The problem has came up in relation to the latest British Bigfoot news from Cannock Chase and subsequent discussion and really revolves around the issue of if we can really apply zoology to most mystery animals.

My main question is: What unknown animals have been discovered as the result of a cryptozoological investigation? The vast number of newly discovered large animals have been found by accident with explorers or zoologist stumbling across them. The big (and one would imagine easy to find) beasts have proved strangely elusive. Also the focus on zoology and the consequent need to show that these are real animals means that strange and anomalous aspects are rather sidelined. Take for example the Bigfoot - not only would a breeding population be difficult to maintain in the UK but reports from around the world link it with UFOs (in the broadest sense) and other anomalous behaviour (like their disappearing or being bulletproof) suggesting it is more than just a real animal.

Patrick Harpur (Daimonic Reality page 68 has drawn analogies with extraterrestrialists (i.e. those who believe UFOs and occupants are in fact aliens):

It is our culture which is divided over whether these animals are spirits and ghosts or whether - absurd as it must seem to a tribal society - they are actual, literal animals. We even have a quasi-science - crypto-zoology - whose adherents go out hunting for black cats or Bigfoot. They are to mystery animals what extraterrestrialists are to UFOs. However, they are not to be despised - everyone who has an encounter with one of these beasts, no less than with a UFO, cannot doubt its reality. The only question is what sort of reality are we talking about?

That is they both filter the data to best suit their interpretations and the same thing can go for Skeptics as well as Believers and quite a few people in between (like those who think UFOs are merely as yet unknown military vehicles).

Equally Jamie Hall (Half Human, Half Animal page 90 and 92) has looked at werebeasts and makes some comments in regard to ABCs:

Even within Europe, cat transformation tales are almost as common as the ones involving wolves, and in some locales (such as England) outnumber the werewolf legends, The word "werecat" encompasses all possible species of feline shapeshifter, ranging from the well-known black panther to tigers, leopards, lions, and even the innocent housecat. It also includes people who turn into strange cat-monsters such as housecats that are the size of cows or seem to be blends of more then one feline species.

..

The moors of the British Isles have always been full of stories about gigantic (sometimes panther-sized) black cats. In the old days, these sightings were taken as either devil cats or werecats. Today, people are still reporting these strange animals, but now the favored explanation has switched to escaped exotic pets.

In fact the idea that cryptids are real animals of this earth seems a less likely explanation than them being from another dimension or werebeasts that return to human form after terrorising the neighbourhood for a while.

Too much zoology and not enough crypto?

This is not some battlecry against cryptozoology or cryptozoologists but a concern that the need for there to be an actual animal at the core of the phenomena might be excluding important information (after all the CFZ are always good value and throw out some interesting ideas for these animals – they just remain unproven). This report, from 2004, quoting Nick Redfern (who is one of the main cryptozoologists on the scene in Cannock Chase) suggests that a mutli-disciplinary approach might be the best one:

A cryptozoologist has an explanation for why no one has been able to catch elusive creatures like the Loch Ness monster and Bigfoot: Because they're not of this earth.

Nick Redfern believes the monsters are not part of the physical world, but instead fall in the paranormal realm.

Redfern and two other researcher buddies took a six-week whirlwind tour of known sighting areas in England and questioned locals as well as tried to track down devil dogs, lake monsters and ape-men.

What they found is that many of the so-called sightings took place near ancient stone circles -- similar to Stonehenge - which leads Redfern to conclude that they are part of the paranormal and can not be captured by physical means.

He theorizes cryptozoologists may have to develop new methods of research, similar to the way ghost hunters use infrared photos to detect haunts.

Source

One can only hope that he keeps those words to mind with the British Bigfoot too.

Links:

• Sasquatch Summer – contains an account of the Greensburg Pennsylvania Case (scroll down to the bottom) where anomalous lights were seen in conjunction with two Bigfeet (Bigfoots?).
• Skinwalker Ranch – one of a number of areas where Sasquatch sightings are mixed in with a whole range of strange phenomena (see previous mention too).