Episode 42 - Lake Monsters

 From the depths of Loch Ness to the remote lakes of Oklahoma, creatures lurk in the dark waters of our world. For centuries, eyewitnesses across continents have reported encounters with intelligent, elusive lake monsters, yet tangible proof remains elusive. 

Today, we explore seven distinct types of lake cryptids through specific accounts, locations, and dates. We examine the biological plausibility of each creature type using real-world analogues: giant sturgeon for plesiosaurs, arapaima for serpents, and, surprisingly, a marine jellyfish that proves freshwater colonization is possible.

 Are these accounts misidentifications of known animals, genuine undiscovered fauna, or something stranger still? We investigate the evidence skeptically but remain open to possibilities science hasn't yet explained. Join us as we dive into the mystery of what dwells beneath the surface. 

Transcript

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Hey everybody, welcome to Archange Station. I'm your host, Mike Porter. Tonight we are going to be diving into, well, at least figured figuratively, we're going to be diving into the world of lake monsters. So for centuries across every continent, people have reported encounters with massive creatures lurking in deep waters in all of these lakes. Now there's certainly loads of sea serpent accounts as well. I'm going to separate that. So this is freshwater creatures that people have been seeing, and these lakes that are some quite deep, like Loch Ness, some not so much. But these accounts come from credible people, so scientists, naturalists, law enforcement. And they describe creatures that really shouldn't exist. But here's these accounts of these creatures. And so what's interesting to me is that these they don't all look the same. So there's quite a few that look very similar, but I've identified others that look completely outside the normal lake monster descriptions. So if you look at Scotland, people will report a long-necked reptile, but in Oklahoma lakes, witnesses describe an eight-armed octopus. And in the Pacific Northwest, they talk about an otter man. So I'm going to kind of go through and try to figure out, you know, if we're witnessing real undiscovered fauna or if it's something stranger. So we're going to look at seven distinct types of lake cryptids, and we'll examine specific eyewitness accounts and dates and locations, and we'll ask, you know, what real animals might explain these sightings. And when the explanations don't work out, then we're going to entertain the possibility that science hasn't addressed yet, which you know, typically when I'm thinking of things, it could be spiritual or interdimensional or something of that nature. So let's start off with the most famous type, and that's the plesi or plesiosaur type monsters. So again, these would be long-necked lake monsters, and these creatures match the anatomy and descriptions of a plesiosaur, which is an extinct marine reptile that died out 66 million years ago. So why does this type cluster in specific regions and what real animals might account for these sightings? So in Loch Ness, this is in the Scottish Highlands, and it's that that lake is 22 miles long and it's 754 feet deep at the maximum depth. And the water is super dark due to its high peak content, and so there's very limited visibility. Now the first modern sighting was in May 2nd of 1933 by George Edwards and Hugh Gray, and they reported the creature moving through the water. Now Gray captured a photograph showing a hump and what appeared to be a long neck. And then in December of 1933, you have the surgeon's photograph taken by Kenneth Wilson. Pardon me, Robert Kenneth Wilson. And that became like the iconic image of the long neck, the small head, and the dark body. And this single image defined Nessie for over 60 years. In 1994, Robert Kenneth Wilson's stepson revealed that the surgeon's photograph was indeed a hoax, as many people thought. The monster basically was a toy submarine with a carved wooden head and a neck that was glued to the top of this radio controlled submarine. In the 1960s through the 2000s, sonar expeditions were enacted through various agencies, which ended up eventually being the Loch Ness Institute, and Robert Rhines was the actual person in charge of trying to scour Loch Ness to find that monster. And they did detect large objects using radar moving beneath the surface, but they never found any conclusive identification. And then most recently in 19, I'm sorry, in 2018 and 2019, there was an e-DNA or environmental DNA study led by Paul Barrett and Giovanni Volti. And they did a thorough examination of the water samples at multiple depths, and they found no evidence of large undiscovered megafauna. But DNA identified only known fish and eels and aquatic mammals. But the eels is a very important thing because this could be what is being seen in that space. And we'll talk more about eel-type creatures later on. So right now the controversy, the controversy is that because there was a hoax, people are just saying everything's a hoax. And I believe people, when they say they've seen something and told the absolute proof that it's not there, is evident. And even though the eDNA samples are saying that there's not um plesiosaur type monster, it could still be some sort of lake creature in that space. So the next one we look at is Champ or Lake Champlain. That's in Vermont. And the the lake is 107 miles long and it's 400 plus deep, 400 plus feet deep at its maximum depth. And in 1609, Samuel de Champlain, which was a French