Tuesday, October 12, 2004
A being called Batsquatch
What know ye of Batsquatch? Gather 'round, children, and I'll spin the tale of the Batsquatch. In the darkened forests of the Pacific Northwest lurk all manner of creatures, some of them well-known...and some of them not so well known. Folks of a cryptozoological bent have long pegged this area as the natural habitat of the elusive bigfoot, a.k.a. sasquatch or wood ape. In the profession of being an enormous, hideously freakish ape-beast in Washington state, however, bigfoot was a rank amateur compared to Batsquatch! Yes, Batsquatch, nocturnal denizen of the forested slopes of Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Rainier, a creature whose mere sight is enough to drive a man mad. Larger than a man, he was, with a body densely covered in fur and purplish or blackish skin. Had claws, huge, like baling hooks. Eyes like hellfire, deep and red, glowing with a primeval malevolence long forgotten in the ways of man. His face was kind of like that of a monkey, and not one of those cute monkeys, either, but one of the horrifyingly frightening ones. 'Twas also somewhat like a bat. By by far the most obvious chiropteran feature would be the wings, twelve feet wide if they were an inch, growing out of his back. Whether or not he can fly with 'em, I can't rightly say, but I'll tell you this: there's been times when, in the depths of night, the witching hour, I heard flapping up on the mount. Way up in the antediluvian stands of conifer where no one goes. Indians won't go there, say it's cursed. I heard tell of a hiker come up that way back in '94, and when he returned his hair had gone all white and he wouldn't talk about what he found up on that hill, just mutter into his whisky "bat"...sometimes followed by "squatch"!
So, what can batsquatch tell us about mammalian phylogeny? In 1910, W. K. Gregory created the taxon Archonta to encompass the Primates and Chiroptera (with the Dermoptera, or flying lemurs, and Scandentia, or tree shrews, also included.) This bat-primate linkage, while debated, was generally accepted as a natural group. Indeed, some workers went to far as to suggest that bats as we know them are actually diphyletic, with one group, the megabats or Megachiroptera (fruit bats and their allies) being more closely related to primates and/or flying lemurs than the microbats or Microchiroptera. However, recent molecular phylogenies have removed bats from the primate-dermopteran-scandentian clade, instead placing them closer to "laurasiatheres", a motley crew of hoofed mammals and carnivorans. This placement has been extremely contentious, with archontan purists citing a number of supposed osteological features unique to bats, primates, flying lemurs, and tree shrews. Many of these characters may be independent acquisitions of similar features, however. The fossil record has been rather lacking in providing good evidence of the basal members of all of these clades. The earliest known bats are essentially identical to modern microbats (albeit with another wing claw and some primitive cranial features) and it is uncertain whether the animals called "archaic primates" (Plesiadapiformes) are really members of the primate lineage at all. So no fossil intermediates at the base of the Archonta exist. This is where Batsquatch comes in. He's got the whole bat thing going on, and the ape thing. This, at last, is the evidence of a monophyletic Archonta that mammalogists have been waiting for. Admittedly, the dorsal bony wings are a bit of a problem, as this appendage configuration is unknown in vertebrates. However, it could be explained as a homeotic mutation from an ancestral bat-ape that developed a second pair of forelegs. Hopeful monster indeed! Furthermore, as sightings of Batsquatch, as are typical of his kind, have always been rather vague, it is possible that the wings and forelimbs are one and the same, and he has the typical chiropteran membranous brachial region.
But we may never know. Alternately, we may. The recent resurgence in volcanic activity on Mt. St. Helens has doubtless disturbed much of the local wildlife, driving them out of the mountains and down to inhabited areas. Who is to say what...or who...might emerge in the next few weeks. Perhaps the time is nigh for the world to be introduced once and for all to a being...called Batsquatch.
Out of the night
When the full moon is bright
Comes a being known as Batsquatch
This beast, who gives pause,
Carves a "B" with his claws
A "B" that stands for Batsquatch
Batsquatch...
A wily rascal is he
Batsquatch...
He makes the sign of the "B"
Batsquatch...Batsquatch...Batsquatch...
