View SlideshowBIGFOOT DISCOVERY PROJECTA sculpture at the Bigfoot Discovery Museum in Felton, Calif., surmises that he’s a family man.
A bigfoot’s howl is multidimensional: a deep and undulating whoop that starts low and ends in a high, feral squeal or resolves completely, like a siren. The first time I unleashed one, while crouching on a bluff overlooking the eastern bank of the Apalachicola River, Matt Moneymaker — who, moments earlier, had loosed a robust, commanding shriek that echoed through the valley — responded with a hearty guffaw.
“I have a cold,” I mumbled by way of an excuse. It was almost 2 a.m., and we were huddled in the dark in Torreya State Park near Bristol, in the Florida panhandle.
My craggy, toadlike holler yielded no response.
Moneymaker is the founder and president of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization (bfro.net), a group of Bigfoot investigators dedicated to acquiring “conclusive documentation of the species’ existence.” Bigfoots, also known as sasquatches or yetis, are famously elusive — if they exist at all. Since 2000, the organization has hosted research expeditions — including some open to nonmembers — to suspected Bigfoot habitats across North America.
The goal is to rouse and record a Bigfoot. The trips — which typically last four days and cost $300 to $500 (not including airfare, camping equipment or food) — are led by an investigator affiliated with the Bigfoot organization who is native to the region. They center on nightly jaunts through the woods.
