Some time ago, a well known cryptozoologist attributed many sightings of live pterosaurs to a news frenzy. I don’t recall the details, so I won’t mention the name of the cryptozoologist. But it was around the mid-1970’s and perhaps into the early 1980’s, in Texas.
Newspapers in Eastern Texas were often reporting the encounters people were having with winged creatures, and some people assumed that all of the reports were from sightings of live pterosaurs. But a few persons (perhaps more than a few) may have reacted to the news reports by letting their imaginations cause distortions. Not all winged creatures that may surprise us at night are unclassified flying creatures; some of them are just too deep in the dark to be recognized. A few birds may have played a part, after everybody had become excited about the news reports.
I don’t mean to imply that none of the sightings in Eastern Texas, three decades ago, were from encounters with live pterosaurs; I believe that some of them were just that. But some persons may have become overly excited because of numerous local news reports.
Skepticism
Since that excitement in Texas, the cryptozoologist who doubted living pterosaurs in Texas became doubtful of all similar reports. He accepted the standard model of universal pterosaur extinction and suspected that the late-twentieth-century and early-twenty-first-century cryptozoological investigations were misguided religious excersizes, not worthy of scientific examination.
Recent Sightings
But recent sighting reports that I have received were not from any particular region: I receive emails from around the world. Almost without exception, the eyewitnesses were not looking for living pterosaurs in their areas; they were shocked to see what they had never imagined was possible to see.
Let’s now consider some of the recent reports that I have received by email and by blog-post comment.
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Kona, Hawaii, (Big Island); about 2008 — report rec’d in fall of 2012
“Between 3-4 foot wingspan; sharp, long beak; featherless wings”
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Vandalia, Ohio, area; about 1989 — report rec’d in Oct-2012
“I saw a pterodactyl up across the river on a tree branch.”
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Near Tucson, Arizona; about late-2011 — report rec’d early Nov-2012
“I have seen one of these creatures under a bridge”
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Alabama; 2010 — report rec’d in fall of 2012
“Its wingspan was probably between 8-10 feet.”
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Washington State; Oct-2012 — report rec’d in Oct-2012
“I know pelicans and this was much larger . . . and appeared to have little to no feathers. Freaky!!!!”
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Birmingham area of England; June-2012 — report rec’d in July-2012
“dark, black even. No visible flapping of wings.”
The above sighting reports are a representative sampling, received from the summer to the fall of 2012. Like other periods of time from early 2004 until the present, there seems to be no relationship between where a sighting took place and when it was reported. In addition, I don’t remember ever noticing any relationship, during the past nine years, between sighting location and sighting date. No local news coverage had any influence on any eyewitness objectiveness, to the best of my knowledge (regardless of what happened in Texas, years before I began my investigations).
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This Houston Chronicle [TX newspaper] article deserves attention, although I had previously written about it briefly on this blog.
Flying Pterosaur, not a Leaping Ray
Mr. Drinnon insists that any extant pterosaur on this planet must resemble pterosaurs known from fossils that have been discovered and that any deviation in appearance means the creature observed cannot be that type of flying creature.
What could prevent such huge flying creatures from eventually expanding their habitat across the planet?