Bedcats may have been invented by lumberjacks trying to outdo each other with tall tales. They spent months in camp, and made up stories to pass the time in the bunkhouse. And Forest History Center assistant director Grant Frasier says it was fun for the loggers to try to scare newcomers to camp. Lotta people that came up here to log were from far away, lot of em were actually from the cities, back east and that, trying to find a way to make a living for awhile. The Forest History Center has a couple books on hand that catalog the beasts that loggers said they saw or heard - or whose strange tracks they followed.
Different creatures crop up in different parts of the country where lumberjacks camped.
And some still exist today. Locals say the hodag, a rhinocerous-like creature, roams Rhinelander, Wisconsin. But for the most part, like the old logging camps, the bizarre forest creatures are extinct today. Major funding for Minnesota Public Radio's regional Internet activities is provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.