Possible Bigfoot Habitat Destroyed By Forest Fire

I’m sorry to report that an area of the forest that I considered to be a likely Bigfoot habitat near Happy Camp has been incinerated by a recent forest fire. The Little Grider Fire ignited on top of a hill right next to the one I live on on July 14, 2007.

The Little Grider Fire

A lightning storm three days before brought over 1200 lightning strikes to the Klamath National Forest. By the next day fire fighters were working to control about 55 fires. The Little Grider Fire probably smoldered a few days before bursting into flames. The only other explanation is that it could have been intentionally set, but that’s very unlikely and locally, nobody seems to believe or talk about that theory.

Little Grider Fire behind Parry’s MarketHere in Happy Camp, we’re used to having fire fighting activity during the summer – but usually the fires are far enough away from town that we’re not terribly concerned about anything but air quality issues. This year, however, the fire was less than a mile from town between my home and Little Grider Creek.

I was out of town for my birthday on July 13. When I arrived home the next evening at 11:30pm, I was shocked and worried when I saw the forest fire nearby. I contacted a local deputy that night and talked to other local residents while we looked at the fire map outside the post office after midnight. The deputy said evacuations were a strong possibility but that I’d be safe at home that night.

The next few days were full of town meetings, packing, storing valuables, and expecting the worst. But many prayers were answered when a heavy rainstorm stalled and put out most of the fire a few days later.

Smoke over Happy CampStill, the fire fighters did a lot of back burning in the area, to decrease underbrush and make the forest around Happy Camp more fire-safe. My partner complained about the animals of our forest whose habitats were being destroyed, and about the air quality, which was wretched. Our valley was full of smoke for days. I’m glad to say that’s over for now and the crews that remain in town are doing mop-up on the Little Grider Fire. The only local people evacuated were those living about ten miles south of town near Elk Creek Road, who were in the path of another fire. Those people are also considered to be Happy Campers though they live outside of town.

I’m very disappointed that this fire spread as far as it did, because I believe that Bigfoot lived in the area. Hopefully if so, they survived in caves, or moved on before the flames reached them.

A few Happy Camp Bigfoot sighting locationsThere have been at least five separate Bigfoot sightings in this area during the last five years, so naturally I had my eye on the nearby forest and have traveled through many times, hoping to see something while driving on the old logging roads.

The map shows the area of the Little Grider Fire, about half-way through it. The stars are Bigfoot sighting locations nearby. Here’s a list of some of those local sightings:

1. A man claimed to have seen a Bigfoot on the hill above Buckhorn Road in 2005. He later recanted.

2. Other sightings also took place on Buckhorn Road in 2005. An unusually large Bigfoot footprint was found half-way up that hill later that summer. The reporter had two separate sighting experiences within a month.

3. An unconfirmed sighting reported to me took place at a picnic table near the airport. A man said he was eating lunch and noticed young Bigfoot (possibly more than one) playing in the forest nearby. I don’t know the year this happened, so it may not have been recent.

4. In 2002 a local teenager was driving down Highway 96 when he saw a large dark creature run across the road near Little Grider Creek.

5. In 2005 a Southern California minister said he saw a large dark creature jump down onto the highway in front of his car, then stand and cross the highway in only two strides.

I don’t want you to think that this fire destroyed all our local Bigfoot habitat; there have been Bigfoot sightings in other areas nearby, and you can tell from the photo above that the Klamath National Forest is vast, with many thousands of acres of possible Bigfoot territory. But this area of the Little Grider Fire was what I considered to be our best local hot spot because of the number of sightings in the area.

9 Replies to “Possible Bigfoot Habitat Destroyed By Forest Fire”

  1. hi linda ,thanx for interesting litte site.no activity for some time but hey, i just stumbled onto it> cheryl comment is interesting…heard they like to make little piles of rocks too.see ya!

  2. 1983 Ohio bigfoot encounter after years of fishing hunting and camping the same area.for over 5 years. Previously we saw odd tree bends and a partial footprint that we didn’t fully expose. We thought the print was from a cougar but none were known to be in Ohio. Once while exploring a high walled strip pond a gigantic rock landed cleanly in the water just out of sight. Oddly the was no bank collapse or additional smaller stones splashing as one would expect from a slight cave-in from the steep banks which were almost vertical. It sounded like a 200 lb slab of rock landed cleanly in the water with no additional splashes. It was close enough to scare us both because that rock seemed thrown ! My friend didn’t care to check it out and I didn’t care to check it out alone as the grass was 5 feet tall plus and visibility was about 10 feet ahead. At this time we both felt like we were in the wrong place at the right time and got back to an area were we could see around better while we talked about how odd that big splash was and how it seemed like a request to leave.
    Some time passed and we were scouting deer trails for the comming fall season. We were 2 miles into the woods on our way out. It was near 6 pm and it was a dry fall day. As we walked I could hear something paralleling us just to the right on a ridge and it was not a deer. The leaves were rustling and it was cracking branches on the ground like we would instead of a stealthy approach of a deer. I clearly remember the noise and thought it was unusual for anything to follow 2 armed hunters like that as these deer are wild and don’t except human presense without bolting. I remember thinking how bold it was and thought it was just a young deer who was curiously tagging along. Then my buddy said “let’s stop here for a minute”. I thought he wanted to wait it out and see if it would walk down out of the woods since it was very close to us. The sounds were less that 20 yards to the right. When we stopped it stopped.
    That’s when it let out the loudest scream yell combination that went on for 15 seconds and then it did it again ! No human has that lung capacity or shear volume. The voice was oddly human like both shrill and deep low tones ending in a garbled turkey like sound. The first scream removed all doubt of this not being a known animal. The second scream removed the safetys from our shotguns as it was distinctly meaner. There was a short stand-off as we were frozen in our tracks and standing back to back locking around. Then it started to run. It started tearing through the woods and for a brief second we weren’t sure if it was running away or right at us because we couldn’t see 10 yards into the thick growth along the trail on that side. not only did it run but it was ground pounding and to my shock sounded like it was on 2 feet. I crouched down when I realized it was running away and I saw it ! It was black reflective fur and looked wide across the back and I saw alternating white spota . It pounded the ground like it weighed 900 pounds and you could hear it booming with every step. I wanted to chase it when all of the sudden it broke a thick trunk that sounded like it was as thick as my thigh. That was discouraging enough and my buddy was not interested in chasing it after that and I’ll admit it scared me out of the idea too. We stood still until we couldn’t hear it anymore and decided to start walking again. Then it occured to us that it ran in the same direction as we needed to go to get to the car. We sort of panicked and ran for about 100 yards before stopping and we both had shotguns. We just weren’t sure we should stick around after being warned clearly.

