 03/07/2006 10:53:03 AM PST by Spruce (Keep your mitts off my wallet)
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To: parsifal
Would you believe this popped up today. Coincidence? I think not!
8 posted on 03/07/2006 10:54:32 AM PST by GreenFreeper (Not blind opposition to progress, but opposition to blind progress)
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To: RockinRight

Alright I need to post article that will not prompt people to post pictures of Helen.


9 posted on 03/07/2006 10:55:14 AM PST by GreenFreeper (Not blind opposition to progress, but opposition to blind progress)
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To: Spruce

Not anymore


10 posted on 03/07/2006 10:55:36 AM PST by AppyPappy (If you aren't part of the solution, there is good money to be made prolonging the problem.)
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To: GreenFreeper

About once every 20 years, something that size bumps a boat in the Delaware River between Trenton and Philadelphia. Sturgeons, once plentiful there, are still reputed to be in the river but are rarely seen.


11 posted on 03/07/2006 10:56:28 AM PST by jjmcgo (Patriarch of the Occident since March 1, 2006)
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To: Bingo Jerry
between 10 and 187 feet long

Yep. And I'm somewhere between 1 and 50 feet tall.

12 posted on 03/07/2006 10:57:22 AM PST by xzins (Retired Army Chaplain and Proud of It. Pray for Our Troops!)
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To: GreenFreeper
Image hosting by Photobucket
13 posted on 03/07/2006 10:57:44 AM PST by digger48
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To: GreenFreeper

14 posted on 03/07/2006 10:58:09 AM PST by Muleteam1 (It's a mad, mad, mad, mad world but the comedians have all left the room.)
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To: GreenFreeper

I believe the 2 men mentioned in the article also saw a UFO, before they were overcome by the swamp gas.......... :-)


15 posted on 03/07/2006 10:58:38 AM PST by Pragmatic Warrior (Grow your own dope. Plant a liberal)
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To: Pragmatic Warrior

the last thing they knew they were hearing humans voices coming out of a pocket radio! Imagine that!


16 posted on 03/07/2006 11:01:53 AM PST by Republicus2001
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To: GreenFreeper

Has Ted Kennedy been seen dating in the area?


17 posted on 03/07/2006 11:03:39 AM PST by Spok (Est omnis de civilitate.)
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To: GreenFreeper

18 posted on 03/07/2006 11:03:48 AM PST by ASA Vet (Would you throw a bucket of water on Hillary if her broom were on fire?)
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To: GreenFreeper

A sea-otter? Glow-bull warning for the gullah-bull.


19 posted on 03/07/2006 11:04:06 AM PST by dhuffman@awod.com (The conspiracy of ignorance masquerades as common sense.)
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To: pcottraux

Aren't you supposed to be pinged for these?

:-)


20 posted on 03/07/2006 11:05:40 AM PST by Hoodlum91 (pcottraux says I'm special!)
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