Yowiehunters Forum

TrevorPeters wrote:I think that pursuing only one type of evidence is a mistake. I would say that most people don't go out seeking only one type of evidence, they just note what they come across.
Unfortunately, they usually don't have the tools to accurately record it and we end up with a smart phone snapshot with no scale. Essentially useless

Hey mate would you like to write an article on this for a issue of The Yowie Times?

I do however, take your point about the likelihood of certain types of evidence in various localities.
This is certainly true of the D'Aguilar National Park site where they seem to use the creeks as travel routes because it is easier than forcing your way through thick rainforest. I know because I investigated it - a whole day of my life I will never get back with no sign found whatsoever.

In that case, an investigation of National Park Walking Tracks and creeks would be high on the list for the discovery of footprints as the leaf litter in the other areas usually results only in scuff marks.

For those who go into the field looking for the Yowie without a notebook and pen, tape measure and photographic device at a very basic minimum, I would be asking why bother.

Document everything and collect what you can in the way of samples.

Possibly the biggest problem then becomes documentation and accessibility of the data.
Who knows how many people in Australia are sitting on things not knowing what to do anything with it?

If data was centrally collected and made available in an online database, research and calculation would be much easier for everyone.
I'm not talking about sighting reports here but real data like documented site plans, measurements, etc. presented in a research-friendly (searchable) format.

TrevorPeters wrote:When you go out in the field do you:

- measure and record any tracks you find?
- measure foot size, step length, stride length and track straddle?
- match that with other data such as a height estimate given by a witness?
- the list goes on.....

Do you do any of this, or none, keep records or just cam it up hoping to get lucky?

Since I have been constrained lately from getting out in the field, I have been trying to work out what can be gleaned from things like audio recordings.

Once of the things people want to know is how big the subject was.
I'll spare you a write-up on assumptions and logical conclusions and just say that it might be possible, albeit with assumptions and known sources of error.
The difficulty is that it is data such as that mentioned above that makes these and other sorts of calculations possible.

Using the above example, of estimating subject height from audio only, one could analyse the audio to find an average time between foot impact sounds.
One could then compare that to a recording of a subject of known height walking past the recorder.
Using the height vs step length ration of humans you could compare the time between foot impact sounds (step time) of both subjects and using the anthropometric ratio mentioned above work out a height estimate.

This assumes equivalent velocity of the two subjects and equivalent anthropometric ratios. Neither of these is able to be determined from an audio recording of the sort currently being collected and thus create a source of error.

So the human height vs step length ratio is approximately 0.43, however, using some measurements fro the Patterson Gimlin Film I came up with 0.55 for the Sasquatch. The more data that is collected, the more accurate these sorts of estimates can be. Using a sample of a single subject is highly inaccurate but if we had say 100 measurements of trackways with step length AND an associated height estimate, the resulting ratio would be more accurate.

We can't just rely on the Bigfoot crowd to do it for us because the Yowie, reputed to have at least two difference species (maybe more) may have anthropometric differences to the Sasquatch.

So next time you wish there was a way of extracting more from your audio or video, remember that data collection really underpins everything, even though it seems incredibly boring.

Cheers
Trev

TrevorPeters wrote:Sure Dan, I could do that but it might take me a while due to family issues.

I'll pm you about it later.