  3. I have long been interested in the Bigfoot or legendary
    Sasquatch. I was born in Oregon but moved to Yreka, California when I was in grade school. My Dad used to
    work for the US Forest Service. He used to come home from work and tell us all about Happy Camp. He also had stories to tell about Bigfoot. This was almost 50 years ago. I’ll never forget the stories he told. The “Bigfoot” does not like construction crews coming in on their territory. They were known to be the culprits of destroying equipment and throwing 50 gallon drums down mountain sides. Very large footprints were everywhere. Nobody liked to talk about what they saw because people would not believe them. Sound familiar? Since I have purchased many books on the
    subject of Bigfoot, I have become very knowledgeable. People that do not believe in Bigfoot
    think it’s a hoax. I don’t think they have that many hairy costumes to go around for hoaxes. And, not that many people want to go far and deep into the mountains of the Happy Camp area just to create a hoax or a joke. People remain ignorant until they educate themselves or have actually seen them. I have found them to be fascinating creatures. I was reading that Roseburg, Oregon has a law that you cannot shoot a Bigfoot. It looks like we are getting somewhere. Thanks for allowing me to give you this information.

  4. Cheryl’s commentis disturbing, sort of, but very fasinating. I have never heard of anyone finding a camp with food left. Someone should really look into it.

  5. I went to check out with a friend a area he found walking in the woods. about 10-15 deer dead. All broken legs and necks all piled on top of each other. He lines up big foot camp sightings in other states. He asked me not to tell anyone about this area in R.I. So, I’m just telling you what I seen. We went walking quite a ways in to find the area. There it was all the dead deer were flat and patches of hair all over the area. I noticed very large mounds of dirt all over this area. The mounds were covered with grass and moss. while looking around , We saw skulls of deer ,cleaned and piled on to of each other ,like blocks.7 skulls. It was like children played with them. We found clam shells all opened up and all cleaned none were broken in pieces. While looking around ,we heard a noice ,deer running a side us then passed us. It was if something was chasing them. We didn’t see Big Foot that day. I didn’t have to, I am now a true believer on what he left for me to see. I was told not to tell anyone about this place but I’m not telling you where it is in R.I.

  6. I was in the general area of Happy Camp in September of 2007 doing site location for a book I’m writing.
    We found an extraordinarily large track off of a gravel road of of 48 between Happy Camp and Obrien, Oregon – Just on the California side.
    I agree with the writer who said not to worry about Bigfoot habitat and fire – I would agree.
    They are too smart and too “mobile” to worry about fire consuming their habitat.
    Anyway – Track was headed due east – Measurement of the length was just a partial – Partial length appeared to be 12 and a half inches from the toes to where the foot bends – Possible second step that turned a portion of a thick branch into powder was 24 to 25 inches – Width of the track at the toes was a whopping 11.5 inches and the depth was a couple of inches in soil that neither I or my friend could even dent – Both of us just under 200 lbs.
    The maker of the track had stepped off of a gravel road and apparently put its’ weight on the front of it’s right foot which sank into the hillside and created a sort of a “step”…..This was the “partial” track – It was 5 to 6 feet off of the road and the possible second step was 11 to 12 feet off the road and literally crushed a portion of a thick branch (both ends of the branch were in place – Only the “middle” was crushed and the length of the possible step was 24 to 25 inches…..
    The width of 11.5 at the toes is definite – Print was very clear in the soil and all five toes were visible – It was a very “human-like” footprint – Except of course for the size.

  7. Hi Linda,

    I went for a walk the last couple of days. I have’nt been up on that hill since I got back from New York.

    The fire burned all around it, but not at all around where all the bigfoot sign are. I went up and walked the whole area. There are still hand and footprints all around there, so it looks like they were there this season.

    Sorry I got so emotional over disclosing the information. I just don’t want an glory seekers bothering them. I know I have stayed off line a lot, but I am really excited about my new site. Could you put the URL in the box for me? I don’t know exactly how to do that yet.

    I thought they were in the yard once this late summer. The dogs acted in that strange way they do when they are around. I love your site and I wish you all the luck. Let’s go out sometime and take some pictures.

    Tara, the Happy Camp bigfoot lady.

  8. It was terrible to have to pack. I didn’t know what to take and what to leave. Making decisions, knowing what limited space we had, was very difficult.

  9. Thank you for adding me to your blogroll. Happy to see that you are back!

    Wow, I am happy to see that you are ok. I can only image how frightening that must be.

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