''Cadborosaurus'', nicknamed Caddy by journalist Archie Wills, is a

sea serpent A sea serpent or sea dragon is a type of dragon sea monster described in various mythologies, most notably Mesopotamian (Tiamat), Judaeo-Christian (Leviathan), Greek (Cetus, Echidna, Hydra, Scylla), and Norse (Jörmungandr). Mythology and folk ...

in the

folklore Folklore is shared by a particular group of people; it encompasses the traditions common to that culture, subculture or group. This includes oral traditions such as tales, legends, proverbs and jokes. They include material culture, ranging ...

of regions of the Pacific Coast of

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

. Its name is derived from

Cadboro Bay Cadboro Bay is a bay near the southern tip of Vancouver Island and its adjacent neighbourhood in the municipalities of Saanich and Oak Bay in Greater Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. Cadboro Bay was the site of Sungayka, a village of the Song ...

Greater Victoria Greater Victoria (also known as the Greater Victoria Region) is located in British Columbia, Canada, on the southern tip of Vancouver Island. It is usually defined as the thirteen municipalities of the Capital Regional District (CRD) ...

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

, and the

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

root word "''saurus''" meaning

lizard Lizards are a widespread group of squamate reptiles, with over 7,000 species, ranging across all continents except Antarctica, as well as most oceanic island chains. The group is paraphyletic since it excludes the snakes and Amphisbaenia alt ...

reptile Reptiles, as most commonly defined are the animals in the class Reptilia ( ), a paraphyletic grouping comprising all sauropsids except birds. Living reptiles comprise turtles, crocodilians, squamates (lizards and snakes) and rhynchocephalians ( ...

Description

''Cadborosaurus willsi'' is said by witnesses to resemble a serpent with vertical coils or humps in tandem behind the horse-like head and long neck, with a pair of small elevating front flippers, and either a pair of hind flippers, or a pair of large webbed hind flippers fused to form a large fan-like tail region that provides forward propulsion.Bousfield, Edward L. & Leblond Paul H. (2000). ''Cadborosaurus: Survivor from the Deep''. Heritage House Publishing. Dr. Paul LeBlond, director of Earth and Ocean Sciences at

UBC The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a public research university with campuses near Vancouver and in Kelowna, British Columbia. Established in 1908, it is British Columbia's oldest university. The university ranks among the top three ...

, and Dr. Edward Blousfield, retired chief zoologist of the

Canadian Museum of Nature The Canadian Museum of Nature (french: Musée canadien de la nature; CMN) is a national natural history museum based in Canada's National Capital Region. The museum's exhibitions and public programs are housed in the Victoria Memorial Museum Bui ...

, state every elongated animal has been put forward as an explanation for Caddy. These animals include

Conger ''Conger'' ( ) is a genus of marine congrid eels. It includes some of the largest types of eels, ranging up to 2 m (6 ft) or more in length, in the case of the European conger. Large congers have often been observed by divers during t ...

eels, humpback whales, elephant seals, ribbon or oarfish, basking sharks, and sea lions. LeBlond and Blousfield state no known creature matches the characteristics found in over 200 sightings collected over a century, noting that Caddy is described as having flippers both anteriorly and posteriorly.

Darren Naish Darren William Naish is a British vertebrate palaeontologist, author and science communicator. As a researcher, he is best known for his work describing and reevaluating dinosaurs and other Mesozoic reptiles, including ''Eotyrannus'', ''Xenopos ...

contends that LeBlond and Blousfield are engaging in "bad science" and have incorrectly assumed that different, conflicting eyewitness reports are all descriptions of one species when various accounts "are most

parsimoniously Occam's razor, Ockham's razor, or Ocham's razor ( la, novacula Occami), also known as the principle of parsimony or the law of parsimony ( la, lex parsimoniae), is the problem-solving principle that "entities should not be multiplied beyond neces ...

interpreted as descriptions of many things."

Creatures identified as ''Cadborosaurus''

Sea lion

In 1943, two police officers, Inspector Robert Owens, and Staff Sergeant Jack Russell, saw a "huge sea serpent with a horse-like head" in

Georgia Strait The Strait of Georgia (french: Détroit de Géorgie) or the Georgia Strait is an arm of the Salish Sea between Vancouver Island and the extreme southwestern mainland coast of British Columbia, Canada and the extreme northwestern mainland coast ...

. Later, "with a pair of binoculars, Sgt. Russell saw that the strange apparition was a huge bull

sea lion Sea lions are pinnipeds characterized by external ear flaps, long foreflippers, the ability to walk on all fours, short and thick hair, and a big chest and belly. Together with the fur seals, they make up the family Otariidae, eared seals. ...

leading a herd of six sea lions... Their undulations as they swam appeared to form a continuous body, with parts showing at intervals as they surfaced and dived. To the naked eye, the sight perfectly impersonated a sea monster."

