New Book - Wild Men (Unnamed) at 11,000 words.

Thus far, with only 11,000 words, I have complete newspaper articles from 17 states, two Canadian provinces, and a couple foreign nations. Most are older stories, i.e. early 1920s back to 1839. For those more recent I am using the headlines and a brief summary of the article.

You must know. This is not a Bigfoot book. Wild men did exist. Feral humans lived on the edge of civilization in the nineteenth century. Others were more the freak show type of wild men, while according to the witnesses' accounts, many others may have been wild animals, like those huge bipedal hairy non-human primates we all know about. This compilation of accounts will allow you to reach your own conclusion.

Starting a new book....Not Zombies this time...It's Wild Men.

The book is unnamed as of yet, but the subject will be the written accounts of the wild men of North American. The older stories of wild men have fascinated me for the last number of months. The Indians knew about them, but the new arrivals from Europe did not. Stories were passed on from mouth to mouth until newspapers began to report on them, beginning in the 1830s, as the growth in numbers of newspapers exploded. Some of these were wild men were just that. They may have been jail escapees, crazies, slaves on the run, deserters, criminals, circus and exhibited fakes or just those in search of the quiet, solitude and beauty of nature and perhaps more than one huge, bipedal, hairy primate that have stalked the forests for perhaps thousands of years.

There are plenty of stories to tell. The headlines are sometimes amusing, and outright laughable. Newspapers were often skeptical of any reports or sightings and did not shy away from disparaging witnesses as having overactive imaginations or too much to drink.

Thus far, 3000 words with many more to come.

Repair of Painting

I may be able to publish my crudely edited video of the repair, but until then here's what I did.

1. Cut out a patch of canvas big enough to cover the tear.
2. Take the painting out of the frame.
3. Apply the patch over the tear on the back of the canvas, using an appropriate adhesive. I used a medium.
4. Weight down the patch with books, making sure there is aluminum foil or waxed paper between the books and the patch so glue doesn't stick to the books.
5. Once the patch dries, paint over the front of the painting where the tear was. It's just a touch up of the small lines of the tear, but make sure the strokes, color and body of the paint sufficiently cover the tear.
6. Let it dry. You're done. Except for a small patch in the back of the painting, it would be hard to tell you had a tear.
Repairing a tear in a painting

Uh Oh...

As I was taking my two paintings to Attleboro to be donated to the Auction to be held by the Attleboro Arts Museum, one of them fell onto the other, tearing the canvas in a three corner tear. It's never happened before to me. Never thought it could. I came home and picked out another painting, created another donation form, and will make the trip to Attleboro tomorrow.

In the meantime, I thought the painting was lost. What a bummer! But a search of the Internet gave me hope that the tear could be repaired, at least enough for me to recover the painting for my personal gallery. I think I do a short video on the project.

More to come. Oh.  The one that got torn was 'Gulliver Street in the Fall'.

The Art Calendar is Getting Busier

Attleboro Arts Museum - Their annual charity auction will take place November 7th. For that, I am donating two pieces as I did last year. One is a piece for which I received an Honorable Mention in the Art Show at Massasoit Community College in May. The other is a night scene of the Manhattan skyline from the shores of Brooklyn. I have to get together the necessary paperwork and get them over to Attleboro by October 2nd.

The two works are in the column to the right: 1) Manhattan from Brooklyn II; 2) Gulliver Street in the Fall.

Taunton Art Association - Their Annual Fall Art Show is the third week in October. I will be submitting three works. They will include my favorite, When Eye Cry, which now shows up in my background of my Twitter account. By the way, my Twitter account can be found at @billg135.

The three works are in the column to the right: 1) Manhattan from Brooklyn I; 2) Why Eye Cry; 3) Unnamed.

Abstract

I am attempting some trials of fluid art using either enamel or acrylic paints. I should have put this into a time lapse video. I have two more to post. They are drying right now. The black, white and orange motif is posted to the right under Abstract. There are two others numbered 2 and 3 that I photographed under poor light and conditions which I'll have to redo.

I continue to tweet Bigfoot and Sasquatch related Topics on Twitter

Check out @billg135 on Twitter for my words relating to DNA, Sasquatch and primate intelligence, some excerpts from my book, how many Bigfoot there are and other topics.

In the meantime I will be delivering some of my paintings to a Fall River for an exhibition. It will include two which I am posting to the column to the right of this.

How Many Bigfoot are there?

How many Bigfoot are there? Of course, no one knows. The BFRO states that informed estimates put the number at  2000-6000 for North America, including Canada. I know there are a number of methods and variables involved in estimating the population sizes of species. However, most don't apply to a cryptid. So, I devised my own method of estimation.