explorer, described encountering a serpent-like creature 20 feet long with a horse head in the lake that now bears his name. And in the 1800s, scattered reports from locals said that the creature was in that lake and it became part of the regional folklore. In July 22nd, 1977, Sandra Mancy, which is a visitor from Connecticut, photographed what she described as a large creature breaking the surface of the water. And the photograph shows a hump and what appears to be a long neck or head. Now some people have said that this looks like someone who is swimming and their arm is up, or it could be a log, but it's a very interesting photograph. And then post-1977, there's been 300 plus documented sightings reported, and consistent descriptions across independent observers suggest that it's either a real phenomenon or a shared cultural expectation. But you know, some are some are photographed, some uh lots of people see it, so there's something there. Uh I don't think it's a mass hallucination. Now, also in Scotland, do you have the Moorrag, which is in Lake Morar, or Loch uh Morar. It's in, like I said, Scotland. And it's the second deepest lock in Scotland. It's 310 feet deep. So in August of 1960, Hugh MacDonald reported a large creature with multiple humps crossing the lock. His account is considered credible. Uh he's a basically a respected local boatman. And what's interesting is there could be these subterranean caves that these creatures could possibly connect between different locks. So throughout the 1960s and 80s, multiple sightings were reported, particularly by experienced fishermen and local residents. The pattern is like Nessie. So morag descriptions focus on long-necked, humped creature with dark coloration. So and there's a multitude of these types of creatures, and that's that's just three, um, that are being seen throughout lakes. So I I'm trying to look at the biological plausibility of plesiosaur type creatures being here, and I think um I think they've been extinct for sixty-six million years, and for a breeding population to survive undetected, there's several different problems. So the first would be pop population genetics. So they would need a minimum of 50 individuals for genetic viability. And a population of this size would be impossible to hide in a lake. Now, could there be a possibility that there's uh tunnels to the sea? And this is more like a uh, you know, like salmon where they swim upstream to where they were first born? Is this sort of like a destination for them to lay eggs or whatever? Um and the majority of their life is spent out in the ocean. I mean that's a possibility. Um respiration. Pleiesiosaurs breathe, or they did breathe, air, and that would call for frequent frequent surface appearances, and that would absolutely guarantee a sighting. Now, like hippos can stay underwater for a great deal of time. Um so it's possible that these things have very large lungs, they're able to take a breath and then go down and stay underwater for a while. And I think if you look at whales and how infrequently they breach to breathe, that becomes more plausible that they could take a breath and then stay underwater forever. Um another big problem would be food requirement. I think a breeding population would need massive quantities of fish, and the only thing uh that would make sense would be out in the ocean. And if it was in a lake, then the depletion of all those resources would be very evident to the people that are around them, especially to fishermen. And there's no plagiosaur remains ever found in freshwater deposits. They were marine mamm mammals or marine uh sorry, marine dinosaurs. So very unlikely that they are freshwater, and I'll talk more about uh the weird things about saltwater creatures being in freshwater in a moment. Now I'm gonna look at possible analogs or pop plausible identifications instead of let's say it's not a plesius, or what could it possibly be? So the first is a giant sturgeon. So sturgeons reach 12 plus feet long, and some historic specimens were reported at 23 feet long, and they have dark coloration and elongated bodies, and in murky water the body might resemble a long neck or the humps that you're seeing. They do have these nodules on them, which is like um scales or like um it's very it's very uh prehistoric looking. Another possibility is giant catfish. So in European waters, including Scotland, some catfish can reach 400 plus pounds and over 10 feet long. Now, when they move through the water, they they move with a serpentine uh shape and they have really large whisker-like barbells on their mouth, which may look odd. Um maybe you know, at scale, or somebody's taking a picture that looks like a neck coming up if they're like twisting in the water. So there's some possibilities there of catfish. Something else that's interesting is seals or whales that were entering into freshwater. So like Lake Champlain connects to the Atlantic via the St. Lawrence River. So harbor seals and even small cestaceans like um like whales could possibly enter. Now the other thing could be just an optical illusion or phenomenon that wave patterns and refraction in murky water and distance miscalculation in that peat-stained water could make these creatures look distorted. So it could be a catfish that's distorted to look elongated because of how refraction works in murky waters. And like I said, there's there's a multitude of these creatures, so any type of lake creature that's the plus uh plesiosaur type could be one of those things. Now there's another type of lake monster called an eel or a snake type. And these have a