The Oxford English Dictionary defines the word cryptid as “An animal whose existence or survival is disputed or unsubstantiated, such as the yeti.” For the following witnesses to living cryptids, there is no dispute. In this series of National Cryptid Society’s case files, you will read what the witnesses have experienced in their own words.
Keep an open mind when reading these accounts, and also remember one’s perception and memory of an event can be influenced by the emotions felt at the time of the occurrence. The contributors to this series of articles are doing the best they can to recount what are in some cases very shocking and traumatic experiences.
If you have a personal cryptid sighting story you would like to tell us, please visit our “Make A Report” page on this site.
The Thing In The Tree
Location: Green Cove Springs, Florida
Date: 2016-2017
Submitted by: Hogan
“In the summer of 2016 or ‘17 I found myself on a bicycle quite a bit, I would just ride around the sweet old town of Green Cove Springs, FL. Between the murky brown waters of the St. John’s River and the vibrant spring greens of the plants that lasted until the winter was well set in, this was a beautiful place to be. Sometime after the 4th of July I was making my semi-routine journey up to the guitar store that was local, it was one of my favorite places to be at the time, and I found myself there almost every day of the week.
Most of the time I would just take the back way to get up there so I could see all of the beautiful brick roadwork and the overhanging trees that the Spanish moss grew off of that shaded the road, made it real nice and pretty back in there. On this particular day I decided I’ll just keep on riding, and I went right past my turn to go to the guitar store and found myself in an area I had never been to before. It stunk and it smelled and it was just foul, all the dirt had turned to mud, the trees had a fuzzy yellow moss growing on them, and I couldn’t hear any birds.
Now you would expect to hear birds when you’re deep in the woods like I was, but it was dead silent. Only a few crickets and some other nasty bugs were audible. Despite being an overall nasty place to be, it was rather pretty, the sun shone through the trees and made nice, warm little rays of sunlight that danced off of the wet, muddy ground.
Well after standing there and looking around the place for a few minutes I spied a log that I could set my bike up against and have a seat. Well that must have been real comfortable cause before I knew it, the time flew by and I was watching the sun set. Now, mind you, it was about 1-o’clock in the afternoon when I first left the house that day and it only took me about 20 minutes to get to this little spot. So as I’m watching this sunset, I think to myself, “I haven’t been here that long have I?”. So I take out my phone and sure enough it was about 6:30pm. Well I figure I might as well just watch the sun set now that I’m out here, so I did.
That’s when I saw what I saw.”
“Ten minutes after I watched the sun go below the tree line I figure I should probably get going. I get on my bike and start pedaling. As I’m going down this little dirt and gravel path that lead to the spot I was just at, I look up and see what I initially thought to be a tree. However, due to the fact I was going slow on my bike, I got a really good look at this thing.
It looked like a man, perched up in a tree like a bird. It had a very coarse textured hair quality to it, and had very unusual, claw like feet. Very similar to the feet of an eagle or possibly even a crane, kind of like a mixture of the two. After I get a real good gander at this thing I just look forward on my bike trying to think about what I just saw and when I’m picturing it in my head again I have an urge to turn around, so I did.
This thing was looking at me, it’s eyes were very large. Very similar in proportion to the Aye-Aye of South American jungles. In fact, the whole facial structure of this thing looked very primate like and quite similar to the Aye-Aye, but much too large to be one. It’s eyes also had a bit of a glow to them, kind of like when you take a picture of a cat with the flash on and it’s eyes shine when you go back and look at the photo. At this point I’m a bit shaken up by the whole thing and just tell myself to continue down the road and don’t think about it.Eventually I get home safe and sound. But let me tell you, I didn’t catch even a second of sleep that night. I had myself convinced that, the thing I saw was gonna come through that window any minute and have itself a nice little snack.”
Submitted by Hogan Apr 6, 2020, 11:42 AM
The National Cryptid Society 