Australian Yowie - Bigfoot Down Under

Just a quick post to ask any Australians (or interested internationals) what they know about the Yowie and it's historical basis.

They are creatures that had a place in Aboriginal legend, and are still around today. There are sightings all over the country and on rare occasions photos and/or video.

Yowie Hunters is the Australian organisation that has been formed to hunt and document the beasts, and i personally have had to call them in in the past... that experience is one of the reasons i'm starting this thread, to hear from other people so i can compare notes.

The Australian Yowie Research Centre conducts scientific study into the possiblity of there actually being creatures in the bush, and is also useful as a central hub for a network of Yowie websites.

So what do you think? Just another Bigfoot? Hoaxes? Possibly an entirely seperate species due to Australia's remoteness? Let us know

To start things off, here is my experience... which i posted in another forum not long ago.

A friend of mine's house backs onto a reserve in which strange stuff has been happening for years, it is a local urban legend if you want to call it that. It is a few hectares of bushland surrounding a billabong (Australian slang for small murky lake) and i really don't know why developers hadn't baught it up and destroyed it yet. Pets dissapear regularly from the houses surrounding it, and the wildlife and herritage mob find dead kangaroos (mutilated sometimes) in and around the reserve when they do their inspections also.

One night about 11:30 pm a mate and i were walking back from town (went for a food run because we ate everything back at his place haha) and we came to the far side of the reserve out the back of his house. Anyway, a small dirt track (and i mean small, like a metre wide then you hit a green bush wall on both sides) goes through it from the town side for about 2km, and comes out about a street away from where he lives, and it was late and we decieded to take the track to save time going around the reserve.

He was telling me about all the strange noises he hears at night from inside the reserve, like gutteral yelling sounds (could be put down to Koalas i guess), scratching on his fence and cries of animals in pain etc etc and that really got me on my nerves as it was already. About halfway down the track we heard something moving through the bush on our right side, but had no hope of hearing it. We stopped, and it stopped aswell. We kept going and the sound came back, a mild crashing noise, probably about 20 or 30 metres away just keeping pace with us. Then the smell hit. A rotten smell of death basically, like you would smell if you left roadkill through your house. That was enough for us and we made a runner down the track, the noise effortlessly keeping pace until at one point it sounded right behind us, my mate was infront of me and looked over his shoulder. I'd never seen a more scared face in my entire life, so i looked back aswell and what i can only describe as at least a fridge-size thing covered in fur was coming down the path at about 30 metres behind us. As you can guess we both let out screams and ran twice as hard until we made it to the street. We ran accross the road to the closest streetlight and stood under it to catch our breath, watching the bush. We saw whatever it was stop at the edge of the bush on the track and wait for a few minutes, then it turned and went back in.

We made it back to my mates house and spent the entire night awake listening to make sure we were safe. It was the scariest night of my life... and as you can guess we havn't been back in there since. Still see the odd article in the local paper about animals dying and going missing.

[edit on 16-12-2006 by fooffstarr]

Holy cow! Nice story. How old were you? Did you get a look at it's head? What sort of head, teeth, eyes did it have?

Any chance of a photo of the dirt track? People here would be telling you to look for hair samples the following day, but it's too late now. Maybe you could set up automatic camera traps to photo anything which moves past the camera.

Is this you?
www.yowiehunters.com.au...
btw people you can look at the bottom of the page and click on the right hand link it will take you to the next audio description file.

this is a good one
www.yowiehunters.com.au...
& the next one...
www.yowiehunters.com.au...
& the next one is good too (358) "sChittin' myself hardcore"
lol
(359) I'm loving these stories!

These Ozzy Yowies appear to be quite aggressive, unlike USA Bigfoot, and Asian Yeti. What do the Aborigines have to say about them? Do they fear them? Do they think they are harmless but best left alone?

Answering my own question
quote from this page
www.theaustralianyowieresearchcenter.com...

According to Aborigines, the yowies were terrifying to look upon: fearsome and hairy, up to or over 2.6 metres in height, with strong muscular bodies, powerful arms and large hands longer than a human's. They walked upright upon two legs with a stooped gait. Their heads were sunk into their shoulders, giving them the stooped appearance.

They had a pointed sagittal crest (skull dome) and a receding forehead with thick, protruding eyebrow-ridges and large deeply-set eyes. Males were often hairier than females, who had long pendulous breasts. The feet of the yowie were much larger than those of a normal-sized human, and possessed an opposable big toe.

These mysterious hominids roamed the remoter, forest-covered mountain regions either in small family groups or or hunting in ones and twos, their females and young secreted back in their lairs. The Aborigines both feared and respected the yowies, venerating them as sacred creatures from the Dreamtime.