completely different body morphology. So these are serpentine creatures, they like flippers and the long neck of a plesiosaur. So they're described as undulating, humped, eel-like, and they appear globally as well, which raises an interesting question. Are these different creatures entirely or different interpretations of the same phenomenon as the loch nest type monster, Nessie? So one of these is called Ogopogo. Now that's in Lake Okanagan in British Columbia, and that lake is 79 miles long and 702 feet deep at its maximum depth. And then in the indigenous tradition, so the Salish people have accounts of Nahakta Naha. I'm saying that wrong, I'm sure. It's a water spirit or creature dating back centuries. But like one of the more modern sightings was in July of 1914, there was alleged sightings of the creature in a lake by multiple witnesses near Vernon, BC. And a consistent description of these things is green or brownish serpentine body, 40 to 60 feet long, three humps visible above the water, and a horse-like or camel-like head. In 1926, newspaper reports of sightings happened and local residents reported seeing the creature multiple times. And from the 1950s to the present, hundreds of reported sightings are happening. So the pattern is often seen in summer months, typically in specific areas of the lake. So it has a sort of a territory that it stays in. Also in Canada, you have the Manipogo, which is in Lake Manitoba. And Lake Manitoba is 140 miles long and 40 miles wide, and the depth varies, but the average is around 70 feet deep. So in August 15th, 1933, there was a well-documented sighting. Alfred Malter reported a large creature he described as 30 to 40 feet long with muddy brown body and a sheep-like head. So horse-like and sheep-like. Very strange for an eagle-type creature. Then in the summer of 1962, there was reported signs, sightings during the height of interest in late Cryptus. Now it could be just sociologically people were hearing about this creature and decided or had a supposed sighting where they misidentified something. But the characteristics of all the sightings were that it was humpbacked, had a long body, and was described as undulating through the water. And then we have Chessy, which is in the Chesapeake Bay, which is connected to the Atlantic. And Chesapeake Bay is 200 miles long and it's the largest estuary in the U.S. So in July 1977, Robert Frew and William Resser photographed a dark, snake-like creature with flippers in the bay. Now it's interesting that this one is very pleasedural like but also serpentine. They said that the creature disappeared beneath the water in a few minutes. In August of 1978, multiple sightings were ported, culminating in a photograph by Donald Kiker, and the image shows a serpentine head and neck rising from the water. Now there's another one in Iceland, and that's Lagerfit. I'm sure I said that wrong. This is in East Iceland, and that lake is 14 miles long and it's glacial in origin. The oldest recorded sighting is in 1345, and it was first written by a saga, written about in a saga which described a certain serpent-like creature in the lake. And then in July of 1960, there was a sighting by multiple witnesses, and they said that the massive creature was arching dramatically out of the water before landing back in. Now in the modern era, sporadic sightings are taking place, and the most recent was in 2012 when there was a video footage that took place allegedly capturing the creature moving through the lake. And I think people have seen this, which has got these ice chunks on the back of this creature as it's moving through the water. It's pretty iconic, and if you're into this sort of thing, you've already seen that video. And the description was that it was massive and it was serpentine, and it was often described with a brownish coloration. Now, again, I can go on to a bunch of other sightings of this type of creature, but what's the plausibility of this thing? So these descriptions differ from plesiosaurs, so there's no flippers typically except for the uh the Chesapeake one, and the motion is undulating and snake-like. So, what real animals might fit that description? So we can look at giant freshwater eels. So the uh the arapa emma gigas, which is the largest freshwater fish in South America, reaches 10 feet and weighs 400 pounds. And of course, it's an eel, so it has a serpentine body that can move through the water with powerful undulating motion. European eels can reach up to five feet, and some, you know, obviously some Amazonian eels grow much larger, like the 10 feet, but 5 feet on a five-foot eel would be extremely unsettling to see because they're usually quite thick and muscular and uh they're aggressive. Now there are some deep sea serpentine type fish, like the ore fish, and that's up to 32 36 feet long, but they do occasionally wash up or enter shallow water, but that that might explain some sea monster sightings, but it doesn't make sense in a freshwater context. So it's harder to connect those types of creatures, even though they're very similar to many accounts of um sea serpents. Now we also have caimans or large freshwater crocodilians. Now they're very rare, if not completely um unavailable in these northern lakes, but sometimes escaped reptiles from zoos or collections could explain some of these sightings. Alright, so let's move to a different type. Uh this one is the otter or weasel type. So we're gonna talk about this because this these types of creatures largely come from indigenous traditions, but reports are sometimes taking place. And the interesting part um is