Skunk Ape

The Skunk ape is a primate that has been sighted in the Southern United States, but most of the reports have come from Florida during the 1960's and 70's. It is named for it's appearance and it's unpleasant odor.

Sightings of the skunk ape go back to before Europeans arrived. Indian tribes such as the Creek, Cherokee, and Seminole all told stories of a creature that stood 5–8 feet tall, and gave off a pungent odor. When Europeans arrived, they learned of the legends from the Native Americans. They reported that these creatures were dangerous towards white people and friendly towards the Indians. A famous example of this reportedly occurred in the fall of 1822. One cold night, two hunters were awoken by a fierce roar near their camp and fled leaving all of their belongings behind. They made it back to their village and told their friends of their experience. The villagers formed a posse to hunt down the creature. They searched the woods for several days armed with rifles, pistols, swords, and knives. After a week of searching, they reportedly found huge footprints in the mud close to where the hunters had their experience. Encouraged by this new find, they made camp and planned to continue searching the next morning. Later that night however, the creature attacked the camp. The creature was reportedly hit repeatedly but still continued to attack. The posse fought back but the creature killed several of the men before they finally managed to kill it. The survivors examined the creature, which they claimed had jet black hair, was 12–13 feet tall and weighed over 1200 lbs. Fearing that the sounds of the battle would attract other creatures, the survivors fled back to the village without bothering to take any evidence of the creature. Historians and biologists argue whether this event really happened. Some say its just a story passed from generation to generation. Others say it happened, but the animal was possibly an unusually large black bear.

In 2000, two photographs of an alleged ape, said to be the Skunk Ape, were taken anonymously and mailed to the Sarasota Sheriff's Department in Florida. They were accompanied by a letter from a woman claiming to have photographed it on the edge of her backyard. The photographer claimed that on three different nights the ape had entered her yard to take apples from a bushel basket on her porch. She was convinced it was an escaped orangutan. The police were dispatched to the house numerous times but when they arrived the Skunk Ape, also known as the stink ape, was gone.

Their are a lot of sighting of giant apes across the world, and the possibility of an undiscovered large ape existing in the undiscovered wilderness is quite high. The photos themselves are quite interesting as well, if you look at the structure of the face of the ape, it looks a lot like a orangutang (although bigger). So this may just be a escaped animal, but the history of the area says that this animal has been around along time, so maybe there might be hidden colonies of the skunk ape roaming the forests of Southern United States. But there still isn't enough evidence to say that they do exist, so until we are able to capture one we will have to put this down as unconfirmed.