Giant oarfish

Some suggestions have been made that Caddy could be an example of the king of herrings or

giant oarfish The giant oarfish (''Regalecus glesne'') is a species of oarfish of the family Regalecidae. It is an oceanodromous species with a worldwide distribution, excluding polar regions. Other common names include Pacific oarfish, king of herrings, ribb ...

(''Regalecus glesne''). This species can reach in length and weigh up to . "They're long and silvery and they undulate like a serpent would as they swim through the water," said H. J. Walker, a senior museum scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, which has several oarfish in its collection.

Basking shark

The carcass of a decomposing

basking shark The basking shark (''Cetorhinus maximus'') is the second-largest living shark and fish, after the whale shark, and one of three plankton-eating shark species, along with the whale shark and megamouth shark. Adults typically reach in length. ...

is often mistaken for Caddy and has fooled experts and laymen. A rotting basking shark may also resemble a decomposing

plesiosaur The Plesiosauria (; Greek: πλησίος, ''plesios'', meaning "near to" and ''sauros'', meaning "lizard") or plesiosaurs are an order or clade of extinct Mesozoic marine reptiles, belonging to the Sauropterygia. Plesiosaurs first appeared ...

First Nations accounts

native Native may refer to: People * Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth * Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory ** Native Americans (disambiguation) In arts and entert ...

image that fits Caddy's description has been traditionally used throughout Alaska. The image indicates that Caddy or a Caddy-like creature moves north to Vancouver when the waters warm. The Inuit of Alaska has even put the picture on their canoes to keep the creature away. The ''Cadborosaurus'' is called ''hiyitl'iik'' by the Manhousat people who live on Sydney Inlet, ''t'chain-ko'' in

Sechelt Sechelt (, Shishalh language chat'lich) is a district municipality located on the lower Sunshine Coast of British Columbia. Approximately 50 km northwest of Vancouver, it is accessible from mainland British Columbia by a 40-minute ferry tr ...

mythology, and ''numkse lee kwala'' by the Comox band of Vancouver Island.

Sightings

There have been more than 300 claimed sightings during the past 200 years, including Deep Cove in

Saanich Inlet , image = Saanich Inlet from Gowlland Tod Provincial Park, Vancouver Island, Canada 13.jpg , image_size = 260px , caption = Saanich Inlet from Gowlland Tod Provincial Park , image_bathymetry = , caption_bathymetry = , location = Northwest o ...

, and

Island View Beach Island View Beach is located on the traditional territory of the Tsawout First Nation, on the Eastern Cordova shore of the Saanich Peninsula, near Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. Much of the southern part of the foreshore make up the public ...

, both of which are also on the

Saanich Peninsula Saanich Peninsula ( str, W̱SÁNEĆ) is located north of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. It is bounded by Saanich Inlet on the west, Satellite Channel on the north, the small Colburne Passage on the northeast, and Haro Strait on the east. The ...

, and at

San Francisco Bay San Francisco Bay is a large tidal estuary in the U.S. state of California, and gives its name to the San Francisco Bay Area. It is dominated by the big cities of San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland. San Francisco Bay drains water from a ...

, California.

Kelly Nash video

In 2009, fisherman Kelly Nash purportedly filmed several minutes of footage featuring ten to fifteen (including young) creatures in

Nushagak Bay Nushagak Bay is a large estuary covering over 100 km2 in southwest part of the U.S. state of Alaska. It opens to Bristol Bay, a large body of water in the eastern Bering Sea north of the Alaska Peninsula. It is home to the area's largest ci ...

. In 2011, a very short segment of the footage was shown on the Discovery TV show ''Hilstranded'', where the Hilstrand brothers (from ''

Deadliest Catch ''Deadliest Catch'' is a reality television series that premiered on the Discovery Channel on April 12, 2005. The show follows crab fishermen aboard fishing vessels in the Bering Sea during the Alaskan king crab and snow crab fishing seasons. The ...

'') apparently saw Nash's footage and unsuccessfully attempted to find one of the creatures.

Carcasses associated with ''Cadborosaurus''

*1930: On 10 November at Glacier Island near Valdez a skeleton was found in ice. The skeleton was long with flippers. Some of the remains were preserved in Cordova for scientific study. The creature is thought to be a whale. *1934: In November on Henry Island near

Prince Rupert Prince Rupert of the Rhine, Duke of Cumberland, (17 December 1619 (O.S.) / 27 December (N.S.) – 29 November 1682 (O.S.)) was an English army officer, admiral, scientist and colonial governor. He first came to prominence as a Royalist cavalr ...