that there are these large types of creatures around the world. Now, are they exactly what the indigenous traditions say they are? That's a different thing. But let's look at Ireland and Scotland, because we've been there multiple times already. So there is this Dobar Choo, which is um in Irish-Scottish Gaelic, Dobar is water and chew is hound, so water hound. And historical accounts appear in Irish folklore and Celtic mythology dating back centuries. Now, the physical description is that it's an otter-like or weasel-like body body, and typically six to twelve feet long in these accounts. They have aggressive behavior towards humans and livestock, and some accounts describe a white stripe or a spot on its back. So the the Dobar Chew allegedly drowns people and livestock in these Irish lakes and rivers. And in modern sightings, there are sporadic reports from rural Ireland and Scotland, particularly from witnesses in isolated lakeside communities. They also have the Waitoleki in New Zealand, and the Maori word for otter-like creature or aquatic animal is Waitoleki. And Maori speak of these water dwelling creatures in the South Island Lakes, particularly around Otago and the Southland regions. And the physical description is otter-like and reported as three to four feet long in most accounts. Now it's interesting that there were no mammals in New Zealand, allegedly, when they got when the um the Maori people moved there. So typically birds and lizards. There was no snakes, and there's not very many. Um I think there's only like one or two spiders that are actually dangerous, but not deadly. So for the most part, it was large amounts of birds. And so an otter-like creature, a mammal, was would be very out of place in New Zealand. Now there are contemporary sightings that have been documented in the 20th century from hikers and fishermen in remote New Zealand lakes. And there's even reports, uh, this is completely different, but there's even reports of a moose around the fjords down in Southland, uh, which would have been brought over from Europe. And that's a possibility with these otters, is that they could have been brought over from Europe. There was red deer brought, there were dogs, there were cats, pigs. Um, so now there's these invasive species there that were not part of the original uh makeup of New Zealand. And this otter-like creature could be one of those that were brought over from England as a sport animal that they could hunt. Um, then we have the Kushtica. Now, this is uh I've talked about this previously, but in um Klinkit, Kushtika means land otter man. Uh so basically um in Klinkit and Haida uh traditions, they describe this as a transformation creature, a part otter and part human, and it was capable of shape shifting. So uh people say, uh specifically the indigenous people say that they are predatory and that they lure humans, particularly children, into the water so that they can transform these people. They pull them under the water to transform them into other Kushtika. Um distribution is sort of accounts all the way from Southeast Alaska, British Columbia, and Pacific Northwest coastal regions. So these traditions persist in contemporary indigenous communities and are treated as a spiritual danger rather than purely a physical threat. But there are people that are seeing these things. Now, what's the biological plausibility of this? So obviously, otters and weasels are real, and actually, giant otters are real, and they're they do exist and they're known to be aggressive. So in South America, giant otters they live in the rivers in the wetlands and they reach five to six feet long and they weigh 25 to 35 pounds, and they're highly aggressive, particularly in defense of its young, and they hunt large fish and they're known to attack larger animals, including humans. And if a similar species existed in the northern lakes, it would match many of the descriptions that people talked about. Now there's also sea otters, and they reach four to five feet, and their intelligence rivals a lot of primates. They use tools, they problem solve, and they show awareness, and there's a large population in cold water lakes which could match the Custica, except you know, the Custica is meant to be five to seven feet tall. Um so obviously the sea otter doesn't make sense, but there could be much like in South America, there could be these larger, um, smaller populations of giant otters in the Pacific Northwest. They have a European mink, now it's smaller but really aggressive, and they're take capable of taking on very large prey uh despite their size. And it's it is possible that there's a species of giant freshwater otter that existed in the past, maybe during the times of megafauna, and could persist still today in isolated lakes. So paleontology paleontological um sorry, paleontological records. I s I can't seem to say that word today. So they show extinct giant otters that roamed North America. So perhaps there is still one to this day. Alright, so the next we have turtle, crocodilian, and other reptilian types. So there are these river creatures that people are talking about. One of them I did a very sh very quick short on, under a minute, is called the Beast of Busco, and this is in Folk Lake, Indiana. Um and Falk Lake uh is also called the Busco Pond, and this is in Churubusco, Indiana. Now the sightings began and reported were 1898 up until the 1950s, and this was a massive turtle-like creature that was 10 to 15 feet long, according to eyewitness accounts. It had a ridge shell, dark coloration, and was sometimes described as moving slowly but