In fact, as already pointed out, Aboriginal folklore is still full of giant manlike beings, creatures sometimes over three metres in height. While some were giant humans who made massive stone tools and sometimes fire, others were more ape-like. From Western Australia and the Northern Territory I have obtained traditions of a gigantic gorilla-like monster that once terrorised Aboriginal tribes of the interior.

[edit on 16/12/2006 by Wig]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
replaced quote with 'ex' tags

[edit on 17/12/06 by masqua]

I was 17 at the time, so 2 years ago. I got a bit of a look at its face, but not much else as my friend's body blocked the view i had. An easy reference for what its head looked like would be cousin It off the Addams family lol. Hate to sound lame but all you could really hair was long shaggy hair and a small sign of black light-reflecting eyes through the hair.

I guess i could get some photos in the future if i ever want to go back there. I havn't spoken to that friend for a while either, i think he has moved now (for good reason too).

The top link is me... wow i didn't even know he had put it on the website.

As far as aggressive creatures goes, read some of the expedition reports from Yowie Hunters. The majority of the time they end up being chased or surrounded by these things. Apparently they stamp their feet as a warning first. That would be terrifying i think.

Right after the thing chased us we were going to organize a heap of people to go and look for it, but i couldn't bring myself to even go back in there, i was that paralysed with fear just looking at the place.

Sorry you don't seem to be getting much response here. This forum seems to be very quiet of late. I only wish I lived in a country which has a long well documented history of these beasts such as USA, Canada, Himalayas & Oz. There have been some sightings in UK but I'm not sure what to make of them.

As far as i can tell they seem to just be another species of ape, and have like all creatures evolved according to their surroundings. Each continent seems to have its own populace of them with slightly different accounts.

I'm fairly sure there would be some anywhere you searched (maybe not the centre of the Gobi desert... but you get the idea ) it is just a matter of finding one of the buggers. Out of all the humanoid races they seem the best at natural stealth.

Saying this, it all depends on whether they exist or not at all. I for one believe they do, as you can probably guess from my first post.

I first heard of the Yowie in an excellent report in the Fortean Times magazine. It had loads of really detailed eye-witness reports from people living on the edge of the bush, just like you friend did. There seems to be many more good sightings of Yowies than bigfoot etc, which makes them way more interesting to me. I've also read that they may be supernatural beings. And yeah, they do seem to be more confident and agressive so I think the Aborigines are correct in fearing and revering them.

[edit on 18-12-2006 by Nammu]

[edit on 18-12-2006 by Nammu]

[edit on 18-12-2006 by Nammu]

Sorry. Had to edit previous post so much cause for some reason it won't let me embed the link:

www.forteantimes.com...

Thanks for the link. Interesting stuff.

Yeah, as you said, the Yowie seems to have alot more of an agressive and fearless personality compared to other nation's hairy homonids. That reason itself can explain the higher numbers of witnesses and accounts.

To the Aboriginal people, the Yowie was most likely treated as a spirit or ancestor, like most things. That is a horrible generalisation, but it is the easiest way to connect them to more supernatural beings. I, however, just believe they are the missing link in evolution. Nothing more kooky about it!

Yowie caught on camera?!

I just found this video in my websearch for info on these creatures. It isn't exactly what you'd call convincing, but it is the closest footage anyone has ever got of one of the Bigfoot family.

Sad part is, according to Cryptomundo, the filmmaker did some work on Star Wars 3, which makes it possible this is just someone in a Wookie costume. If you look closely at the slow motion section, you can see eye holes of sorts in a costume when it turns to run. Most likely a hoax, but a good one never the less.

The Aboriginies have passed down tales/stories of a race of human like creatures that used to eat their children whom they reffered to as Bunyips.

BTW in my opinion the video in the post directly above this post looks alot like a special forces SAS soldier in full Sniper Cammo gear ( just my opinion ).

[edit on 21-12-2006 by mazzroth]

[edit on 21-12-2006 by mazzroth]

It does look a bit like a Ghille suit doesnt it...

I lived in the country for 23 years, never really heard or experienced any type of 'yowie' or whatever??? And incase you wondering, I camp alot and explore range's, parks, forests. Not suggesting this is not possible, but just my experience I've never come accross anything like a yowie. This said, I am interested to explore further, maybe my ignorance played a big part.

