Evidence Collection

A Comprehensive and Uncompromising Field Guide to Sasquatch Evidence Collection

Somewhere in the Pacific Northwest — in the dense, ancient, rain-soaked forests of Washington, Oregon, or Northern California, in the volcanic highlands of the Cascades, or along the remote river corridors of British Columbia — there exists, at this very moment, biological evidence of the North American Sasquatch. Hair caught on a branch at a height and a location inconsistent with any known animal. A partial footprint preserved in creek-bank mud whose dimensions and dermal ridge patterns defy explanation by reference to any documented species. A ground nest constructed from woven and bent vegetation in a pattern that experienced researchers have described as gorilla-like in its architecture. Soil permeated with the shed skin cells and biological trace material of a creature that rested there within the past hours or days. This evidence exists. Of that, at Sasquatch Syndicate, we have no doubt whatsoever.

And somewhere in the history of this research — probably in many places, across many years, and involving many well-intentioned and genuinely passionate researchers — that evidence, or evidence exactly like it, was found, handled with bare hands, stored in a plastic sandwich bag in a warm jacket pocket, submitted weeks later to a laboratory that lacked the specific expertise to analyze it, and returned as inconclusive, contaminated, or unanalyzable. The evidence that could have changed everything became the evidence that proved nothing — not because it lacked scientific significance in the field, but because the protocols required to preserve and protect that significance through the collection, storage, transport, and submission process were not followed, were not known, or were not taken seriously enough in the moment of discovery.

This is the reality that Dr. Todd Disotell, Ph.D., Professor of Molecular Anthropology at New York University and one of the most technically accomplished ancient and degraded DNA researchers working anywhere in the world today, has communicated with consistent emphasis and genuine urgency in every conversation he has had with the Sasquatch research community — including his landmark appearance on the Sasquatch Syndicate podcast episode Building the Citizen Scientist, in which he shared the specific evidence collection protocols that every field researcher in this community needs to understand, internalize, and apply with unwavering consistency every single time they go into the field.

"Just because a species hasn't been found," Dr. Disotell stated in that conversation with the measured confidence of a scientist who has spent his career working at the frontier of biological discovery, "doesn't mean it doesn't exist. There are many new species discovered each and every year." This statement — from one of the most credentialed and most methodologically rigorous DNA researchers in the world — should be understood as both an encouragement and a challenge. An encouragement because it confirms that the scientific establishment's failure to formally document Sasquatch is not, in the view of at least one deeply qualified expert, evidence of the creature's non-existence. A challenge because it implicitly raises the question of what it will take to provide that documentation — and the answer, as Dr. Disotell's guidance makes clear, begins not in the laboratory but in the field, in the moment of discovery, in the decisions made by the researcher who finds the evidence before anyone else does.

This article is dedicated entirely to those decisions — and to the protocols, the preparation, the equipment, and the disciplined methodology that give the evidence you collect the best possible chance of producing the kind of scientifically credible, reproducible, peer-reviewable results that will finally and permanently change the conversation about the North American Sasquatch in mainstream science.

Why Contamination Is Your Single Biggest Enemy
Before we discuss what to do, it is worth spending considerable time discussing why it matters so much — because the temptation to handle evidence with less than perfect protocol is most easily resisted by a researcher who fully understands what is at stake when protocol fails. And what is at stake is not merely the quality of a single sample but the scientific credibility of the entire research enterprise.

DNA analysis of biological samples works, in its most fundamental form, by identifying the genetic sequences present in the sample and matching them against the sequences of known species in the global genetic database. When a sample contains only the biological material of the original organism — and that material has been adequately preserved through proper collection and storage — the analysis can produce a clean, unambiguous result identifying the species of origin, or flagging the presence of a novel sequence that does not match any known species. This is the result every Sasquatch researcher dreams of obtaining. It is also the result that contamination makes it impossible to obtain.

Human DNA is everywhere. It is in the cells shed continuously from your skin as you move through the world. It is in the microscopic droplets expelled with every breath you take. It is on your fingers, your palms, your lips, your clothing, and every surface you touch. It is, from the perspective of biological sample collection, the most pervasive and most insidious source of contamination imaginable — because the researcher who finds the evidence and the evidence itself are, from the moment of discovery, in immediate physical proximity, and every second of that proximity represents an opportunity for human genetic material to be deposited on or near the sample. A single skin cell deposited on a hair sample during ungloved handling can be sufficient to overwhelm the much smaller quantity of target DNA present in a degraded environmental sample, producing a result that identifies the sample as human — and ending what might have been the most significant evidence analysis in the history of this research before it ever properly begins.

