OK, I was a bit bored this afternoon and had nothing better to do, so I decided to waste a couple of minutes and write something on the following comment:
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You aren't answering the questions. Why would delusions vary by region? Why would a misidentified mobile tree stump be white in Illinois and dark brown in Oregon? Why do people have some deep need to imagine monsters in the forests, but not in the deserts?
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First of all, lets recognize that there are myths about monsters and fabulous creatures nearly at every single corner of the world. Deserts are not an exception. People have deep needs to see -and belive that there are- monsters and fabulous creatures everywhere. Now that the original statement is corrected, we can continue.
"Why delusions vary with region?"
Lets follow the proposed line of reasoning, that can be defined as "the differences in sigting reports mean different species (or genus or subspecies)". Now, what about asking why the reports of lake monsters change with location? Why people see serpentiform creatures (Cardborosaurus) in North America lakes but in Loch Nessand plesiosaur-like (Nessieteras) animals ? According to the reasoning in question, the answer would be that the lakes from North America are home to a species different of aquatic monsters different from Loch Ness. However, despite the cryptozoologists' claims, both belong to the species
Inexistentsaurus immaginarius. The lakes in question are just not able to sustain a viable population of such large creatures. Thus, the argument that different descriptions could indicate different species is not sustained.
But why are they different?
A good answer would be a combination between the eyewitnesses' cultural background with the environment where the sighting happened (asuming they are not lies). Also, light conditions can influentiate color perception, a condition that migh influentiate the reported creature color (it may even be the key factor). Human perception and memory have many flaws, trees have different colors (that change accordig to lightining conditions). And legends, tales and reports of brown creatures at location A might induce people to report such feature. Remember that the so-called "mobile tree stumps" might not have been moving at all!
Again, myths and sighting reports are not a valid argument pro-existence of
Bigfootus inexistans...