My grandfather is one of the last aboriginal elders in Fremantle, he was born in a remote town called Wandering which is down the south of Western Australia on the way to Albany. He is one of many of my family, including myself who have had personal experiences with yowies. The nyoongar(tribe of Southern West Australia) people call the yowies, Woodarchies or Mumaries(spelt both how you would say the names) they are described as small like children, about 3 feet tall, covered with long dark hair, can run as fast as a horse can gallop and have double the strength of a human man. It was said in my family that they were known to abduct children by singing them away from their families whilst they were in the bush and take them as their own, my uncle as a child of 5yrs old was taken whilst the family was camping and was only found because of the collection of bottlecaps he had in his pocket and the noise that they made when he walked. He was a normal happy noisy child, but may father said that he was confused when he was found and couldn't remember why he had left the camp or what had happened.
A couple of years later my grandfather whilst hunting just out of Bodington witnessed two woodarchies roaming through thick bushland on a rocky outcrop. He was on the ridge of the gully and had a good view of the area but at first he thought it was two children because of their size, from the camping ground which was located about 1km away from where he wa. He realised how fast they were traveling and as they got closer realised that they were covered in fur, but what ran with them was what scared him the most. Following both creatures was a naked adult woman, her hair was very long and he said she was filthy, but she was human. Needless to say he never went hunting on his own again. A few months later after mentioning what he had seen to a few select people Pop found out that a female child of 7 months old had disapeared from a car parked on the roadside whilst her father had releived himself amongst the trees some twenty years before.

Thanks for the great post justnads.

I had tried to explain the Aboriginal stories of the Yowie, but you do a far better job than I! Learning history and stories from someone like your Grandfather must have been amazing; Far more educational than being like me and reading about it in books.

The particular event with the wildwoman is the most interesting.

I had read somewhere years ago about reports of campers coming into contact with a naked, filthy woman in the bush down your way. The fact that your Grandfather saw her with several Yowies tells me something far more important than anything so far in this thread: That the creatures do indeed have some form of family system, most likely similar to other primates. They must have taken her as a baby (from the car you mentioned) and brought her up as one of their own.

I'll have to go back through all my sources and have a read about similar cases again now. You've sparked my interest.

Thanks again for the post. I'll give you a WATS award for it!

Justnads

I live down near the area you are talking about and grew up there, your story is very interesting as I have never heard that one before. I must ask you a question though, what is a wodullah ?.

fooffstarr in your original post you said your friend was ahead of you, looked back and his expression was of fear so you look back yourself. in your next post you say your friends body obstructed your view back. sorry to nitpick...

i find the yowie phenomenon pretty interesting myself. the original australians still know 100x more about this country than us whiteys.

Originally posted by Shar_Chi
fooffstarr in your original post you said your friend was ahead of you, looked back and his expression was of fear so you look back yourself. in your next post you say your friends body obstructed your view back. sorry to nitpick...

i find the yowie phenomenon pretty interesting myself. the original australians still know 100x more about this country than us whiteys.

I was wondering when someone would find that I noticed that typo a few days ago and I've been too lazy to change it. Was simply a case of over tiredness and crossed wires. He was in front of me. My view back was semi-obscured, simply because of the density of the bush, but i saw enough.

Originally posted by fooffstarr
I was 17 at the time, so 2 years ago. I got a bit of a look at its face, but not much else. An easy reference for what its head looked like would be cousin It off the Addams family lol. Hate to sound lame but all you could really hair was long shaggy hair and a small sign of black light-reflecting eyes through the hair.

I guess i could get some photos in the future if i ever want to go back there. I havn't spoken to that friend for a while either, i think he has moved now (for good reason too).

The top link is me... wow i didn't even know he had put it on the website.

As far as aggressive creatures goes, read some of the expedition reports from Yowie Hunters. The majority of the time they end up being chased or surrounded by these things. Apparently they stamp their feet as a warning first. That would be terrifying i think.

Right after the thing chased us we were going to organize a heap of people to go and look for it, but i couldn't bring myself to even go back in there, i was that paralysed with fear just looking at the place.

Been a while since i posted this topic, but now that i have DSL i thought i'd put up the location i saw the thing i mentioned in the first post.

Google Earth:

31°26'10.22"S 152°52'44.80"E

Don't know how easy that would be to find, but ill put up a screenshot or 2 as well.






In the first image, the spot is in the direct centre of the map, between the houses boardering the racecourse, and the dirt area next to the road in the top right.

That area of bushland has a few tracks going through it, one of which we took on that night.

The 2nd photo is a pan to the top left of the photo, to show that the bush goes back, past the airport and continues on. I believe it is probably still living in there somewhere.

Hey man, A few years ago I was staying at a friends farm and I think we saw the same thing you described, there was a few animals going missing around that time too, dogs found killed and birds with wings and necks shredded. Anyway, we were out shooting fruit bats at night, when we saw something lumbering and making growling noises in some bushes near a fence, at first we thought a kangaroo was caught in the barbed wire. It was fairly close by, just near the trees that the bats were in, so we went to take a closer look, when the bushes just sort of exploded apart! So we just bailed back to the motorbikes and rode home as fast as we could. The next morning we went back to the spot and the fence was ripped apart, we both thought that whatever it was must have had fairly tough skin, as there was no fur or flesh caught on the barbed wire.
Though in our story, the creature seemed more scared then aggressive and there was no bad smell. I also found out that most of the Aboriginal stories of Yowies were just to scare children and misbehaver's into being good though.