How Old Bigfoot?

The old joke goes: How Old Bigfoot?  Answer: Old Bigfoot just fine! But is he really fine?

How long do Sasquatch creatures live?  What? You have no idea? You say, 'look dude, we don't even know if they truly exist much less what their lifestyle and life expectancy might be.' 

Ok, ok, for the sake of argument and useful speculation, let's say they exist and that they are physical, flesh and blood creatures. Now we can cite the numerous witness reports to dress out size, weight and basic physiology.

I stink, therefore I am!

This is a biped, it has two arms with human-like hands at the ends. A single head and the basic torso that all humans share. There are reports that Bigfoot creatures have nipples, which further humanizes them, suggesting a typical birth process that create little Bigfoots. How cute!

But if we can theorize that this bipedal hybrid animal is a mammal that must live on our plain of existence, then we might be able to conclude that they eat and drink and breathe the same air we do. Since the bulk of Sasquatch sightings are mostly from this country, I cite the statistic that average human life spans in the United States are said to be 76 years for men and 81 for the ladies. 

But humans are not Sasquatches. As clever, highly evolved Homo sapiens, we have erected (forgive the pun) a complex cage of mitigating circumstances that both lengthen and shorten our lives. Good medicines and Doctor/surgeons fix things that go south in our bodies, while we work hard at ruining our health with lethargy, drug addiction, food additives, pollution and stress. 

I feel pretty good for my age!

So your average Bigfoot should ostensibly be much better off in terms of his health, given that they don't consume the awful things humans do, they run like the wind, they breathe cleaner air and the only stress they might have is when they slip up and are forced to dodge an occasional semi-truck. 

Even though Sasquatches don't undergo the surgical procedures that humans use to prolong life, I maintain that since they do not ingest the bad things we ingest, they are unlikely to need to have diseased organs removed and/or replaced. It's a wash.

Humans like Okinawans lived very long, healthy lives due to their diets and social customs. Mostly vegetarian, along with regular exercise and in the close-knit families who include grandparents living with their children's children, many Okinawans lived well over 110 years. That number plummeted after the 1960s when more westernized diets became popular in Japanese prefectures and cancer rates began to rise. This suggests that clean living increases life span, which puts Mr. Natural in a good place for a long life.

I should buy a boat

But according to the work of Oregon Zoologist, Dr. W. Hennner Fahrenbach, in 1998:

'By applying scaling formulae to the 660 lb body of the average sasquatch, a gestation period of about 9 months and an average life span (in captivity) of 36 years can be estimated. This life expectancy implies an occasional survival into the fifth decade, reports which account for descriptions of some animals as looking old and wrinkled, having "rotten, snaggle teeth" and unkempt, matted "angora goat dreadlocks" or patchy, worn hair. Survival times for gorillas in captivity range into the middle of the third decade of life.' 

This is a sad conclusion. While it is understandable that a scientist might make this conclusion based on captive animals, our friend the Bigfoot is hardly a typical zoo animal. While his habitat may be continually encroached upon by loggers and developers, BFs are not dependent on the food sources of zoo animals nor subject to the stress of being caged and observed for decades.

This said, we do have good reportage of Sasquatches that are not exactly the picture of health. 

From the BFRO:

http://www.bfro.net/gdb/show_report.asp?id=42448

Willie Nelson called....wants his personality back.

'So I got to see a Sasquatch up close and personal. My window was down and I was no more than 20 feet from him. His face was human looking except that he had no chin and he had a somewhat heavy brow ridge. The nose was a human nose and was more european than african looking. The eyes were black, the skin was grey as was his hair and he had more or less human teeth...what was left of them. His teeth were in terrible condition.'

And from the BFRO investigator, Scott Taylor:

'He remarked that the teeth were all yellow, chipped, and some were missing. It is quite likely that this creature was old.'

But how old, Scotty? The witness did not venture a guess and how could he?

I know I have a birth certificate lying around the cave somewhere, dang it!

We can estimate the age of a horse by looking at it's teeth, however. And while we don't have any Sasquatch teeth handy, let's assume that 'yellow, chipped' teeth in 'terrible condition', even some ostensibly missing, would put Hairy the Squatch at least forty or so, ok?

We know that Apes, Gorillas, Chimpanzees and Orang-Utans have average life spans of around 40 years and that gorillas in captivity can live as much as 50 years. Cheetah, Tarzan's sidekick, lived to be 80 years old, which is a long time to play second fiddle to a TV star.

So we could conclude that a Great Ape hybrid might live as long as this.

Old Yellow Top, a purported Sasquatch creature that frequented Cobalt, Ontario Canada was first reported in 1906, and still apparently around as recently as 1970, which would put him at about 64 years of age, and it seems fair to assume he didn't just pop onto the scene as an adult.

So, until we actually bump into a Sasquatch birthday party and can count the candles, the jury will remain out. It seems safe to say that if Bigfoot was eligible for Social Security, there would be some checks going out to some pretty woodsy addresses as the best estimate for a senior Squatch comes in at over 64 Seasons. Happy Birthday Big Guy...look under the log, I left you a toothbrush.