Batsquatch!
What know ye of Batsquatch? Gather 'round, children, and I'll spin the tale of the Batsquatch. In the darkened forests of the Pacific Northwest lurk all manner of creatures, some of them well-known...and some of them not so well known. Folks of a cryptozoological bent have long pegged this area as the natural habitat of the elusive bigfoot, a.k.a. sasquatch or wood ape. In the profession of being an enormous, hideously freakish ape-beast in Washington state, however, bigfoot was a rank amateur compared to Batsquatch! Yes, Batsquatch, nocturnal denizen of the forested slopes of Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Rainier, a creature whose mere sight is enough to drive a man mad. Larger than a man, he was, with a body densely covered in fur and purplish or blackish skin. Had claws, huge, like baling hooks. Eyes like hellfire, deep and red, glowing with a primeval malevolence long forgotten in the ways of man. His face was kind of like that of a monkey, and not one of those cute monkeys, either, but one of the horrifyingly frightening ones. 'Twas also somewhat like a bat. By by far the most obvious chiropteran feature would be the wings, twelve feet wide if they were an inch, growing out of his back. Whether or not he can fly with 'em, I can't rightly say, but I'll tell you this: there's been times when, in the depths of night, the witching hour, I heard flapping up on the mount. Way up in the antediluvian stands of conifer where no one goes. Indians won't go there, say it's cursed. I heard tell of a hiker come up that way back in '94, and when he returned his hair had gone all white and he wouldn't talk about what he found up on that hill, just mutter into his whisky "bat"...sometimes followed by "squatch"!
So, what can batsquatch tell us about mammalian phylogeny? In 1910, W. K. Gregory created the taxon Archonta to encompass the Primates and Chiroptera (with the Dermoptera, or flying lemurs, and Scandentia, or tree shrews, also included.) This bat-primate linkage, while debated, was generally accepted as a natural group. Indeed, some workers went to far as to suggest that bats as we know them are actually diphyletic, with one group, the megabats or Megachiroptera (fruit bats and their allies) being more closely related to primates and/or flying lemurs than the microbats or Microchiroptera. However, recent molecular phylogenies have removed bats from the primate-dermopteran-scandentian clade, instead placing them closer to "laurasiatheres", a motley crew of hoofed mammals and carnivorans. This placement has been extremely contentious, with archontan purists citing a number of supposed osteological features unique to bats, primates, flying lemurs, and tree shrews. Many of these characters may be independent acquisitions of similar features, however. The fossil record has been rather lacking in providing good evidence of the basal members of all of these clades. The earliest known bats are essentially identical to modern microbats (albeit with another wing claw and some primitive cranial features) and it is uncertain whether the animals called "archaic primates" (Plesiadapiformes) are really members of the primate lineage at all. So no fossil intermediates at the base of the Archonta exist. This is where Batsquatch comes in. He's got the whole bat thing going on, and the ape thing. This, at last, is the evidence of a monophyletic Archonta that mammalogists have been waiting for. Admittedly, the dorsal bony wings are a bit of a problem, as this appendage configuration is unknown in vertebrates. However, it could be explained as a homeotic mutation from an ancestral bat-ape that developed a second pair of forelegs. Hopeful monster indeed! Furthermore, as sightings of Batsquatch, as are typical of his kind, have always been rather vague, it is possible that the wings and forelimbs are one and the same, and he has the typical chiropteran membranous brachial region.
But we may never know. Alternately, we may. The recent resurgence in volcanic activity on Mt. St. Helens has doubtless disturbed much of the local wildlife, driving them out of the mountains and down to inhabited areas. Who is to say what...or who...might emerge in the next few weeks. Perhaps the time is nigh for the world to be introduced once and for all to a being...called Batsquatch.
Out of the night
When the full moon is bright
Comes a being known as Batsquatch
This beast, who gives pause,
Carves a "B" with his claws
A "B" that stands for Batsquatch
Batsquatch...
A wily rascal is he
Batsquatch...
He makes the sign of the "B"
Batsquatch...Batsquatch...Batsquatch...
Batsquatch!
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