31 Days of Monsters: Ahool

Creatures flying through the air aren't limited to bird and people shot out of cannons or giant slingshots. There are also insects and the occasional lizard or squirrel. Then, of course, there are the bats.

Name: Ahool

Size: A wingspan of 10 feet.

Appearance: Typical of a bat, only much larger. Wide, leathery wings, a body covered in grey fur, and large, dark eyes. Some reports describe the face as almost monkey-like.

Threat: Low. It has been known to swoop down at people in boats, but reports of it outright attacking and inflicting injuries are rare. The aggressive behavior it takes fits in with similar actions by animals seeking only to scare away intruders into their territory.

 Fortunately, for those who still have nightmares based on The Wizard of OZ, despite its ability to fly, the Ahool remains reported exclusively on the island of Java in the Philippines. Although reports of other large, bat-like creatures have also been reported in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and in the jungles of India.

It's unsurprising that bats are included in the animals of which we fear growing to giant size. Even as small as most species are, they tend to send people running as they flitter about our heads at night. Their leathery wings and unusual way of locating prey, as well as their nocturnal habits all feature into things which confuse and frightened primitive man. The way some species subsist on the blood of much larger animals also brings a certain level of fear and it part of the reason they were connected with vampires. As we've learned more about them, we've even found new reasons to fear them, with the addition of Rabies and other similar diseases they can carry.

The Ahool is one of those creatures, though, that actually has a fair explanation.While there isn't any direct evidence of the creature the Ahool is claimed to be, there is a similar animal which is very rare that lives in the jungles of Java. The Javan Wood Owl is a good candidate to be the creature. Its wingspan is a far cry from that reported of the giant bat, only reaching an average of four feet, but witness estimates of such things are easily exaggerated, particularly at night and in a panic at having something swoop over your head. As the owls have been known to do to people hiking and working near their territory.

Still, the idea of giant bats has the ability to haunt human dreams and the invariably pop up in several movies, TV shows, and books. There is a reason we have Batman and not Nightman, after all. There is just something unnerving about them which bites into us.

As far as entertainment goes, there is The Devil Bat starring Bela Legosi, and The Bat with Vincent Price. More recently are the movies Bats and Vampire Bats (Which I don't believe are related, though I must admit to not having seen them). There is also Attack of the Bat Monsters and The Bat People for those who enjoy the older now-campy monster movies.

So, there really isn't much to be afraid of honestly, as far as bats go. Some may carry Rabies, but those cases are getting rarer and rarer as animals that are even suspected are trapped and destroyed. They're not really out to eat us, or suck us dry. Usually.

~ Shaun

31 Days of Monsters: Ogopogo

It seems whenever there is a new fad, you alway quickly get knock-offs, copies, and imitations as everyone tries to have, get, or be the new trend on the block. For a while, it seemed that everyone was trying to claim to have their very own lake monster, despite some people not even having a lake.

Name: Ogopogo

Size: 40 - 50 feet long.

Appearance: This would be the typical sea serpent. A long, serpentine body, with fins, several humps or coils which stick out of the water, as well as a head which reportedly resembles a horse.

Threat: Low. Among all the sightings, none mention the creature attacking or making threatening gestures towards people.

Hundreds or even thousands of lakes around the world have had reports of monsters living in them in the past twenty or thirty years. This one hails from Lake Okanagan in British Columbia, Canada. Ogopogo is one of the more well-known lake monsters, though its popularity never peaked in the same way the Loch Ness Monster's has.

The native tribes that live on the lake have told stories of the creature dating back into the 1800's. The first modern-day sighting though, was in 1926 when traffic on a road next to the lake completely stopped and no less than 30 cars of people claimed to have seen a large, unidentified animal in the water. All the witnesses described the same creature when asked about it.

The name of the creature was originally Naitaka, a name given it by one of the local native american tribes. However, for reasons unknown, the creature started to be called Ogopogo, a name taken from an English song written in 1924.

Sightings of Ogopogo are infrequent, but there are usually one or two a year. Interest in the creature has been enough to spur shows like Monsterquest and Destination Truth to devote an episode to searching for the creature. Some with negligible results, while others turn up some surprising information. It has also been referenced in an episode of The X-Files, the National Geographic series Is It Real?, and even The Venture Brothers.

