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Youtube Channel on Living Pterosaurs

Protect Animal Life banner for this Youtube channel

By the ropen expert Jonathan Whitcomb

Five months ago today, I uploaded my first video to the Youtube channel Protect Animal Life. Let’s now look at where this video channel stands as of August 29, 2019.

I suggest that Protect Animal Life (PAL) is the number-one Youtube channel on sightings of apparent living pterosaurs, first in both the quantity of videos on these flying creatures and first in the quality of videos, at least in being accurate and up-to-date.

As of August 29, 2019, here are some of the most recent videos on this channel, in order of the most-recently uploaded ones on top:

Ropen – bald or hairy? This video answers critics regarding hair on the animals.

Ropen of Papua New Guinea This is a four-minute introduction to the ropen.

Living Pterosaurs – Why fear? —Plus: a secret— two kinds of fear people have

Living Pterosaurs – in newspapers This is an introduction to some news articles.

Now look at some of the most popular of the videos in terms of number of views:

young lady in a nature preserve points to a clearing - also the silhouette of a ropen

Giant Pterodactyl in California

This mini-documentary, five minutes long, gives you a brief overview of a few of the sightings of these flying creatures in several areas of California. It’s in a different form of music-video genre: a modern version of a classical piece of music (Bach).

frightening head of a ropen - also a young lady in happy surprise

Do Pterodactyls Live in Hawaii?

This features a number of sightings of apparent pterosaurs in Hawaii (4½ min long).

Jonathan and Gladys Whitcomb near the top of Ensign Peak in Salt Lake City, Utah

Pterodactyl Sightings in Los Angeles

This Youtube video is 3½ minutes long. Jonathan Whitcomb and his wife, Gladys, invite the viewer to “please listen to the eyewitnesses.”

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Ropen Hair

Over the years, I’ve rarely mentioned much on this blog about the possibility that ropens in general are covered with some amount of fine hair. Only a small fraction of the total eyewitnesses have been close enough to see such a detail, even if they had a mind to take notice of hair, or lack thereof, at the time of their sightings.

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Living pterosaurs in California

Here we have several blog posts, each with at least some reference to these flying creatures in the state of California:

  • How many people see living pterodactyls?
  • ‘Dinosaur’ book for children and teens
  • New cryptozoology book
  • Living-pterosaur sightings while driving
  • Ropen or pterosaur in New Mexico
  • Pterosaurs east of Griffith Park (Los Angeles, CA)

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Video about the modern pterosaurs

The video “Living Pterosaurs – in newspapers” mostly avoids any scientific examination, except for my explanation of what may have occurred in sightings which were mentioned in the Los Angeles Herald (1891 article). Some pterosaur fossils have been known, by scientists in recent decades, to have evidence of a particular posture: When sitting, such pterosaurs would have their wings folded up, creating two huge bumps near the lower back area, or thereabouts. This could remind some non-scientists of the two bumps on the backs of some frogs. [The video mentions what at least one of the eyewitnesses said: the two “dragons” looked like frogs, perhaps when they were sitting near the edge of a pond.]

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Ropens in Los Angeles County

“Long Tail of the Ropen”

“I saw it around 9 am this morning today. It was a giant black bird of some types. I live very close to San Fernando and Fletcher . . .” [Los Angeles]

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Attacks From Flying Creatures

What many Americans call pterodactyls—those apparently can hunt more than just fish in rivers or bats in caves; a few of them appear to be dangerous to human children, although the evidence at the moment is mostly circumstantial.

The following information is taken mostly from the nonfiction book Missing 411 – Western United States & Canada, by the investigative journalist David Paulides. But from my own perspective, a few individual modern pterosaurs are considered as a potential cause of some of these children becoming missing.

Missing children in Oregon and Washington state

One of the strange cases of persons disappearing in the northwestern USA is that of the two-year-old Keith Parkins. The toddler was visiting his grandparents, who lived in a rugged area of northeastern Oregon. This was in April of 1952, near the North Fork of the John Day River, which is just south of the border with Washington.

Little Keith may have wandered away from the house at about noon, but critical details were not available to Mr. Paulides during his investigation decades later. For some reason, one or more of the searchers decided to look in a creek bed twelve miles away, and that is where they found the unconscious two-year-old, only nineteen hours after he disappeared.

A newspaper reported:

“He was found face down on the chilly ground at 6:40 a.m., nearly nine miles from the farm in a direct line. At the hospital to which he was flown he was reported recovering from shock and exposure. The temperature in his mountain night dropped far below freezing. He crossed at least one icy stream.”

According to the book by Paulides:

“His mother said . . . [his pants] were torn to shreds . . .”

