Bigfoot in Maine: A History of Encounters in the Pine Tree State

Maine is among the most heavily forested states in the country, so there should be little surprise it is home to a fair number of Bigfoot encounters.

While the northern counties are the most remote, the southern counties seem to generated the most sightings, according to data at the Bigfoot Filed Researches Organization.

Over the years, some of those reports have come with photos and/or video. For instance, in 2017, a woman in York County produced video of what she said could be footprints from the beast.

In her report to BFRO, the woman said she was hiking in Vaughn Woods State Park in South Berwick when she came across the prints.

The snow had stopped yesterday and I tell you these prints were FRESH. I am thinking I just missed that squatch by a matter of minutes or hours! SO CLOSE! Well, let me tell you what!! These things were 12'' long and the stride between steps was measured at 8 feet! The line of prints was straight, just like you see with other evidence of a bigfoot trail! It was INSANE.

Bigfoot researcher Loren Coleman is a bona fide expert on the subject. Coleman runs the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland. In 2019 interview below, he talked about recent rumored sightings and why Mainers are particularly fascinated with the creature:

Coleman has written more than 40 books including The Field Guide to Bigfoot and Other Mystery Primates. He advised the 'Finding Bigfoot' team when the Animal Planet show came to Maine in 2016.

In 2015, this video of a reported sighting in Turner sparked some debate about whether the figure captured was indeed evidence of the legendary creature. Investigators couldn't be sure.

Some of the "evidence" can not be seen, only heard. Take, for instance, the recording below made by Michael Merchant of Hampden. Merchant was participant in Spike TV's 2014 show 10 Million Dollar Bigfoot Bounty. Neither Merchant nor anyone else claimed the show's hefty bounty.

So far, these have been relatively recent reports. However, many encounters -- including this report from north of Bangor -- were reported in the 1970s, just a few years after the 1967 release of the famous Patterson-Gimlin footage from California.

I observed a large, hairy creature, either dark brown or black, striding swiftly across the southbound lanes from the treed median to the woods on the right side of the road. The creature walked smoothly and stood very erect. At first I thought it was a gorilla, then immediately realized that didn't make any sense; but it had too long arms for a bear, and didn't stand or move like one.

Here's another report from the 1970s that relies on scat -- and the hurling of a huge boulder -- as potential evidence of the creature's appearance in Piscataquis County near Katahdin.

One morning I hunted alone south of the lake, when I encountered a strange musky smell in the woods along with a foot-long black scat that looked human except for the extraordinary thickness and width. I also observed small scat that looked like a large pile of baby feces with white and yellow texture. As I proceeded on, I was confronted with the sound of thumping like a partridge on steroids drumming. The ground actually shook.

The ground didn't shake when two sisters in Hancock County reported seeing a large, shaggy creature on the side of Route 46 while driving to school in the mid-1990s. The sisters said the creature was "about the size of a human, was covered with very dark, shaggy hair, and it was sorta hunched over with its arms hanging down quite far.

[I] know what we saw was real and i know that it wasn't a bear. Bears are not shaped like humans and very rarely walk around on two feet.

The sister who made the report noted that people don't believe her when she tells the story and, indeed, it's said only about 20 percent of people believe in Bigfoot.

Do you?