Due, perhaps, to Ogopogo's rather tame nature, or to the fact that it is so specific in its location, there aren't really any books or movies specifically about the creature. Probably the most well-known lake monster movie is the oldie The Crater Lake Monster. Other titles though that you can look up, which may or may not be similar to the Ogopogo creature are Creature from Black Lake, Serpent Lake, and the ever popular Lake Placid.

So something to keep in mind, you don't have to be out in the ocean, to be unaware of what could be swimming around just underneath your feet. Just ask Jeremy Wade. 

~ Shaun

31 Days of Monsters: Yeti

We know for a fact that the continents used to be a lot closer together and animals could easily travel from one place to another. As the land masses spread apart, species get separated into different areas and eventually adapt specifically to that area. This creates species which are more or less the same, with small, fundamental differences that allows them to be identified from each other. This is one of the base ideas in the theory of evolution.

Name: Yeti, Abominable Snowman

Size: 6 - 8 feet tall.

Appearance: Human-like, walking upright and covered in hair which is usually described as either a dark brown or white.

Threat: Low-Medium.

If any of you are planning a trip to try and scale Mount Everest (a bucket list item if I ever saw one), that is where most sightings of this creature tend to be, typically at the higher altitudes between 10 - 20,000 feet. Sightings have been made throughout much of the Himalayan mountains where humans live and stories and tales are told from ancient times.

One of the interesting things about the Yeti, Sasquatch, and all the like cryptids from around the world, is how similar they all are in appearance. You would expect different cultures in different parts of the world to see different things, for instance horns, spines, maybe quills. Instead, all of the bigfoot types are remarkably similar to each other, with small differences like the Yeti's white coloration, which would allow it to hide much better as an ambush predator on the snow-covered slopes on which it reportedly lives. Compare this to the dark brown or black of Sasquatch which lives in the dark woods of the Pacific Northwest and the light brown/orange of the Orang-Pendek in the tropical jungles of the Philippines. Such similarities should only help to give credence to their existence, as they demonstrate evolution despite it being a concept foreign to such isolated tribes as many tales of these creatures come from.


Sightings of the Yeti have been made by such notable expeditions as those sent by the Royal Geographical Society in 1925. Sir Edmund Hillary even reported the discovery of large, human-like footprints during his historical ascent of Everest in 1953. I would rather think he would be one to take seriously, as I doubt he would want to suggest he was actually beaten to the mountaintop by someone walking barefoot, no less.

Oddly enough, the Yeti has actually had more screen time than its cousin the Sasquatch, with multiple movies to its name, though books featuring his visage seem to be scarce. His visage was the basis for the Wampa from Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, and who can forget the Bumble from the classic stop-motion version of Rudolph. Most recently, they made a cameo in The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. On top of that, www.imdb.com lists seven different movies with Yeti in the title, including this interesting title.

So if you find yourself lost in the Himalayas this summer and stumble upon a huge man-beast covered in fur. Offer him a hug, that may be all he's looking for.

~ Shaun

31 Days of Monsters: Rods

So, I've noticed the blog is posting things by the date I write them, not necessarily by the date it goes up. Sorry if that's caused any confusion, if you want, you can click on the Cryptid label on the bottom right to see only the posts involved in this challenge.

Name: Rods, Skyfish

Size: Variable, from inches to at least one account of almost a mile in length.

Appearance: Long, cylindrical bodies with fins that run their entire length.

Threat: None.

One of the few creatures that seem to be found worldwide. Rods have been caught unexpectedly in pictures from South America, North America, Iraq and Australia. The curious thing about them is that they are never seen with the naked eye, although they have even been caught on video in some cases. They don't seem to have a preference between night or day, and they seem to roam in groups, although larger specimens have been seen traveling along.

The fact that Rods are never seen with the naked eye, has led some to speculate that the creatures are spirits, tiny UFO's, or even inter-dimensional animals. While any of those could certainly be possible, it would seem to me to be just as likely that they simply reflect a spectrum of light just outside of our visual range, rather than any particular color. You have to admit, it would be almost impossible to beat that kind of camouflage outside of heat sensors or infrared goggles. To a degree, the fact that we can't see them could also be attributed to their speed, which under some estimates is faster than the speed of sound.

Pictures of the sky in which they have appeared, taken in rapid succession, show them crossing the expanse of sky  in the frame in a matter of seconds. Given speeds like that and their relatively small dimensions, excluding length, it would be a simple matter for one to zip right before your eyes and you would never have a clue.

