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Pterosaurs Across the Pacific

Photo by "Roslyn in Starfish Island" Quezon Province

Long-tailed pterosaurs, called by the name “ropen,” are reported in many areas surrounding the Pacific Ocean, including islands near the mainland of Asia. We now have considerable sighting evidence even in Hawaii, islands surrounded by vaste areas of the Pacific.

Two “Pterodactyls” Observed in Philippines in 2008

According to the eyewitness, “I think we’re not the only ones who saw it, because my classmate told me that there are sightings of this thing in Atimonan, Quezon [Province], just one-half hr travel from Pagbilao, and I was told by the local fisherman there that he saw it several times, flying above the sea.”

. . . Question: Did the two creatures have tails?

Answer: YES! they have long tails about 3 to 4 meters long . . .it is    not a bird: They don’t have any feathers.

Question: Did you have a good view of them?

Answer: Yes! I was not the only one who saw it . . .

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Photo by "Roslyn in Starfish Island" Quezon Province

Quezon Province, Philippines

How can long-tailed pterosaurs fly across the Pacific Ocean and be found in many countries? Consider the size of some of these flying creatures. Some eyewitnesses estimate the wingspans: “30-50 feet” (Perth creature), “29 feet” (Finschhafen “pterodactyl”), “seven meters” (for one wing of the Lake Pung ropen, sighting around 1994). What could prevent such huge flying creatures from eventually expanding their habitat across the planet?

Additional Notes (Nov 5, 2012):

After publishing the above information, somebody responded with the idea that “many” sightings of apparent pterosaurs are misidentified Manta ray fish that jump out of the sea. But many problems are found in that conjecture.

  • The great majority of sighting reports that I have received involved flying creatures that were not over the sea but flying over land. That eliminates the Manta ray conjecture for those sightings.
  • Those few sighting that were of creatures over the sea—some of them involved long periods of flight, far longer than the few seconds it takes for a Manta ray fish to jump out of the sea and fall back into the water.
  • Other sightings over the sea involved descriptions that were unlike anything we know about any Manta ray: bioluminescence, for example, or flying in pairs (ray fish don’t jump up out of the water in pairs in a way that would look like two pterosaurs flying in tandem).

The sighting mentioned above, in the Philippines, had critical points from the eyewitness, details absent above:

“. . . a LONG NECK and . . . a horn behind their heads. They have a long beak. I even saw their claws between their wings. . . . They seldom flap their wings, about every three to four seconds.”

That destroys the Manta ray conjecture for this particular sighting in the Philippines.

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From the Third Edition of Live Pterosaurs in America:

Some birds migrate for many thousands of miles. . . . Since humans were inspired by birds to invent flying machines, give credit to birds for that inspiration. And give credit to the lowly Monarch Butterfly for migrating in large numbers for 2000 miles, with individuals crossing the Atlantic Ocean sometimes. But the wings of a giant ropen make the whole planet accessible . . .

Pterosaur in Hawaii

[The eyewitness] stepped out into his front yard and saw, about 100 feet high, a gliding ”pterodactyl.”

Pterosaurs in the Southwest Pacific

For Americans (and perhaps citizens of other developed countries) who know about recent sighting reports of apparent living pterosaurs, the best known area for sightings may be in Papua New Guinea.

Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea

I believe in living pterosaurs and hope they will soon be officially discovered. More important, I believe in you, that you can soar above dogmatic assumptions about extinctions.

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cover of ebook - Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea - ver-25

Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea (nonfiction e-book) now FREE

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Pterosaurs in Eastern Australia and in New Zealand

The digital book Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea mentions several pterosaur sightings in Australia, including one in Queensland.

Kathy was driving [at about 8:30] at night, with her thirteen-year-old daughter, when the huge creature flew over the car:

“. . . The wings were so big. Black bat leather like.”

“One wing covered the car . . . you could see, just the underneath.”

“As it [bent its] wing . . . you could see how strong it was, so big.”

“No feathers just leather.”

“You could see the vein look stretching across the wing . . . covered with black stretched leather.”

Kathy answered my question about the location:

“We saw it at Mt Coolum Sunshine Coast . . . one hill away from Centenary Heights Rd.”

The digital book also mentions:

In modern eyewitness reports [worldwide, not restricted to Australia], long-tailed pterosaurs outnumber short-tails, at least four-to-one. Standard models of extinction make this ratio appear strange, for the long-tailed variety were thought to have dwindled before the short-tailed pterosaurs became dominant, at least that’s the theory. Nevertheless, the ratio is significant in modern sightings, appearing consistent regardless of the culture or beliefs or education of the eyewitness. . . .

