Devil's Footprints Fit Shape Of Male Giant Dragonfly Clasper

[Alan Lowey]

The Devil's Footprints are an enduring mystery that have occurred on more than one occasion.

On the night of 8–9 February 1855 and one or two later nights, after a heavy snowfall, a series of hoof-like marks appeared in the snow. These footprints, most of which measured around four inches long, three inches across, between eight and sixteen inches apart and mostly in a single file, were reported from over thirty locations across Devon and a couple in Dorset. It was estimated that the total distance of the tracks amounted to between 40 and 100 miles. Houses, rivers, haystacks and other obstacles were travelled straight over, and footprints appeared on the tops of snow-covered roofs and high walls which lay in the footprints' path, as well as leading up to and exiting various drain pipes as small as four inches in diameter. From a news report:

"It appears on Thursday night last, there was a very heavy snowfall in the neighbourhood of Exeter and the South of Devon. On the following morning the inhabitants of the above towns were surprised at discovering the footmarks of some strange and mysterious animal endowed with the power of ubiquity, as the footprints were to be seen in all kinds of unaccountable places - on the tops of houses and narrow walls, in gardens and court-yards, enclosed by high walls and pailings, as well in open fields."

The area in which the prints appeared extended from Exmouth, up to Topsham, and across the Exe Estuary to Dawlish and Teignmouth. R.H. Busk, in an article published in Notes and Queries in 1890, stated that footprints also appeared further afield, as far south as Totnes and Torquay, and that there were other reports of the prints as far away as Weymouth (Dorset) and even Lincolnshire.

There were also attendant rumours about sightings of a "devil-like figure" in the Devon area during the scare. Many townspeople armed themselves and attempted to track down the beast responsible, without success

A comment from this Skeptoid site 'The Devil Walked in Devon' adds some interesting details to the nature of the mystery prints:

This subject was covered in a radio broadcast on the BBC (The Stargazer talks) by Lt. Commander Rupert T. Gould, RN on 13th February 1935. He drew attention to the observation that the tracks were convex meaning that the 'hoof' must have been concave. This ruled out many suggestions that the track were made by familiar animals with 'pads' on their feet. The residents would have been familiar with the tracks of such animals. The tracks also approached the front doors of dwellings before retreating. He also commented that, at a spacing of 8 inches over an estimated 60 miles of tracks made over night in thirteen hours, the 'creature' must have made 9 strides per second! There must have been more than one creature.

From the 'Mysterious Britain' site it states:

There are similar scattered cases from other parts of the world and also one written account in Britain. According to Ralph of Coggeshall, (who also recorded strange arial phenomena during his era) a writer from the 13th Century, on the 19th of July 1205 strange hoof print appeared after a violent electrical storm. In mid July these tracks would only be visible in the soft earth, and the electrical storm suggests some kind of natural phenomenon as yet unknown.

A comment adds yet another documented case:

A similar but less known episode involved the great explorer James Clark Ross. One of the tasks of his historic 1839-1843 expedition was to take geomagnetic reading in a number of locations. One of these prearranged locations was the barren and desolate Kerguelen Island (now a French possession) in the Southern Indian ocean, which was reached in May 1840. While looking for a suitable location to set up their geomagnetic and astronomical stations the ship crew came across a trail of hoofprints in the snow, which was followed until it disappeared on the rocky soil. Ross wrote that he was "intrigued" by this discovery, since no creature native to the island could leave such prints. The HMSs Erebus and Terror stayed at Kerguelen for two months, while geomagnetic, tidal and astronomical observations were carried and both the officer and the crew explored the island in search of the mysterious beast but to no avail. One officer speculated that the hoofrints belonged to a horse which managed to swim to the shore from a wrecked ship, but his guess was as good as anybody else's.

A more recent case of an elderly lady waking to find the mysterious prints in the snow in her garden received some media attention. See the case of Woolsery's Jill Wade.


...................


Now compare the horseshoe shape imprint with that of the male dragonfly clasper which it uses to hold the female during mating.


But giant dragonflies can't exist, I hear you claim. Yet good eyewitness accounts abound. Here's one from 'Mysterious Universe':

San Marcos, California

Wade stopped at the beach in Del Mar, California, on his way home from San Diego to San Marcos, on a lazy summer afternoon. He spent the rest of that June day surf fishing and arrived home after dark, around 9 p.m. “I relaxed, had a beer or two and went to my covered drive to clean my catch,” Wade said. “I completed that task and looked to the north at the rocky mountainside in the near distance.”

He didn’t expect to see what was there. “Above my neighbor’s homes across the street something was shimmering and moving rapidly side to side in a space of maybe 60 feet at 20 feet altitude,” Wade said. “I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me from the time earlier in the day when I spent time on the beach in the bright afternoon sun. I was wrong.”