, badly decomposed remains about long found. Dr. Neal Carter examined the remains. Creature identified as

. *1937: In October a purported ''Cadborosaurus'' carcass was retrieved from the stomach of a sperm whale in Naden Harbour and photographed. A sample of this carcass was sent to the BC Provincial Museum, where it was tentatively identified as a fetal

baleen whale Baleen whales (systematic name Mysticeti), also known as whalebone whales, are a parvorder of carnivorous marine mammals of the infraorder Cetacea (whales, dolphins and porpoises) which use keratinaceous baleen plates (or "whalebone") in their ...

by museum director Francis Kermode. *1941: A carcass called "Sarah the sea hag" was found on

Kitsilano Beach Kitsilano Beach is one of the most popular beaches in Vancouver, especially in the warm summer months. Located at the north edge of the Kitsilano neighbourhood, the beach faces out onto English Bay. Description The beach is home to the longes ...

. W.A. Clemens and

Ian McTaggart-Cowan Ian McTaggart-Cowan (June 25, 1910 – April 18, 2010) was a Scottish-Canadian zoologist, conservation movement, conservationist, and television presenter. He has been called "the father of Canadian ecology". He was the brother of meteorologist P ...

identified it as a shark. *1947: In December at Vernon Bay,

Barkley Sound , image = Fishing boat in the Broken Group Islands.jpg , image_size = 260px , alt = , caption = Barkley Sound , image_bathymetry = , alt_bathymetry = , caption_bathymetry = , locat ...

, Vancouver Island a creature was found. It was identified as a shark. *1950: In Delake, Oregon a creature was found with 4 tails and thick hair. It was identified as a whale shark. *1956: Somewhere near Dry Harbour south of

Yakutat, Alaska The City and Borough of Yakutat (, ; Tlingit: ''Yaakwdáat''; russian: Якутат) is a borough in the U.S. state of Alaska and the name of a former city within it. The name in Tlingit is ''Yaakwdáat'' (meaning "the place where canoes r ...

a long carcass was found with long hair.

Trevor Kincaid Trevor Kincaid (December 21, 1872 – July 1, 1970) was a Canadian-American scientist and professor at the University of Washington who achieved national acclaim for his scientific achievements while an undergraduate student. Kincaid's interests ...

is quoted as saying "description fits no known creature." W.A. Clemens identified the carcass as a

Baird's beaked whale Baird's beaked whale (''Berardius bairdii''), also known as the northern giant bottlenose whale, North Pacific bottlenose whale, giant four-toothed whale, northern four-toothed whale and the North Pacific four-toothed whale, is a species of whale ...

. *1962: In April near

Ucluelet Ucluelet (, also Ukee) is a district municipality (population 1,717) on the Ucluelet Peninsula on the west coast of Vancouver Island in British Columbia, Canada. Ucluelet means "people of the safe harbour" in the indigenous Nuu-chah-nulth (No ...

a 14-foot long carcass was found with elephant like head. The carcass was dragged ashore by Simon Peter and later thought to be an elephant seal. *1963: In September near Oak Harbor,

Whidbey Island Whidbey Island (historical spellings Whidby, Whitbey, or Whitby) is the largest of the islands composing Island County, Washington, in the United States, and the largest island in Washington State. (The other large island is Camano Island, ...

a carcass was found with a head resembling a horse. A. D. Welander of Fisheries thought it was a basking shark.

Purported live capture

*1968: In August, W. Hagelund claims to have caught a baby Caddy near

De Courcy Island De Courcy Island is one of the Gulf Islands of the coast of southwestern British Columbia, Canada, located between the Pylades and Stuart Channels approximately southeast of Nanaimo and approximately southwest of Vancouver. The island, abou ...

only to return it to the water. *1991: In July, on Johns Island (

San Juan Islands The San Juan Islands are an archipelago in the Pacific Northwest of the United States between the U.S. state of Washington and Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. The San Juan Islands are part of Washington state, and form the core of ...

), Phyllis Harsh claims to have caught a small, baby Caddy and returned it to the water.

References

{{reflist * Bousfield, E. L., & P. H. LeBlond (1995). "An account of ''Cadborosaurus willsi'', new genus, new species, a large aquatic reptile from the Pacific coast of North America". ''Amphipacifica'' Vol 1 Suppl. 1: pp. 1–25, 19 figs. * Jupp, Ursula. (1988, reprinted 1993). ''Cadboro: A Ship, A Bay, A Sea-Monster''. Jay Editions.

External links

2009 MSNBC Article
Canadian folklore Coast of British Columbia Culture of British Columbia Canadian legendary creatures Water monsters Globsters Cryptids Sea serpents