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The Navajo Skinwalker & 'Skinwalker Ranch'

Does no one find it a little bit annoying that the only reaction these people seem to have to any visitation by a strange creature was to try and shoot it?

Possibly that is why events took such a sinister turn. Lets face it - if you make first contact with someone and they try to blow you away it is not going to leave you with a very good impression of them.

Also, if you consider that this land has been home to strange events going back well before the settlement of the region by Europeans it is possible to assume that whatever these critters are they may feel a greater sense of ownership to that territory and consider the farmers the intruders.
 
I knew a half breed Navajo who worked in South Africa a few years back. His grandfather lived on a reservation and told him stories about what I guess were skinwalkers - he related some of these to us - the description was very much like a werewolf in European legend.
 
I find it more than annoying. I find it evil. Did you notice that the reporter simply dismissed what the local Indians had to say about the place? By the way, Indians do not call themselves "Native Americans."

This place has a history. I have no doubt the native people know a great deal about what goes on there, and their shamans most likely know even more. If the local people are like most other tribes though, they will share only the most superficial of information with outsiders.
 
Bosbaba said:
Does no one find it a little bit annoying that the only reaction these people seem to have to any visitation by a strange creature was to try and shoot it?
Click to expand...

True, but remember we are talking about the US.

Seriously, though, it's a good point. This NIDS bunch appear to pride themselves on their adherence to quality scientific investigative techniques, yet when they have a chance to investigate the phenomenon first hand they prefer to repeatedly discharge high-calibre weapons into poorly-lit woodland. Obviously, this method has yeilded very important scientific data in the past. Not.

Mind you, since I'm certain the entire episode was made up I'm not going to get too uptight about it.
 
It is a point to remember(although it may be entirely unrelated to this topic) that some of the Ute Indian prophecies were interpreted by the early Mormon settlers as divine proof that the territory was to be their chosen land. One could argue that the Ute tribe have an apparently high degree of spirituality working in their favour.
 
Desperado said:
This NIDS bunch appear to pride themselves on their adherence to quality scientific investigative techniques, yet when they have a chance to investigate the phenomenon first hand they prefer to repeatedly discharge high-calibre weapons into poorly-lit woodland.
Click to expand...
It was the rancher, 'Gorman', who fired, not the NIDS team themselves. (Although in a sense he was an employee of NIDS.) The article doesn't say how many shots were fired, just that he "fired at both figures from a distance of 40 yards. The creature on the ground seemed to vanish. The thing in the tree apparently fell to the ground because Gorman heard it as it landed heavily.."

There wouldn't have been any point in firing again at the one that vanished, and he thought he'd got the other, so it may have just been the two shots.

Not that I condone shooting at things, but it seems they could well have been terrified of these apparitions.
 
Utah Ranch investigation

Has anybody been reading the "Skinwalker" stuff in the "Breaking News" section of FT's website (first bit here then the second part here )?
Mod Edit: These two links are dead but used to lead to parts 1 & 2 of the Las Vegas Mercury story linked to previously. Archived versions found via The Wayback Machine here: Part 1 Part 2

:eek:

If so was anybody else as blown away by it all as I was? If it was just the initial witness on his own seeing these things then I'd probably say it was some kind of money-spinning hoax, but here you have an independent research team actually applying some science and saying that they don't know what's happening! Does anybody know if there are any books out about this yet?

From reading the stuff in these reports I'd say there was more than enough to fill a weighty volume!!
Fascinating stuff. A bit of real mystery...unless someone can tell me otherwise.
 
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A bit familiar though

Wasn't there something similar to this reported in Tim Good's "Alien Liaison" come to think of it - but wasn't it based around a ranch in Colorado?

I seem to recall there were UFO sightings, Bigfoot encounters, Cattle Mutilations and disembodied voices...

Hmmm...just a thought. I'll have to find the book and check it out again.
 
Originally posted by Caroline:
NIDS claim to follow scientific method yet make an assumption from incomplete evidence
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It seems to me that NIDS are completely baffled by the whole thing.

re - the Velociraptor... Again, NIDS do not make any assumptions. The article states that
"...the print from the ranch closely resembled that of a velociraptor, an extinct dinosaur made famous in the Jurassic Park films. (For the record, no one at NIDS is saying he shot a velociraptor. They don't know what it was.)"
Click to expand...
 
There was a Discovery Channel program that aired
a year or two before "Walking with Dinosaurs" that
ended with shots of fossilized footprints intercut
with shots of a modern-day bird (a turkey?)
walking in mud and leaving much the same print.

An ostrich or emu would fit the bill for large reflective
eyes, swift movement and (I assume) the ability to
jump high fences in a single bound.

Thoughts?

TVgeek
- having a lucid moment ;)
 
Well, TVgeek, emus (and I assume, ostriches) don't (can't?) jump fences. They try to go through them sometimes and can end up totally trapped. Their eyes are about 3 " apart, not 3', and aren't notably reflective, but they can sure run fast - no doubt about that!
 