One assumption I made was that Bigfoot breeding populations are borderline insufficient to sustain themselves. I think we all hope that's not true, but if they were a known species, I believe they'd be on the Endangered Species List.  I suspect there has been a lot of inbreeding among Sasquatches. This may have resulted in some physical deformities, such as feet with three four or six toes, maybe even albinism. These characteristics have been reported. However, I did find some research that indicated that mountain gorillas, another great ape, were known to have been inbreeding when their populations dipped to dangerously low levels. However, they did not suffer any detectable genetic problems as a result of inbreeding.

The second assumption I made was that each breeding population inhabited a limited, albeit large area, say the size of a large state, a Canadian Province or two, or several smaller states.

Lastly, I used the number of 200 as the minimum number in a breeding population. This is approximately the number of mountain gorillas which existed at their lowest population level before awareness of their situation caused conditions to change and their numbers to rise.

These groups of states might be thought of as habitation areas for roaming groups of Bigfoot. You can agree or disagree with the numbers or how they are broken out.
Florida
Texas
Oklahoma-AR
Ohio-Penn
Mich-MInn
Canada ~5 Provinces
Wash
Oregon
Calif
New England
KY-TN-VA
NC-SC-GA
AK-BC
UT-ID-CO
So, that makes 18 large areas perhaps accommodating 200 Bigfoot each.

So, 200 x 18 = 3600.  Although I didn't mean to, I sort of confirmed the BFRO 'informed' estimate. Doesn't mean it's right, but it's a reasonable starting point.

Ways to Buy the Book

Silvapithecus Americanus is available from the Apple iBook store, Barnes & Noble, Sony, Kobo, Smashwords and others.
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/Silvapithecus?store=allproducts&keyword=Silvapithecus
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/535464

Massasoit Arts Festival

Both of my paintings have been accepted for the above festival. They appear to the right. The black and white moonlit ocean scene won an honorable mention.

Ribbon Winners of Taunton Art Association Fall and Spring Art Shows to Exhibit Works

My painting, seen to the right, 'Gulliver Street in the Fall', will be displayed at the Trescott Street Gallery starting May 15th for about a month, along with the other winners. 

Silvapithecus Americanus - Will DNA be the final word if a specimen is taken?

What will DNA tell us about Bigfoot?

If and when a Bigfoot specimen is taken, it is expected that the DNA results will help place the Bigfoot somewhere in the ape-human family tree. Don't be so sure. 

DNA is not the be-all, end-all 'blueprint' when it comes to defining differences and similarities between species like the great apes and humans, or for that matter, any species.  There is also morphology to consider. (Wiki describes Morphology as a branch of biology dealing with the study of the form and structure of organisms and their specific structural features. This includes aspects of the outward appearance (shape, structure, color, pattern), i.e., external morphology as well as the form and structure of the internal parts like bones and organs, i.e., internal morphology or anatomy.)

You've probably heard that humans are most closely related to the great ape, the chimpanzee. Nucleotide mismatches with humans occur in the African great apes, as is determined by DNA hybridization, at the rate of 1.1%. Humans and orangutans differ by a factor of 2.4%. That's a pretty close genetic similarity.*

Yet, as small the percentage is, why aren't chimps and humans almost identical in a morphological sense? (i.e. why don' t they look more alike?) * Did you know that human males differ from human females in their DNA by about 1.5%. A major reason is that the male Y chromosome is much smaller female X chromosome. If you took only the percentage differences, wouldn't you conclude that human males are more closely related to chimps than human females? The difference, of course, is that human males and females are much more similar to each other morphologically. Some of these are derived features of the Homo sapiens species. (In the study of evolutionary relationships, derived refers to traits that exist in a present organism, but did not exist in the organism's ancestors.)*

Let's talk about another great ape, the orangutan. There are two species of orangutans, Bornean and Sumatran. The mitochondrial DNA difference between these two very similar species exceeds that between humans and chimpanzees. Yet, the two types of orangutans are much more similar to each other morphologically than humans are with chimps.* As an aside, I think the study of orangutans is very important because the possible ancestors of Bigfoot are Sivapithecus and the later Gigantopithecus, both who have strong ties to current day orangutans.

The comparison of gene sequences is not enough. Importantly, it's the effect of communication between regulatory genes and RNA, so-called genomic processes that is going to result in an improved understanding of evolution and genes.

(*ideas from 'The Red Ape' by Jeffrey H. Schwartz)

So, what's my point?

When that big, hairy ape's DNA is truly taken from a valid specimen, expect there to be more questions than answers about whether it is human's closest relative. The morphology of the creature should be considered. There is no scientific justification to favor DNA over morphological data.

The First Returns re: Silvapithecus Americanus are in!

"Wow. I enjoyed it very much. I couldn't anticipate what would happen next." - V.B., Orlando

The Book is available at Barnes & Noble and the Apple iBook Store.

Sales and Sample Downloads Have Begun

Follow me and the book on Twitter @billg135

Book Trailer

The book trailer for Silvapithecus Americanus is located at http://youtu.be/XNENdcj7P_U.