deliberately. And then in July 1949, Oscar Smith, who was a respected local resident, reported seeing the creature on the shore near Folk Lake, and his detailed account described armor-like shell plating and a reptilian head as well. And then May through July of 1972, local residents convinced were convinced that the creature existed, and they drained Falk Lake, hoping to capture it. But the lake, when it was completely emptied, there was no creature to be found. So either the creature escaped before drainage because it could move across the land, or it never existed in the lake itself, or something prevents its discovery despite the draining, which could be uh again, there could be some subterranean tunnels that it could get into, or um, you know, turtles, snapping turtles, they do go into uh tunnels in the lake beds. Um so it's a possibility that it could be under mud if they drain the lake. And then in Bear Lake, uh Idaho, Utah border, there is this um now Bear Lake is 29 miles long and 200 feet deep at the at its maximum depth. And there are accounts dating back to the 1800s, but possibly earlier from indigenous people. And what they're describing is a long body creature, often described as a mosasaur-like or crocodilian type creature, and there's multiple reports that mention a crocodile-like head, dark body, four flippers visible. So in August of 1868, multiple witnesses reported seeing a creature described as 60 feet long with the head of a crocodile. In July of 1876, it was well documented there was a guy named Joseph Rich and others who allegedly saw the creature attacking swimmers. And so the sightings clustered around the summer months, which makes sense because you know crocodiles are cold-blooded creatures, and they do go into a sort of hibernation type activity when it's cold. We also have the alkali monster in Alkali Lake, Nebraska, and that lake is um located in Garden County. And the description of this thing was 40-foot alligator-like creature, rough scaly skin, and a horn on its head, which is very odd. Now, most of the accounts were in the 19th century, but there are subporadic accounts during the 20th century as well. And uh one of the documented sightings is in August of 1923, and witnesses reported seeing the creature rise from the water and described it as massive and aggressive. These creatures, so turtles and crocodilians, have real-world analogues, and some of them are quite dramatic. So, alligator snapping turtles are native to southeastern USA, and they can reach 200 plus pounds and have a shell up to two and a half feet wide. They're very prehistoric looking and they have a massive bite. So maybe an escaped specimen could be in the northern lakes, but I mean that would be remarkable not but not impossible. And then the American alligator can reach 11 feet long, uh, with some specimens reported at over 19 feet tall. They're cold-blooded, uh, but they can enter torpor in winter, so that's sort of like a uh hibernation. And um they uh I'm sorry, I got lost there for a second. Um, here we go. So escaped alligators from southern states have been reported in northern lakes. Now, American crocodiles are slightly smaller than alligators, but equally aggressive, and they're rare but documented in southern wetlands. And then we have monitor lizards, which are uh semi-aquatic, and there's various large species, particularly the Asian water monitor, and they have escaped from captivity and established populations in unexpected locations. I'm going a bit long here. Um let's do this. Let's just go over the next type, and um maybe I'll do a follow-up. No, we'll just push right through it here. Okay. Now another type, and I'll be very brief about this one, is the cephalopod type, and this is an octopus. And really there's only one of these, and this is in Oklahoma, uh, or various lakes in within Oklahoma. And the accounts are in the late 1800s and early 1900s, and the description is it's an eight-armed creature, three to twenty feet long in various accounts, and it's reddish-brown or orange in color, and it's described as hunting livestock that come to drink at the water's edge. So there was a notable research researcher named Gary Campbell, and he documented numerous accounts in his Lake Monster case book, but there's no reliable photographic evidence. And obviously, uh there's no skeletal remains, no dead specimens, and no DNA ever recorded. And of course, uh cephalopods uh they only have like um sort of uh cartilage-like structures, so and those would dissolve or be um biodegraded into non-existence very quickly. So freshwater octopi is biologically implausible, and that's because they have osmoregulation, which basically octopus maintain an internal salt concentration through specialized kidney functions that are evolved for marine environments. So freshwater exposure would cause some osmotic imbalance. However, some cephalopods do survive in brackish water, so um cuttlefish uh could it also could be an unknown or relic population that have adapted. For instance, in New Zealand and Palau, there are lakes that are freshwater that have jellyfish in them, and some of them have been adapted to a point where they no longer have stinging nettles. So it's possible that uh an aquatic, uh, an oceanic type creature could be adapted to a freshwater environment. So we've journeyed through all of these different types of creatures: pleasosaurs, serpents, otters, turtles, octopi. So the thing that's interesting is uh similar creatures appear in similar geographic regions, which is you know sort of like what biologists would look at. The sightings surge