A Brief History of Australian Cryptozoology - Paul Cropper
Australian's have been fascinated by reports of bunyips, panthers, yowies and tigers for decades, and since the early days of the colony a few individuals have quietly collected and investigated these incidents. Paul Cropper's talk will provide a brief history of cryptozoology in this country, from early research into bunyips through to the present day growing use of the Internet by various groups and researchers to collect and disseminate reports.
 

• 10:00 AM to 10:30 AM

Myths & Monsters - Dr Helmut Loofs Wissowa
Dr. Helmut Loofs-Wissowa has been tracking the elusive "Wildmen" of South East Asia for the better part of his academic career. His talk will cover the search for still unknown non-sapiens hominids, usually called "Wildmen", and what it has to do with science. There are by now thousands of reports of such Wildmen throughout the world: Abominable Snowmen or Yetis in the Himalayas, Yahoos, Yowies or Hairymen in Australia. There are also reports of such beings, under different names, from Indonesia, Malaysia, Burma, Pakistan, Mongolia, the Caucasus, various parts of Africa and even South America. To dismiss all this as collective hallucination, the primitive need for the mythological or simply as archetypallegends common to all mankind will not do any more.

• 10:30 AM to 11:00 AM

Strange creatures on the antipodean UFO trail - Bill Chalker
In 1927, Fernvale experienced a range of phenomena like an episode out of the Twilight Zone.  UFOs, strange men, strange beings ("elephant" humanoids - was Ganesa the hindu elephant headed deity abroad in rural Australia?), "big bird" creatures, animal disturbances and deaths were reported. Bill Chalker explores the strange events, which were an extraordinary fortelling of things to come - UFOs in 1947 and the Mothman milieu of 1966-67, where strange "birdmen", UFOs & bizarre events haunted the region.

• 11:00 AM to 12:00 Noon

Australian Yowie Research - Dean Harrison
Founder of Australian Yowie Research, Dean Harrison, will speak about his own personal experiences in trying to track down the elusive bush ape, otherwise known as the Yowie. Dean will share some of the groupıs most interesting cases - spanning from Springbrook in Queensland to the Blue Mountains in NSW - discussing the creatureıs behaviour and showing some startling evidence of its existence!

• 12:00 Noon to 12:30 PM

The Bunyip - Professor Gary Opit
³She had never actually observed the animal itself, did not even regard it as anything particularly unusual, for she had long grown accustomed to its strange roaring call at night, until the swamp was eventually drained and turned into pasture...she knew only of the animalıs haunting roaring call and that it was known as a Bunyipı.² Respected naturalist Prof Gary Opit looks at the Bunyip and searches for some truth amongst the myth and legend.

Strange Sea Creatures - Malcolm Smith
It would be interesting to speculate how many ³sea serpent² or ³sea monster² sightings go unrecorded because the witnesses fear ridicule. When the witnesses do come forth, their stories are most likely to be published in regional newspapers, where they attract little attention, rather than the major capital city dailies. As Malcolm Smith discovers, the publicity received by the Loch Ness Monster in 1933 precipitated fully seven sea serpent reports the following year, commencing in far north Queensland and moving south!

• 2:00 PM to 2:15 PM

Yowies - A Witness Perspective - Neil Frost
Neil and his family have lived in the Blue Mountains area for the last 10 years, during which time they have come into contact with a creature(s) they believe to be a Yowie. They have collected casts of the creature's footprints, recorded its calls and photographed what they believe to be the creature's eyes peering from nearby bushland. Many of his neighbours have also had experiences with the creature and local Aborigines in the area are also familiar with it. Today Neil will share his personal experiences and his efforts to capture solid evidence of the creature.

• 2:15 PM to 3:00 PM

Blue Mountains Yowie Research - Dave McBean & Michael Hallett
Blue Mountains Cryptid Research is a small group of people dedicated to the search for and study of a cryptic ape / relict hominid species in the Blue Mountains of NSW, Australia. They have given the name "The Australian Bush Ape" or "Hairy Man"  to this creature, otherwise known as Yowie, Yahoo and Doolagarl. As a group, they avoid a sensationalist approach and shun media exposure as they believe it attracts the wrong kind of attention to a potentially endangered species. Their aim is to study the behaviour of the Bush Ape to learn more about it and perhaps demystify it.
the subject.

ARFRA Results to Date - Peter Chapple
ARFRA Founder Peter Chapple will update the public on the number of reports received by the Australian Rare Fauna Research Association, their work to date and the latest developments in respect to the big cat and Tasmanian Tiger (Thylacine).

• 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM

"High Strangeness" in Yowie Reports.
Tony Healy asks the question: "Are the hairy giants flesh and blood - or are they psychic phenomena?" The vast majority of people who report yowie sightings sincerely believe they have encountered living, breathing animals. A small percentage of reports, however, contain truly bizarre ingredients which strongly suggest there is something quite uncanny about the elusive ape-men. Another factor which suggests the yowies are in some way paranormal is that they appear to be just one part of a world-wide phenomenon: strikingly similar traditions of uncatchable ape-men occur in many other parts of the world.

• DRINKS
   
• 7pm DINNER at Giovanniıs, George Street, Circular Quay