Two shimmering, nearly transparent parallel lines about three-feet wide in the air moved silently and quickly side to side in the faint glow of a streetlight. “It was just wings and eyes,” he said. “The wings didn’t flap like a birds, it was more like a dragonfly, but dragonflies don’t grow three-foot wingspans, fly at night, or display what seemed to be some kind of intelligence like this thing did.”

The entity’s side-to-side movements encompassed about 60 feet in what Wade estimated was only a few seconds. Wade said the entity seemed to know he had seen it and it stopped in the air. “Whatever it was, it halted its side-to-side movement and seemed to focus on me,” he said.

Fear gripped Wade and he felt his hair rise from his scalp to his ankles. “I was sure it was a real thing, then I noticed the thing had big black eyes,” he said. “They weren’t friendly eyes at all.”

The entity quickly shot across the street toward Wade. He dropped to the pavement and it swooped over his head. “The thing was interested in me,” Wade said. “It was staring me down when it was across the street and either attacked or was trying to intimidate me, or who knows what, when it came at me.”

Wade moved from under the covered part of his drive to get a better look at the swooping thing. It was directly above his head. “I felt great fear,” Wade said. “I said to the thing out loud,’ I see you.’”

It moved again.

“It zipped back into view from the direction it had gone, and was looking directly down at me with the weird unblinking eyes,” he said. “It realized I was looking right at it, and it took off in a flash. It’s gone. For good, I hope.”

Strange but true? A giant male dragonfly was bouncing along on upright on it's tail, using it's wings for additional lift to clear walls, fences and to cross a river to continue on the other side in a straight line?

[P.S. I've just had to remove all the links because I have yet to make 15 posts]

...................

 

[Checkmite]

Insects don't tend to be very active during winter, as they are essentially cold-blooded. I do not believe a dragonfly or any other insect would be around to make the prints. Assuming the dragonfly mistakenly flew out of a warm building say, and landed in the snow, I don't think it would make it more than a meter or two before it fell into cold stasis, let alone across town and over the miles these footprints are typically claimed to travel.

I do not know how true it is, but at face value I find the account of the giant dragonfly to be both fascinating and terrifying.

 

[Alan Lowey]

Insects don't tend to be very active during winter, as they are essentially cold-blooded. I do not believe a dragonfly or any other insect would be around to make the prints. Assuming the dragonfly mistakenly flew out of a warm building say, and landed in the snow, I don't think it would make it more than a meter or two before it fell into cold stasis, let alone across town and over the miles these footprints are typically claimed to travel.

I do not know how true it is, but at face value I find the account of the giant dragonfly to be both fascinating and terrifying.

This is a giant dragonfly-like insect though. It's obviously unique in that it has overcome the air-oxygen restrictions on the size of insects able to fly. I'm proposing that it has evolved a strategy of storing blood from other animals in the thick veins of it's wings. This would in effect make it "warm blooded".

I appreciate the fascination of the sighting. It is terrifying at first, but better the devil you know.

 

[Ketyk]

I would like to see your evidence.

But to be able to post links you need a minimum of posts.

Try posting here to up your total: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=26

 

[MikeG]

Why would a dragon-fly.........any dragon fly, walk on its clasper, rather than using its 6 legs?

I think the witness to the monster dragon-fly thing ought to reveal what "a few beers" meant in actuality, and that local kids might be questioned about radio controlled model aircraft, before anyone gets too excited by this report.

Mike

 

[Ketyk]

Hi MikeG. I thought I would give this a chance. It has been a while since I walked someone though the protocol of the site and the challenge.

I am rusty.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

While I have no comment about the latest hypothesis, this was one of my favorite mysteries as a kid. I read the book, "This Baffling World" and the "Devil at Devonshire" was one of the stories.

 

[marplots]

It doesn't sound like Lucifer has been entirely ruled out.

 

[Ketyk]

...And now I am expected to sleep with the thought Lucifer is in my closet?...

 

[Alan Lowey]

Why would a dragon-fly.........any dragon fly, walk on its clasper, rather than using its 6 legs?

I think the witness to the monster dragon-fly thing ought to reveal what "a few beers" meant in actuality, and that local kids might be questioned about radio controlled model aircraft, before anyone gets too excited by this report.

Mike

Good question. The answer is due to the number of trachea tubes expanding with increased size.

What Keeps Bugs from Being Bigger?

Overall, they found that larger beetle species devote a disproportionately greater fraction of their body to tracheal tubes than do smaller species.

The team focused in particular on the passageways that lead from the body core to the head and to the legs. They reasoned that these orifices may be bottlenecks for tracheal tubes, limiting how much oxygen can be delivered to the extremities.

If the orifices to the legs limit beetle size, then why not just grow bigger openings? There may be genetic or developmental barriers that can't be overcome. Or, the issue may be mechanical. Insects wear their skeletons on the outside, and therefore many joints need to be narrow to work. Perhaps an oversized orifice would mean that the leg-body joint wouldn’t bend as well.