I agree with this author: Searchers looking nine miles away, in a straight direction (twelve miles in walking), only nineteen hours after a two-year-old has gone missing—that is highly unusual. Yet among the strangest of the missing-person cases, this extraordinary ground travel is not so unusual for children of only two or three years of age. I believe that Mr. Paulides and I agree that at least some of these cases involve small children being carried long distances. Carried by whom or by what? That is the question.

But other children have gone missing in Oregon and Washington.

A similar case: Daryl Webley

In April of 1949, two-year-old Daryl went missing from the yard of his family’s home in the Colville area of Washington state. Searchers could not find him until the next day. He was alive but almost nude and badly scratched, in a canyon some distance above where the tracking dogs had found his cap, pants, and one of his shoes.

Like little Keith, this two-year-old, only three years before Keith’s adventure, recovered from his night of cold exposure. This case in 1949, however, has the child himself scratched rather than only the pants badly torn. Daryl was missing for fourteen hours rather than nineteen, yet I believe that relates to survival, not to the cause of disappearance.

How can the 1949 case be explained as an attack from a large flying creature? Perhaps a ropen carried the boy over the canyon, accidentally dropping him into bushes that cushioned the fall. When the animal realized the potential meal was missing, it flew down the canyon, looking for Daryl but failing to find him. The ropen then dropped the clothing where it was later found by the tracking dogs.

I know that this is speculative, but compare this explanation to any other. One of the ropen’s feet had grabbed the boy’s cap, immediately pulling it off, leaving Daryl hanging upside down. How so? The other ropen foot was holding onto both the lower end of one pant leg and the nearby shoe. When the boy fell out of both his shoe and his pants, the creature continued flying a short distance, still holding onto the cap, shoe, and pants. What else explains why those particular articles of clothing were found together but some distance away from where the boy was found?

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large pond near Columbia River, Oregon, 2014

A pond near the Columbia River, Oregon

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Missing Persons and Flying Creatures

Before going on, understand that many apparent pterosaurs in the United States have no interest in attacking people. In fact, the Marfa Lights in Texas as said to be friendly with humans, when they give any sign that they acknowledge us.

Attacks From a Ropen in New Mexico

Of the six persons who were missing in one area of New Mexico, three of them were children, in age from three to seven, in June of 1951. Those three kids were lost together and found together, all alive. The other three persons were adults who were never found, and they disappeared in 1982, 1998, and 2009. The following comparisons suggest there is no cause-relationship between the children and the adults . . .

Wikipedia Causes Ropen “Extinction”

It seems likely that one or more of his students or one or more of the readers of his post were involved. Regardless, you will no longer see Wikipedia’s “Ropen” page at the top of a Google search for that cryptid, for that page is now extinct.

Nightmare: Attack in the Dead of Winter

I dare not now describe to you, in detail, this attacker . . . not yet; it requires an introduction that includes the behavior of Marfa Lights. How they fly gives us no direct clue to the appearance of what causes them (yes, I believe they are physical things that glow). But the apparent dancing of those lights, their complex interactions with each other—that shows us they are more than just lights, and the glow and the motions may serve a purpose.

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Ropens in North America

Whether called “dinosaur bird” or “prehistoric bird” or “pterodactyl,” by an eyewitness, a modern pterosaur with long tail is called by cryptozoologists “ropen.” Let’s consider three of the lesser-known sightings first, then two better-publicized ones.

California (around Riverside/Corona border)

Hello my name is _____ I believe I have seen a ropen in Lake Hills, Southern California. It was larger than most hawks. The ropen had a very long tail and its head had a large crest. I estimate the wing span between 10 and 15 feet in length however it may have been smaller or larger.

California (Orange County; sighting in 1989)

The 405 freeway was congested, as usual.  Sitting in the back seat on the right side . . . I looked up again at traffic and there was no change.  Some movement further up in the air caught my attention.  My jaw dropped. Soaring in the sky without flapping its wings was a flying creature.  It may have been about 500 feet from our car, about 12 stories high.  Its wingspan seemed to be about 8-12 feet.  Its color was a dark brown, like a chocolate candy bar.  The legs did not seem very long and it had a tail about the length of its body from the torso to the top of its head.  Its beak seemed to be about the length of its torso and it was mostly flat and a little pointy at the end.  There were no feathers or plumage, but its skin was not smooth – it looked like rough leather. At the end of its tail was triangular, almost like a cartoonish devil’s tail. . . . After about 10 seconds, I excitedly yelled to my mom, who was sitting in front of me, that there was a dinosaur flying around outside.  She replied with an “Oh wow!  That’s nice!” without bothering to look out the window.

Louisiana

I remember seeing one when I was a kid in Louisiana I thought it was a demon or the devil bat like leathery wings peach to light brown in color fairly large wing span and the spade/diamond shaped tail I knew it wasn’t a bird then I remember the first time I saw a pteradactyl in a book and I was like so that’s what I saw but how? starting to think there are plenty of them alive around the world still.

