Finding Bigfoot

''Finding Bigfoot'' was an American television series that aired on Animal Planet. The program followed four "researchers" and explorers investigating potential evidence of Bigfoot, a cryptid hominid allegedly living in the wildernesses of the United States and Canada. While the Finding Bigfoot team never captured photographic evidence of the creature's existence, the show gained high ratings and was a top earner for Animal Planet. It premiered on May 29, 2011, and the series finale and 100th episode was released on May 27, 2018.

Premise

The team consists of Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization (BFRO) founder and President Matt Moneymaker, researchers James "Bobo" Fay & Cliff “Chuck” Barackman, and skeptical scientist Ranae Holland. The series never questions the existence of bigfoot, but rather documents the team's futile search efforts and study of potential evidence in an attempt to prove the existence of the creature.

Over the course of the series, the team has introduced many new bigfoot related terms into the American vernacular. For example, the term "bigfoot" is rarely used in favor of "squatch" (short for sasquatch). Their investigations are referred to as "squatchin'". The areas they investigate are often described as "Squatchy", with Washington having been described as "the squatchiest state."

Cast

*Matt Moneymaker:
:Moneymaker is the founder and president of the Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization (founded in 1995). Moneymaker was born and raised in Los Angeles, California, and moved to Ohio in the 2000s. He has been researching bigfoot for 30 years.
*Cliff Barackman:
:Born and raised in Long Beach, California, Barackman currently resides in Portland, Oregon. The evidence analyst of the group has been a dedicated sasquatch field researcher for the past two decades who has been known to spend over 200 days a year in the field. He is also an accomplished jazz guitarist holding a Bachelor of Arts degree from California State University, Long Beach.
*James "Bobo" Fay:
:The field caller was born and raised in Manhattan Beach, California, and has been interested in bigfoot since the 1980s. The tallest and burliest member of the team, he is the one most often used to stand in for bigfoot in reconstructions. Fay is known for his "Gone Squatchin" hat, and often wears other bigfoot-related attire. He and Barackman are close friends and searched for Bigfoot together before the series started. In 2014, Boston Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia met Fay at Fenway Park before a game and gave him an autographed baseball bat with a Sasquatch logo on the bottom of it.
*Ranae Holland:
:The skeptical member of the cast is a field biologist born and raised in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. While she is not a member of the BFRO, and does not believe in Bigfoot, her interest in the creature was fueled by her father's fascination with the phenomenon. As a child, she and her father spent quality time together "squatching" and watching bigfoot movies.
Paige Riley

Episodes

An episode begins with the Finding Bigfoot team driving to a location on the trail of photographic, video, audio, or eyewitness evidence of a Bigfoot. The team will go to the location where the evidence was gathered from, and speak to the person who gathered the evidence. If it is a photograph or a video, the team will perform a recreation and a size comparison of the event, using the same camera that the witness used. The team then performs their first night investigation at that same location. Its fairly lit

Starting with the second season, one member of the team will almost always remain at the location for a solo night investigation for several more nights. The other three (or all four in the first season) members will then head to a 'town hall meeting' to which members of the public are invited to come and share their Bigfoot encounter stories. In some heavily Bigfoot reported areas, such as Washington, these events are sometimes invite only.

After the witnesses tell their encounter stories, they are asked to mark their sighting locations on a map, which the team then uses to look for a pattern of sightings. The team will then visit three of the best-reported encounters, that are usually close to one another. After visiting all three witnesses, the team will collect the member who was doing the solo night investigation and select an area to do their final night investigation.

For the final night investigation, the team usually devises a unique plan to try to attract a Bigfoot, usually involving noise or light, by using boats on a lake, or silent electric ATVs. They also do wood knocks, which is believed to mimic a bigfoot's communication. Night-vision technology and forward looking infrared (FLIR) cameras are used to document these investigations. They will then evaluate what they learned and announce their evaluations during the ending credits. Occasionally, they will show their trail cam pictures or DNA results following the credits/summary.

In the third season, the team expanded their search from North America to investigate the Sasquatch phenomenon known as "Yowies" in Australia. Later in the season, they traveled to Indonesia searching for the " Orang Pendek", and to Vietnam to search for the "Wildman". In season four, the team traveled to China in search of the "Yeren", and Nepal in search of the "Yeti

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