Expedition Reports

First Panda Lady Has Died

Joined by her husband, Jack (left), and brother-in-law Quentin Young is Adelaide “Su-Lin” Young. Photo courtesy of her family. Forget about the fictional “Indiana Jones,” or even the real “Zoology Jones,” for a minute. Recall, please, that women were part of the early exploration adventures too! Ruth Harkness is often remembered as the first woman to have found the giant panda. But why was that first cub named Su-Lin? Here is the rest of the story. After Ruth Harkness’ husband William died as he set out to find the first live giant pandas, she turned to a man only identified [...]

Parasitic Plant Rediscovered After 20 Years

A plant only its mother and father could love? It looks beautiful to me. This is a cryptobotany triumph. This rediscovered parasitic plant was found June 12, 2006, in Guerrero, Mexico, and not seen since 1985. Photograph by George Yatskievych. A scientist with the Missouri Botanical Garden has rediscovered and identified a rare parasitic plant that hasn’t been seen by botanists in more than 20 years. A single specimen of the plant was found in Mexico in 1985, but the plant wasn’t seen again until St. Louis botanist George Yatskievych and a colleague found it in a pine oak forest [...]

Gilroy Associate Announces Tracks

Rex Gilroy’s earlier Karumba, Australia, track find. An individual only identifying himself as “ausiepath9,” who serves as a spokesperson for the Gilroys of Australia, is posting around the web that “Fresh Moa Tracks” have been discovered in New Zealand. This associate shares this week that “Rex and Heather have returned from New Zealand and have many new discoveries to show” in the future, including “the Moa tracks Rex discovered.” Ausiepath9 relates that a “few years back” Rex Gilroy “discovered a small scrub Moa track(s) [sic] up-to 20 in leaf-mould..of which two were cast.” But the latest tracks are apparently different: [...]

Free Cryptozoology at JSE

Don’t worry. You now can join years of scientific explorers at the edge, for free. In a gesture of Superman scale, Greg Taylor of The Daily Grail passes along the news that all issues of the Journal of Scientific Exploration have been released as free PDF downloads here. Greg Taylor writes: If you head to the JSE website now, you’ll find that they have actually made *all* volumes from 1987 to 2006 available as free PDF downloads. That’s 20 volumes/70 issues of JSE (!!!) – absolutely the most important journal for ideas on the edge of science and knowledge. Thought [...]

Cryptozoo Book With A Warning

Extreme Expedition: Travel Adventures Stalking the World’s Mystery Animals by Adam Davies (Anomalist Books) has been published. It contains a rare “warning label” not often seen on cryptozoological works. Davies, who is departing on a new Yeren expedition on April 28, 2008, is sharing with the world his most recent adventures. Does a dinosaur exist in the Congo? Does a Yeti-like creature live in the jungles of Sumatra? Does a fearsome Death Worm inhabit the deserts of Mongolia? Explorer Adam Davies has traveled some of the most dangerous places in the world in search of these and other supposedly mythical [...]

Hillary’s Yeti Debunking Lives On

Sir Edmund Hillary recently died, and yet his legacy of Yeti debunking continues onward, even now through his associates. The Telegraph of Calcutta, India has published a subtle little article recalling in glowing terms Hillary’s damaging Yeti investigations, which were set up skeptically, versus open-mindedly, from the very start. In the article, “Climber recalls days with Edmund, hunting for Yeti,” the Telegraph’s correspondent writes of one man who was on the trek: Nearly half-a-century ago, Bhanu Banerjee accompanied legendary climber Edmund Hillary to a Himalayan expedition in pursuit of the Abominable Snowman and came back with some incredible memories. “Every [...]