Cryptozoology is not a branch of science, at least not in the usual sense; but it can motivate zoologists to conduct field investigations, at least in theory it can motivate them. It is the “study of hidden animals,” and usually relies less on direct scientific examination and more on eyewitness testimony; nevertheless, we can use scientific reasoning and methods within the boundaries of cryptozoology. . . .

Skeptics sometimes imagine misidentifications and hoaxes as explanations for pterosaur sightings. Statistical analysis has eliminated hoaxes as a major factor, but what about birds and bats that might have looked somewhat like pterosaurs? Detailed examinations of individual sightings eliminate that misidentification idea, but each report needs to be examined individually. I have researched that possibility off and on for about eight years.

From the paperback book Searching for Ropens (second edition):

In 2006, a young man living in Eastern Australia emailed the Perth couple about his close encounter with a nocturnal creature in the early 1990’s, when he was about twelve years old. During his farm chores, between 9:00 p.m. and 10:00 p.m., he forgot something and had to backtrack. When he looked back at where he had been, at the door of a shed, he saw a large creature with wings. It was on the roof of the shed, just above the door where he had recently been standing.

. . . the boy had a brief view of the body and wings of the creature. It was larger than an average man six feet tall, with wings that folded to the side and back, reminiscent of bat wings. The boy ran to his house for help, but his parents saw nothing; by the time they had responded, the creature was gone.

New Zealand Pterosaur

Across New Zealand, North Islands farmland and countryside, there have been for almost a century tales from farmers and hunters, of a horrid winged beast, with long sharp fangs lining its narrow, beak-like jaws. . . . Farmers despise it [it attacks their cattle at night]. It is called “The Flying Slasher.” [Of course, this could be a non-pterosaur flying creature; who knows?]

Book About Live Pterosaurs in Australia

I don’t ask you to launch your imagination to fly with every story about a live “pterodactyl.” When somebody sends me an email about a strange flying creature, I don’t jump onto the first paragraph as if the creature had to have been a living pterosaur . . .

Whitcomb on Radio Talk Show in Australia

Aaron: Joining me today is Jonathan David Whitcomb, author of Live Pterosaurs in America and a new book which has just come out: Live Pterosaurs in Australia and [in] Papua New Guinea. . . .

. . . Jonathan: Most species of pterosaurs have become extinct at some time in the past . . . What we’re trying to portray to the world is that we’ve discovered a large number of eyewitnesses, from different parts of the world, who testify of something that couldn’t be anything other than one or more species of living pterosaur.

Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papau New Guinea

“At the far side of the clearing, a huge creature was running and flapping its wings. All the grass around it was flattened by the blasts of wind from the creature getting airborne. . . .”

Pig Eaten by Pterosaur in New Zealand

On a morning of 1981, [a farming couple witnessed] a spectacle they would never forget. After being woken by strange sounds, the couple walked to the pig sty . . . They were shocked to see a rather large piglet head butting an animal they had never seen before, a bat-like creature with an impressive, long beak, covered in scales. Both were covered in blood . . . the piglet seemed to be losing the fight. The winged creature . . . [after more fighting] flew off with the body [of the pig] in its jaws.

Whitcomb on Radio Talk Show in Australia

On September 25th, I was interviewed, by telephone, by Aaron Wright of Mysterious Universe, in Australia. It was not a live radio show but was audio-edited and broadcast (or published) on a podcast around September 28th.

The interview lasted about an hour, as I remember, but because of audio problems only a fraction of it was used in the podcast (online radio broadcast). Here is part of the beginning:

Aaron: Joining me today is Jonathan David Whitcomb, author of Live Pterosaurs in America and a new book which has just come out: Live Pterosaurs in Australia and Papua New Guinea.

Thanks for joining us, Jonathan; how are you today?

Jonathan: Oh, great! Thanks very much for inviting me.

Aaron: Oh, you’re very welcome. So let’s just talk about ropens . . . and pterosaurs. What are these creatures? I thought they were extinct.

Jonathan: Most species of pterosaurs have become extinct at some time in the past . . . What we’re trying to portray to the world is that we’ve discovered a large number of eyewitnesses, from different parts of the world, who testify of something that couldn’t be anything other than one or more species of living pterosaur.

I’ll give you an example. In Papua New Guinea, some of the villagers, the language that they speak, they have a word called “ropen,” and that designates a large nocturnal flying creature. And we know from eyewitnesses that it has a long tail, and it has a bioluminescent capacity. It glows for a few seconds at a time at night, as it’s flying.

Aaron: So how large are these creatures?

Jonathan: The largest ones are very rare. But they’re so large that they cannot be mistaken if a person sees one. I’ll give you an example. In Perth, Australia, (I believe the year was 1997), it was in December, a couple was taking a walk. . . . They saw a creature flying up, and eventually they came to the conclusion that it could be as large as fifty-foot wingspan, from tip-to-tip of the wings.

Aaron: Fifty foot!