[P.S. Thanks Ketyk for the tip. I managed to get my posts up to 15]

.....

 

[Alareth]

“I was sure it was a real thing, then I noticed the thing had big black eyes,” he said. “They weren’t friendly eyes at all.”

“It zipped back into view from the direction it had gone, and was looking directly down at me with the weird unblinking eyes,”

Considering dragonflies have disproportionately large compound eyes in comparison to the rest of their bodies, those descriptions of the creatures eyes don't seem to fit.

 

[Alan Lowey]

Considering dragonflies have disproportionately large compound eyes in comparison to the rest of their bodies, those descriptions of the creatures eyes don't seem to fit.

Why not? He saw it at night remember.

It's also a dragonfly-like species which has a common ancestor with the average sized dragonfly we are familiar with. So it will have differences.

 

[Alan Lowey]

Here's a Centre For Fortean Zoology (CFZ) Investigation of the 2009 prints in the snow.

THE CFZ INVESTIGATES: Mysterious footprints in Woolsery

Notice how I think he's got the direction correct. It probably landed from over the bush and hopped towards the house and then back out down the garden.

....

 

[catsmate]

Insects don't tend to be very active during winter, as they are essentially cold-blooded. I do not believe a dragonfly or any other insect would be around to make the prints. Assuming the dragonfly mistakenly flew out of a warm building say, and landed in the snow, I don't think it would make it more than a meter or two before it fell into cold stasis, let alone across town and over the miles these footprints are typically claimed to travel.

I do not know how true it is, but at face value I find the account of the giant dragonfly to be both fascinating and terrifying.

The likely effect of the cold seems plausible to me.

This is a giant dragonfly-like insect though. It's obviously unique in that it has overcome the air-oxygen restrictions on the size of insects able to fly.

I'm proposing that it has evolved a strategy of storing blood from other animals in the thick veins of it's wings. This would in effect make it "warm blooded".

Do you have any evidence for this claim?

I appreciate the fascination of the sighting. It is terrifying at first, but better the devil you know.

You mean inventing a new species?

 

[Agatha]

From the Daily Mail (!) story pictured above:

...several scientists had seen pictures of the [5 inch long with a span of 11 to 17 inches] footprints and had varying opinions on what could be responsible including mink, rabbit, hare, sheep and a muntjac deer.

Mink, rabbits, hares, sheep and muntjacs are all found in Devon. Giant dragonflies, not so much.

 

[MikeG]

Good question. The answer is.....

You were doing so well up to here.

......due to the number of trachea tubes expanding with increased size......

.......then you failed outright.

Bigger insects have more internal windpipes than smaller insects, do they? You'll need to link to something to convince me of that. But then you'll need to tell me what on earth the number of windpipes has to do with an insect choosing to walk on its clasper, rather than walking on its legs. Even if I had 27 windpipes I am pretty sure I'd still walk on my feet, rather than on, say, my jaws.

A couple of links to some published science supporting your twaddle case would be good.

 

[MrQhuest]

I'm trying to picture an unknown species of giant dragonfly, hopping along in a straight line, on its tail, in the middle of winter.
I know its an argument from ignorance, but its just not working for me.
Do normal dragonflies exhibit this behavior?
Are there any other animals that leave these strange horseshoe shaped tracks?

MrQ

 

[Alan Lowey]

Here's the link to a published paper Increase in tracheal investment with beetle size supports hypothesis of oxygen limitation on insect gigantism

This supports my hypothesis that if the eyewitness sightings of giant dragonflies are correct, then the leg segmentation of the exoskeleton wouldn't allow sufficient flexibility for normal walking. Therefore the male giant dragonfly, if injured or exhausted or suffering from 'insect frostbite', would have to hop on it's tail using it's wings for assistance.

I'm assuming that the clasper-less females would migrate to sunnier climates and the male stay to defend their prime den sites and territory.


Longest insect migration ever as dragonflies fly 11,000-mile round-trip over ocean

 

[Alan Lowey]

I'm trying to picture an unknown species of giant dragonfly, hopping along in a straight line, on its tail, in the middle of winter.
I know its an argument from ignorance, but its just not working for me.
Do normal dragonflies exhibit this behavior?
Are there any other animals that leave these strange horseshoe shaped tracks?

MrQ

No other animals known could make the tracks. I'm proposing a new species which only has a common ancestor with the known species of dragonfly.

It takes a while to imagine that this is a possibility, I agree. It's the best one there is imv. Give me something better which can explain the long enduring mystery. There isn't one.

 

[Resume]

This supports my hypothesis that if the eyewitness sightings of giant dragonflies are correct . . .

And if me Auntie had balls . . .