during specific periods. So in the 30s for Nesses, the 70s and 80s for Champ and Chesse. This is when humans looked hardest, or when the creatures were most active, we can't be sure. So I don't know if there's a causation correlation issue there. Um across all these types, creatures avoid capture. They show intelligence, they appear to recognize humans as threats, and they favor deep water where human observation is limited. And despite centuries of accounts in modern technology, there's very little, if no tangible proof, no skeletal remains, no conclusive photos, and no DNA. So what we do know is that many of these creatures described in lake monster accounts have real-world analogs, giant sturgeons, massive catfish, alligator snapping turtles, giant otters. So there are many accounts, obviously, that are demonstrably fake, like the searches photo was a fake. Um, but many accounts come from credible witnesses in multiple independent instances and talking about the same thing. And deep water in lakes remains largely unexplored and unmonitored by humans. So now they spend more time out in the ocean trying to figure out what's out there than they do typically in these lake environments trying to figure out what's inside those. So we don't know whether unknown species of a significant size could exist in these lakes undetected because we haven't really done the research as much as we could have. Um why sightings cluster in certain time periods and geographic regions, that tells me the geograph geographic regions tells me that there is a population of something there that people are seeing. Now the time periods that may just be when people's attention is focused in these environments. If one person sees it, then typically there's a cluster that sees this thing. We don't know if this could be some sort of dimensional or state or quantum entanglement thing. We do know from science and from quantum um physics that there are parallel and multiple dimensions. We just don't know how much we have access to those and whether our brains are misaligned from those. I do know we've lost a lot of our abilities over the years. Um we used to be able to see better at night, we used to detect prey much easier, we used to be more in tune with the spiritual world, and all of that's changed over the time, and I think technology is meant to sort of dampen that. And uh obviously uh I don't know what the answer is other than unplugging and becoming a hermit. Joke about that from time to time. But I think I think we've lost a lot of our ability through the course of our years and our connection with nature and our ability to um see these, see beyond what we see today. There was uh a talk about the Aboriginals in Australia being able to see the pathways of their ancestors as sort of like colored lights that were snaking through their environments, and even if they've never been to a location before, they could follow ancestral paths, um, and they would say that it was like this colored string that led them through where they were supposed to go. And perhaps we could all do that at some point in time, but we've lost the ability now. Um and I think I think that's probably one of these things where maybe we have glimpses of our previous life and our previous abilities. So I think the diversity of late cryptid accounts from Pisaur Plesiosaur to um intelligent octopuses to shape-shifting otterman suggests several possibilities. Either we're seeing misidentifications of known creatures filtered through human perception and cultural expectation, or we're glimpsing genuine unknown fauna, or, and this is the possibility science hasn't adequately addressed yet, we're encountering phenomena that don't fit our current understanding of physics or biology. So what I find compelling is not any single sighting, but a pattern across centuries, across continents, and across cultures that had no communication with each other. So people report encountering intelligent, elusive creatures in deep water. Indigenous traditions that predate modern cryptozoology describe water entities that are remarkably consistent with what people are seeing today. The scientific method demands proof. So without a specimen, without DNA, or without fossil evidence, we can't confirm these creatures exist, but absence of proof is not absence, is not proof of absence. In a world where less than 5% of the ocean has been explored, where deep freshwater lakes remain equally mysterious, the possibility does remain open that there are real monsters or creatures out there that are around, and we just have yet to spend the time and effort to ensure that we've exhausted all scientific um due diligence to say definitively that that is not something that's real. Alright, thanks for listening. I'm your host, Mike Porter, and I really enjoyed having this conversation with you. If you've seen something strange or unusual, a lake creature, uh, I once pulled a 63-pound uh catfish out of the water, and I know what a monster that thing was. I can't imagine seeing one that was 10 feet long. Um anyway, if you've had a strange encounter, please let me know. Mike at arcane station.com. Uh go to my YouTube channel. I do uh one minute or less shorts on each subject Monday through Saturday, and each day is dedicated to like cryptids or high strangeness or paranormal. Take a look on there. I also have case files where I do a little bit like this, except that's more visual, and I have images. I've done one on werewolf uh werewolf type creatures, and I've done one on Bigfoot type creatures. Um anyway, hope you've enjoyed the show. Have a wonderful night.