Orang Pendek project

[designer]

A few years ago there was a show that was looking for the Orang Pendek. They said they were putting up camera traps for a long term study, years of monitoring the forest. I've tried searching for info on how it's going but can't find any. I don't remember the name of the group doing the reserch. Anyone know about it?

[HeathenRoyalty]

I thin it might have been a National Geographic thing.

[Earl.Of.Trumps]

I wish I could help. I do remember that but I cannot recall the group.

[EnderOTD]

I can recall seeing an episode by MonsterQuest and maybe one through animal planet or discovery.

[+DieChecker]

It was a National Geographic backed project. It was quite active for a couple years, and then AFAIK no one ever went back, or they just abandoned the project. The site posted a lot of pics of college kids in the jungle setting stuff up and recovering data, but it was really boring reading.

http://www.orangpendek.org/

Blog seems to run from Dec 2005 to Apr 2008. Then nothing....

While the National Geographic grant covered our initial start-up costs, we estimate the project will require at least US$15,000 a year to maintain the cameras and continue the search for orang pendek.

We will be setting up a donation system through Paypal on this page soon. So please check back if you are interested in donating to the project!

The NatGeo grant must have run out and that Paypal thing never happened.

[HeathenRoyalty]

Well that sucks.

[evancj]

That's how these things work. It's an established pattern in the crypto community.

Lots of extraordinary claims and promises, and then...nothing, nada, zip, zilch.

In the not to distant future they will recycle the same crap over again, figuring we are all a bunch of idiots and will not remember the last batch of BS they fed us.

Of course there are those of us who apparently do not have any long term memory, and will gladly let themselves be fed the same BS all over again without question, or doubt.

[+DieChecker]

I think it is likely because the Grad Student (an assumption) who was running the project and writing the grant proposals graduated and no one else wanted to keep it up.

[Dragonwind]

Yeah it was pretty lack lustre. Quote from one of the cameramen 'I saw it...I had my camera around my neck...but I just kept quiet'. FFS you take all that camera equipment...see something unusual but don't fire off photos???? I would fire that guy...but no...he gets on TV describing his encounter and setting up more camera traps.

A youtube poster had a good idea 'why not let the locals maintain the camera traps and give them some money and something constructive to do.'

They found footprints that could easily have been a bear, common in the area, that's about all.

I think it's possible that the flores hobbit could have survived more recently than what fossil discoveries we have indicate (approx 13,000 years ago) but bipedal hominids surviving, even in remote jungles, without some sort of organised group dynamic population structure is virtually impossible. The world is vastly populated, expanded and ecologically fragmented from even 200 years ago. If they are out there now I would suspect early explorers into SE asia would have found them centuries ago.

It's also possible it could be an undiscovered Orangutan species but again they don't have a large range/territory. Eventually they would be found as they would also require a relatively large breeding population or would leave scats. Most of the newly discovered species in this part of the world are small, nocturnal or relatively solitary.

[Rafterman]

Reminds me a bit of Leonard Nimoy wrapping up the Bigfoot episode of In Search Of by saying that proof was right around the corner.

[Q-C]

but bipedal hominids surviving, even in remote jungles, without some sort of organised group dynamic population structure is virtually impossible.

snipping and bolding mine

I *like* this. I've always thought this way (about bigfoot and kin), including socializing with us humans, which (depending who you talk to) apparently doesn't happen or, it does happens but is somehow impossible to prove!

Edited October 8, 2013 by QuiteContrary

[keninsc]

As far as proof goes, the same thing applies to this Bigfoot....Orang-Pendek thing, as it does with UFO's. I can't explain either one. And short of a UFO crashing in Central Park or someone dragging out a couple of dead Bigfoots, there is no proof. That is not to say they don't exist, because it's simply impossible to prove anything DOESN'T exist. At best all you can do is speculate about the lack of proof and then extrapolate that to imply that they don't exist.

That's really all you can do.