There really is a lot here to work with, between speeds, lengths, and a degree of invisibility, so it's a little surprising they haven't appeared in movies or literature. They are a recent find, though, only first being spotted in 1994, with sightings fairly scarce since then, despite them all being caught on film.

There is one other reason there hasn't been any movies or stories told about these creatures. That would be the fact that they just plain don't exist. The real reason nobody has ever seen one without a camera is that we can see them for what they really are, which, unfortunately, is just moths, butterflies, and other flying insects. The Rod is simply an effect created when an insect flies past the camera with a little 'oomph' behind it and the camera captures several wingbeats and distance traveled in a single frame. A company in China actually had several "Rods" appear on their surveillance cameras, so as an experiment, they set up nets to try and capture them and set to watching the video. When Rods appeared, they closed the nets and went to check their catch, finding only moths and other common bugs.

Still, it creates some food for thought. After all, the spectrum of light that we see is miniscule compared to the  full range possible in nature. It really wouldn't be that inconceivable that creatures could be out there that simply don't reflect light in the visible range, rendering themselves invisible to us. Who knows, there could be such creatures in the room with you right now, and you'd never even know it. Maybe that slight brush against your hair wasn't just a small breeze, after all.

~ Shaun

31 Days of Monsters: Thunderbird

It only seems natural that people take things that scare them, and imagine stories of those creatures but enlarged to monstrous sizes. Everything from spiders and leeches to bats and people have been super-sized to inspire fear and terror. When it becomes interesting is when there are tales told of giant animals which don't normally inspire horror and loathing.

Name: Roc, Thunderbird, many tribes of native americans were aware of the stories of the creature though, and each has their own name for it. 

Size: Differing reports suggest animals with wingspans anywhere between ten to 20 or even 30 feet wide.

Appearance: A giant bird, with a head that can either be similar to an eagle or a vulture. 

Threat: Low. While the Thunderbird is told to be extremely powerful, there are no contemporary stories of these creatures actively hunting adult humans, even though a carnivorous bird at that size would have little difficulty in such a feat. 

Reported sightings remain scarce, but consistent in the southern US, with sightings as far North as Illinois. What makes the sightings hard to verify is the fact that almost all are of the animal in flight at high altitudes, giving little to make size comparisons with. The best reports are those of pilots in private aircraft who occasionally see exceptionally large birds that they can't identify, following in their tailwind. 

Several photos taken in the old west, report to show slain creatures which were claimed to be the mythical Thunderbird. Most of these have since been reported as fakes, but some remain unverified. The creatures pictured however, resemble the prehistoric Pterosaurs than the giant eagles of legend. It is curious however, as the science of paleontology was not widely known during that period and so good fakes of creatures which were yet to be discovered makes one pause and wonder if the Thunderbird legend could have been inspired by surviving flying reptiles. I find that doubtful, though. The legends of the native americans across the areas where Thunderbirds were occasionally seen are remarkably consistent in what they describe, and they describe a large bird, with feathers, not something which would probably described as bat-like. 

The most likely theory put forth, is that of large non-native birds getting lost somehow or searching for places to expand their territory. Sightings of Thunderbirds in Alaska, for instance, are mainly attributed to sightings of Stellar's Sea Eagles, which regularly boasts a wingspan of eight feet. There is also one reported encounter from Illinois about three boys who were playing in their backyard when a pair of large birds swooped down on them, grabbing one of them, lifting him about two feet off the ground and carrying him about thirty feet before letting go. The descriptions of the birds given by the boys and other witnesses matched up with descriptions of the Andean Condor. How the birds ended up so far from the Andes is anyone's guess. 

Giant birds have appeared several times through writing and movies. More often than not, they are simply depicted as giant, flying monsters, rather than described as the mythical Thunderbird. One of the most well known is the giant bird monster from the era of old Hollywood The Giant Claw. After that are movies such as Roadkill. As stated though, these are giant birds, and not specifically the Thunderbird, which in legends was more of an ally or a warning, or even one of the Gods as opposed to an actual threat to man.

Try to keep in mind as you're traveling this summer, especially if you happen to be on a long car trip through the southern states, in addition to what could be underground, underwater, or in the woods, sometimes all it takes to see something unusual is to look up and see what's right above your head.

~ Shaun