STATE FILE · FL
Cryptids of Florida
What cryptids are in Florida? The best-known are Skunk Ape, Bigfoot, Chupacabra and Altamaha-ha.
Florida’s signature cryptid is the Skunk Ape, a shaggy, man-sized ape said to roam the Everglades and Big Cypress Swamp and to announce itself with a terrible stench. Reports go back decades, but the creature became widely known in the 1970s and gained its most famous evidence in 2000, when an anonymous letter to the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office enclosed photographs of an ape-like figure in a backyard near Myakka – the so-called Myakka Skunk Ape photos. In the tiny settlement of Ochopee, on the Tamiami Trail, Dave Shealy runs the Skunk Ape Research Headquarters, a roadside campground and gift shop devoted to the creature.
Cryptids reported in Florida
HOMINID · 1818
Skunk Ape
Big Cypress Swamp and the Everglades, Florida
Florida’s answer to Bigfoot: a shaggy, foul-smelling ape-man said to roam the Everglades and Big Cypress Swamp, reported since the 1970s and before.
WIDELY REPORTED
HOMINID · 1958
Bigfoot
Pacific Northwest forests, reported across North America
North America’s most famous cryptid: a huge, hairy, upright ape-like being reported from the Pacific Northwest to Florida since the 1958 “Bigfoot” tracks.
WIDELY REPORTED
OTHER · 1995
Chupacabra
Canóvanas, Puerto Rico
The “goat-sucker” of 1990s Puerto Rico: a spiny, bloodsucking beast blamed for livestock deaths that spread across Latin America and Texas.
WIDELY REPORTED
LAKE & SEA MONSTER · 1830
Altamaha-ha
Mouth of the Altamaha River, near Darien, Georgia
“Altie,” the sea serpent of coastal Georgia, said to swim the marshes and old rice canals at the mouth of the Altamaha River near Darien.
REGIONAL LEGENDThe legends of Florida
Florida has a long sea-monster history too. In 1896 a huge carcass washed up on Anastasia Island near St. Augustine and was declared by some to be a giant octopus; later tissue analysis suggested it was a mass of whale blubber. In 1962 a young survivor of a boating accident off Pensacola told of a long-necked creature that he said killed his friends. Chupacabra scares followed in the 1990s, when livestock deaths in South Florida were linked to the Puerto Rican legend.
Skeptics point to black bears, escaped exotic animals, hoaxers in costumes and the swamp’s sulphurous smells. But with millions of acres of wetland, sawgrass prairie and cypress dome, Florida remains one of the most-visited destinations for cryptid enthusiasts, many of whom combine monster hunting with airboat tours and wildlife watching.
Hotspots
The Skunk Ape’s home turf, with the Skunk Ape Research Headquarters on the Tamiami Trail.
Vast sawgrass marshes and mangroves where many Skunk Ape reports originate.
Sarasota County wilderness close to where the famous 2000 Skunk Ape photos were taken.
Site of the 1896 “St. Augustine Monster” carcass, once billed as a giant octopus.
A large sand-pine scrub forest in central Florida with a steady stream of Bigfoot-type reports.
Sightings timeline
- 1818A “man-sized monkey” near Apalachicola Skunk Ape
Cryptozoology writers point to an 1818 newspaper item describing an ape-like creature raiding settlers’ food stores in the Panhandle. It is often cited as the earliest Florida report, though the original account is brief and its meaning is uncertain.
- April 1830Captain Delano’s sea serpent Altamaha-ha
The Savannah Georgian printed a Darien dispatch describing a creature about 70 feet long with an alligator-shaped head, seen by the captain and crew of the schooner Eagle. Delano insisted it was no whale; island planters reported a strange animal in St. Simons Sound that spring.
- January 1974Police search Miami-area swamps Skunk Ape
During the 1970s wave of sightings in Dade and Broward counties, an Associated Press news crew filmed officers searching the swamp edge for a strange ape-like creature. The story helped fix the name “Skunk Ape” in the public mind.
- 1981The Gwin–Wilson sighting Altamaha-ha
Larry Gwin, a former newspaper publisher, and Steven Wilson reported a creature with two large humps about five feet apart that left a powerful wake. The story ran nationwide and prompted other locals to share older sightings.
- 1997Fire chief’s photo and a burst of reports Skunk Ape
Ochopee fire chief Vince Doerr photographed what he said was a hairy creature crossing the road in the Big Cypress. Within weeks dozens of people reported sightings in the preserve, while Dave Shealy described bait stations raided and strange tracks.
- July 8, 2000Dave Shealy’s video Skunk Ape
Shealy filmed a dark, upright figure moving through a palm hammock and then running across flooded swamp. Believers point to its speed through deep water; critics say it is indistinguishable from a person in an ape suit.
- December 2000The Myakka photographs Skunk Ape
An anonymous letter writer sent the Sarasota County Sheriff’s Office two photos of a large ape-like animal she said had been taking apples from her back porch near Interstate 75. She feared it was an escaped orangutan; the photos have never been traced to their source.
- 2010Video near Fort King George Altamaha-ha
An amateur photographer filmed something swimming in the channel off the Fort King George Historic Site. Like most such clips, it shows a distant, ambiguous shape in the water.
- March 2, 2013Video at Myakka River State Park Skunk Ape
A visitor posted phone video of a distant, dark figure he and his son chased across a field in the park. Local TV covered the claim, but the footage was too grainy and distant to show anything identifiable.
- March 2018The Wolf Island carcass Altamaha-ha
A father and son photographed a decomposed, long-snouted carcass on a beach near Darien, and the images went viral as a possible Altie. Marine biologists suggested a rotted shark or other known animal; later that year the artist Zardulu claimed to have made it from a stuffed shark and papier-mâché.
Latest from Florida
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Videos
ARCHIVE.ORG3:07
Patterson–Gimlin film (unedited)
Roger Patterson and Bob GimlinThe original 1967 Bluff Creek footage – the most famous and most debated minute in Bigfoot history. Marked public domain on archive.org.
ARCHIVE.ORG4:59
The Film That Made Bigfoot A Star
Oregon Public BroadcastingOPB’s short documentary on how the Patterson–Gimlin film turned a regional legend into a global icon – and the hoax claims around it.
▶ VIDEO
Sts’ailes Sasquatch Days in Harrison Hot Springs
Tourism Harrison River ValleyShows the festival celebrating the Sts’ailes people’s Sásq’ets, the being behind the word “Sasquatch” (no archive.org equivalent).
▶ VIDEO
El Chupacabras, a Modern Mystery
Monstrum | PBS StoriedFolklorist Emily Zarka traces both the Puerto Rican and the Texas chupacabra and the real explanations behind them.
ARCHIVE.ORG1:31
Police Search for Ape-Like Creature (1974 news segment)
Associated PressOriginal January 1974 footage of the search in the Miami-area swamps during the 1970s wave of sightings. (Associated Press newsreel archived on archive.org.)
ARCHIVE.ORG2:16
Dave Shealy Skunk Ape Footage (2000)
Dave ShealyThe famous July 2000 video from the Big Cypress – judge for yourself whether it shows an animal or a costume.