Jonathan: But we have a number of other sightings across the southwest Pacific and in other parts of the world, including California in the United States, in which there are rare cases of a very large creature being sited in the daytime.

Just a few years ago, a man was driving in the daylight, in clear daylight, in Orange County, in Southern California, and he was startled to see this creature fly up from the marshy area on his left. It flew over the road—it’s . .  not too far above the road in front of him. And he says that the length from the nose (the front of the beak or whatever it was) to the end of the tail was the same as the width of the road. Now I went out there and I measured it: It was thirty feet. And he said about sixteen feet of that length was tail.

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Jonathan David Whitcomb, at home in Long Beach, California.

Jonathan Whitcomb Interviewed for Canadian Television Show

For many years my associates and I have searched for living pterosaurs and interviewed many eyewitnesses. . . . Those who believe in modern pterosaurs have been ridiculed for years, with no end in sight for the ridicule. But cutting down ridicule by cutting down one of these amazing animals [shooting an animal for evidence] would be wrong. We need to protect precious life, not destroy it.

“Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea” is Number One Selling Cryptozoology Ebook

cover of ebook - Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea - ver-25

This morning I did a search on Amazon: Kindle nonfiction ebooks found on the first eight pages by the word “cryptozoology.” I was delighted to find my newest book in the number one spot.

The results are under two conditions: only nonfiction ebooks whose subject matters are primarily related to cryptozoology or one or more cryptids. I found plenty of novels, and a few books primarily about paranormal subjects such as ghosts, UFO’s, and non-biological weirdness; none of those are included.

I don’t mean to imply that my ebook Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea has been the number one bestseller every day for the past two weeks; but I promote it as a serious work, worthy of attention in the cryptozoological community and elsewhere.

It was time consuming, examining many books to determine if they were genuine nonfiction cryptozoological ebooks. Rather than spend almost an entire day on the project, I stopped after eight pages and the following 32 entries (low number means a book is selling better):

#54,232   Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea

#56,296   THERE’S SOMETHING IN THE WOODS: A Transatlantic Hunt for Monsters and the Mysterious

#61,206   Destination Truth

#61,604   Caverns, Cauldrons, and Concealed Creatures . . .

#114,361  Real Monsters, Gruesome Critters, and Beasts from the Darkside

#167,180  Monsters of New Jersey: Mysterious Creatures in the Garden State

#181,785  Top Secret Sasquatch: Exposing the True Nature of Bigfoot . . .

#194,811  AUSTRALIAN CRYPTOZOOLOGY: The Australian Yowie, New Guinea Mermaid . . .

#203,984  The Werewolf in America: The True History

#219,288  Strange Animals. An Atlas and History. 1800 to 1977

#222,554  Monster Spotter’s Guide to North America

#235,455  Creature of Controversy: A Candid Look . . . [Bigfoot]

#240,984  Mysterious Kentucky

#251,756  Monsters of West Virginia: Mysterious Creatures . . .

#259,558  Bigfoot in the New Jersey ‘Burbs

#301,135  Bigfoot in Kentucky

#311,889  Abominable Snowmen, Legend Come to Life

#326,295  You Are Sasquatch

#350,605  THE YOWIE: In Search of Australia’s Bigfoot

#356,052  The Beasts that Hide from Man: Seeking the World’s Last Undiscovered Animals

#377,898  Biblical Cryptozoology Revealed Cryptids of The Bible

#445,400  Extreme Expeditions: Travel Adventures Stalking the World’s Mystery Animals

#481,424  Cryptozoology: Lectures

#491,004  Hidden Animals: A Field Guide to Batsquatch, Chupacabra . . .

#561,779  Mythical Monsters

#563,788  Mokele-Mbembe-Legend of the Congo Dinosaur

#564,486  Encyclopedia of Cryptozoology

#578,635  Tom Slick: True Life Encounters in Cryptozoology

#618,504  The Evolution of the Dragon

#807,721  Beastly Encounters

#1,031,918  Lake Norman Monster: A Decade of Sightings (2002-2012)

#1,115,104  Die Seeschlange vom Comer See (German Edition)

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cover of ebook - Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea - ver-25

Cover of the digital book published in September, 2012, in nonfiction cryptozoology genre (not in print-paper format)

Update: This book is now offered FOR FREE, as a pdf easy-download, to promote awareness of modern pterosaurs

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Live Pterosaurs in Australia and in Papua New Guinea

I believe in living pterosaurs and hope they will soon be officially discovered. More important, I believe in you, that you can soar above dogmatic assumptions about extinctions. I hope that you already understand that we are more than a by-product of culture: Our existence transcends the boundaries of the human cultural assumptions that have shaped our beliefs.

Giant Flying Creature in Australia

Pterosaur Sighting in Queensland

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