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pond at San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary

Wildlife sanctuary in Southern California, where a large ropen was reported to fly

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Now for a couple better-known sighting reports of ropens.

California (Los Angeles)

This morning at about 6am I saw three “dragons” flying over the 5-North freeway between Griffith Park and Glendale. They appeared to be several feet long, with a head:body:tail ratio that was certainly not that of a bird. Their wings were long, angular and pointed and their tails had triangular points. They appeared light in color – white, gray or light green. They were flying southeast in a triangular formation. I definitely saw them, but was driving so I could not stop and watch where they went.

Cuba (around 1965)

I was in Guantanamo Naval Base in 1965 and I saw one too, near the shipyards. . . . I was around six years old. My brother George was with me, but he was only around four. We were walking down near the boat yards, headed home. . . . There were some stagnant pools here and there, a few inches deep in the area. We were walking through that scrub area, and suddenly it sat up, as if it had been eating something or resting.

The head and upper part of its body, about a third of the wings at the joint (tips still held down) showed. . . . right in front of us about thirty feet away. All of us froze for about five seconds, then it leaned to its left and took off with a fwap fwap fwap sound, in a big hurry . . .

It did have a tail and it had a diamond shaped tip . . . The skin was a leathery, brownish reddish color. It had little teeth, a LOT of them. The eye was smallish and dark. [Eyewitness Patty Carson]

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“I saw a Prehistoric Bird”

The path it took was up and then swooping down, as if it were dive-bombing  my car. As it crossed my path, in front and slightly above me, I saw it had a head that was curved, like a hammer; the head had a crest on the top that was solid, not feathery at all . . . The tail was long . . .

Ropen

Like eyewitnesses in Australia, some of the eyewitnesses in the United States label the  flying creature “pterodactyl.” Most of these flying creatures have long tails, and many of those long tails are seen to have a vane or flange at the end. This appears to relate to the Rhamphorhynchoid tail flange that is known from fossils of some pterosaurs.

Pterosaur Sightings East of Griffith Park, CA

In two separate sightings, two eyewitnesses in Los Angeles, California, reported flying creatures described like pterosaurs. The sightings were a little over a mile apart, both from drivers on the northbound Interstate-5 Freeway, just east of Griffith Park, near Glendale.

The sightings were ten weeks apart, with both eyewitnesses contacting me by email.

March 3, 2013, Sighting of “three dragons”

  1. Flying south at 6:10 a.m.
  2. Eyewitness was sure they were not birds
  3. No wing flaps
  4. Long thin tails had “triangular points”
  5. Observed in early daylight – “it wasn’t dark”
  6. Presence or absence of feathers: “I couldn’t tell, it was too quick”
  7. Was there a head crest? A: Could not tell
  8. Alone in the car, driving northbound
  9. Credibility verified by Whitcomb, but limited

May 13, 2013, Sighting of a “Pterosaur”

  1. Flying northeast at about 4:00 p.m.
  2. Eyewitness was “almost positive” it was not a bird
  3. No wing flaps
  4. Did not notice if it had a tail or not
  5. Observed in full daylight
  6. Presence or absence of feathers: “No feathers”
  7. Was there a head crest? A: “I did see its head crest” [yes]
  8. Alone in the car, driving northbound
  9. Credibility verified by Whitcomb, but limited

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Observatory and planetarium on a high hill overlooking downtown Los Angeles, California - in Griffith Park

Griffith Park observatory and astronomy museum in Los Angeles

Photograph: courtesy of “Puck90”

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Dragons or Pterosaurs in Griffith Park

How delighted I was, this past March, to receive an eyewitness report of three “dragons” flying over the I-5 freeway in Los Angeles! . . . How delighted I was, earlier this month, to received an eyewitness report of a “pterosaur” flying over that same stretch of freeway just east of Griffith Park!

Griffith Park “Dragons”

The three flying creatures observed  near Griffith Park, California . . . March 3, 2013, by a driver on the I-5 freeway were not  at first glance assumed to be birds . . . something like three kites . . . But the lady  soon changed her mind when she  saw the tails move.

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Jonathan Whitcomb's third edition of "Live Pterosaurs in America" - nonfiction cryptozoology genre - sightings of "pterodactyls" still living

Live Pterosaurs in America – third edition (non-fiction cryptozoology)

From this nonfiction book about modern pterosaurs (page 96):

Where did we get the idea of pterosaur extinction? Early discoverers of pterosaur fossils had no knowledge of living pterosaurs; they assumed they were looking at the remains of extinct creatures, and that assumption has been magnified for two centuries. I believe that the idea was cemented into Western thought when Darwin’s General Theory of Evolution became popular in the nineteenth century, but search textbooks in vain for solid scientific evidence of pterosaur extinction, for the conjecture itself is more philosophical than scientific. It is an assumption.