Thanks, Sebastian...
I don't think any land animal has
EVER had a 3 foot
span between its eyes...
except my neighbors Newfoundland! ;)

Were they seeing 3 creatures? One in the tree
and two on the ground? The tree creature could
have been a bird that left the 'raptor-like tracks...

Well, until they publish their complete findings --
anecdotes included -- we'll just have to wait and see.

TVgeek
 
Bump this thread because of the long and extremely creepy article on this case in FT169.
 
As Ian Simmons states, it was essentially a rehash of George Knapp's two-part article in the Las Vegas Mercury. As for it being creepy, having already read it on this thread, it does lose something of its impact a second time around. The follow up with NIDS was welcome though, along with their refusal to publish any findings. Just more grist for the conspiracy mill.
 
Caroline said:
In that case why make a comparison with a velociraptor?
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Velociraptors, as well as other dromaesaurids such as the larger Deinonychus (the ones in Jurrassic Park look like V. but are as big as D.) have a very distinctive footprint compared to other therapods on account of the big hinged claw. Did the footprint actually seem to have the same claw, or is that the only small therapod he knows the name of?
 
I think the word "velociraptor" was used because some had seen Jurassic Park.

It's a strange thing, when I look on the web it says the Velociraptor was first described in 1924. They appear to be everywhere, on every web page about dinosaurs. Yet for years as a kid I was obsessed with dinosaurs - I knew the name of practically every one, every species and sub-species - and before Jurassic Park I'd never heard of Velociraptor. Not only that, but the few massive reference books I still possess have absolutely no mention of them at all, and some list thousands of species. Very odd...
 
I have only two books, both several years old, which mention them; one as an interesting fossil find containing a velociraptor and protoceratops engulfed by a sandstorm and locked in combat for eternity (bummer) and one as a less interesting cousin of Deinonychus.
 
The article in FT169 states that the footprints were 3-toed, yet a Velociraptor would leave 2-toed footprints (and this is shown on Jurassic Park, when the Velociraptor nest is found, with footprints leading away from the eggshells).
Deinonychus was discovered in 1969, and its body shape, and method of killing forced palaeontologists at the time to re-evaluate their ideas, and consider dinosaurs to be warm-blooded, highly active, intelligent predators, instead of overgrown lizards.
Greg Paul, a palaeo-artist, decided Deinonychus was the same genus as Velociraptor, and so renamed it (he has since changed his mind). Since Paul's artworks were used as inspiration for the dino's in JP, this is why they used the name Velociraptor, which has since caught the public's imagination.
Incidently, the Velociraptors in the film were considerably larger than any known species at the time, but after the film was released, another type was discovered, called Utahraptor which was as large as the raptors in the film (It still doesn't have a 3 foot wide head though)
 
strange one this,
there could possibly be some kind of portal or something of that nature in the area,the old indian legends seem to point to something it's just that the NIDS involvement is strange.
They won't release any data because they don't want to be called unscientific.I would suggest in this field you don't need reams of data,just that one genuine photograph or piece of video footage will suffice.Anyway i would hardly call an organisation that fixes sophisticated monitoring and surveilance equipment to telgraph poles with duct tape scientific,more like laughable.The involvement of ex military personnel and Wankenhut:) security don't hold much for them being an independent organisation.
After having read this thread again from the start,they sound like a bunch of amateurs.Loads of so called happenings and no visible evidence,they are supported with loads of cash and every member of the group should be carrying camera and video equipment at all times.As was mentioned on an earlier post shooting at one of these creatures what a great idea!Forget getting evidence just get your gun.
Now they seem to be concentrating on keeping people out of the area.
Publish and be damned i say.(or put up or shut up)
 
CallMeKenneth said:
Incidently, the Velociraptors in the film were considerably larger than any known species at the time, but after the film was released, another type was discovered, called Utahraptor which was as large as the raptors in the film (It still doesn't have a 3 foot wide head though)
Click to expand...

From Utah...doodeedoodoo, doodeedoodoo....
 
Judge Nutmeg said:
After having read this thread again from the start,they sound like a bunch of amateurs.Loads of so called happenings and no visible evidence,they are supported with loads of cash and every member of the group should be carrying camera and video equipment at all times.As was mentioned on an earlier post shooting at one of these creatures what a great idea!Forget getting evidence just get your gun.
Now they seem to be concentrating on keeping people out of the area.
Publish and be damned i say.(or put up or shut up)
Click to expand...

Oh, they've already got the standard defences in place -

(1) Equipments goes mysteriously wrong whenever something strange happens.

(2) As explained in the article - bullets seem to have no effect on the strange manifestations. Check out the first story with the wolf.

All very convenient.

Anyway, before I get awash with cynicism - I should say that the whole situation is most intriguing - fact or fiction - something fascinating is going on.
 
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