Bigfoot sightings crop up all over the United States, but the focus of one search group this weekend is a wooded area near Youngstown.
California-based Searching for Bigfoot Inc. traveled to Girard, a city in Trumbull County near Youngstown, after a man claimed he took a picture of a creature that looked a lot like the big guy.
In fact, Xavier King told a Youngstown television station he saw Bigfoot twice while driving toward Youngstown.
"I had seen something, I don’t know what it was, I had seen something that’s all I know," he said. “I got out and took a picture.”
King showed the pictures to a friend, who sent it along to T.J. Biscardi, director of operations for Searching for Bigfoot, and the hunt was on. Biscardi says he gets a number of reports of Bigfoot sightings from Ohio at this time of year because the creatures are migrating north.
The group is hosting a $1 million bounty competition, a reward for anyone who can deliver information leading to the capture or discovery of an actual Bigfoot. Because King’s pictures are part of the competition, Biscardi declined to share them.
This weekend, the group planned to camp near Girard, hoping to track the local creature with trail cameras and food bait. The aim, Biscardi says, is to prove the sightings are not just figments of the imagination.
“We’ll get to capture one of these creatures and bring it back,” he said, “and prove to the world that they exist.”