Environmental contamination compounds the problem. Soil bacteria, fungal spores, insect DNA, the genetic material of the dozens of other organisms that inhabit the same environment as the sample — all of these represent potential sources of genetic noise that can obscure the target signal in a poorly preserved or improperly stored sample. Temperature, humidity, UV radiation, and the passage of time all accelerate the degradation of DNA in biological samples, reducing the quantity and quality of recoverable genetic material with every hour that passes between collection and laboratory submission. The researcher who waits three weeks to submit a sample stored at room temperature in a paper bag may find that the laboratory has nothing interpretable to work with — not because the original sample lacked biological significance but because the DNA it contained has been degraded beyond recovery.

Understanding these realities is not meant to discourage field researchers — it is meant to impress upon them with complete seriousness and complete honesty that the protocols described in this article are not optional refinements for the particularly fastidious researcher. They are the minimum necessary conditions for producing evidence with any genuine possibility of contributing to the scientific record. Every shortcut taken in the evidence collection process is a step toward a contaminated sample, an inconclusive result, and another lost opportunity to advance this research toward the breakthrough that this community has been working toward for decades.

Preparation Before You Leave Home — The Foundation of Scientific Evidence Collection
The single most important principle in scientific field evidence collection — the principle that Dr. Disotell emphasized in his podcast conversation with Sasquatch Syndicate and that every experienced field researcher who has worked at the level of genuine scientific rigor will confirm from personal experience — is that preparation happens before you go into the field, not after you have found something. The moment of discovery is not the time to be improvising your equipment, improvising your protocols, or making decisions about sample handling under the influence of the adrenaline, the excitement, and the time pressure that accompany an active field discovery. By the time you are standing over a piece of evidence that may change everything, every decision about how you are going to handle it should already have been made — made calmly, deliberately, and with full knowledge of the scientific requirements — and every piece of equipment required to implement those decisions should already be in your field kit, organized, clean, and immediately accessible.

Your evidence collection kit should be assembled at home, in clean conditions, before every field outing — and it should be treated, from the moment of assembly, as a sterile or near-sterile environment that you handle with gloves and that you protect from contamination through careful storage and careful transport. Here is what that kit must contain, and why each item earns its mandatory place in the pack:

Your Evidence Collection Kit — The Complete and Non-Negotiable Contents

Nitrile Gloves — Multiple Pairs
Nitrile gloves are the single most important piece of equipment in your evidence collection kit, and no aspect of that statement should be treated as hyperbole. From the moment you identify a potential evidence site — not from the moment you decide to collect a sample, but from the moment you first approach the area — your hands must be gloved. No exceptions. No "I'll just take a quick look first." No "I forgot my gloves but I'll be careful." Without gloves, every surface you touch, every sample you handle, every piece of equipment you use is potentially contaminated with your own DNA before the collection process has even begun.

Nitrile is preferred over latex for two important reasons — nitrile is more resistant to puncture and tearing in field conditions, and nitrile is hypoallergenic, making it usable by researchers with latex sensitivities. Pack a minimum of six pairs per field outing — more is always better — and change gloves between handling different samples, between handling your documentation materials and your collection equipment, and any time you have reason to believe your gloves may have been compromised by contact with a contaminating surface.

N95 Respirator Mask or Surgical Mask
Your breath is a vector of contamination. Every exhaled breath deposits a microscopic cloud of moisture droplets carrying your own biological material — including skin cells, oral epithelial cells, and your own DNA — into the immediate environment. In close proximity to a biological sample, particularly a delicate hair sample or a surface deposit of trace biological material, this exhaled contamination can be deposited directly on the evidence in quantities sufficient to compromise the subsequent analysis. An N95 respirator mask or surgical mask worn over your nose and mouth during the approach to and collection from any evidence site eliminates this vector of contamination entirely. It is uncomfortable. It is easy to forget. It is not optional.

Sterile DNA Collection Tubes
For liquid or semi-liquid biological samples — blood, saliva, tissue — sterile DNA collection tubes represent the gold standard of sample containment. These tubes, available from laboratory supply companies and from Paleo DNA Laboratories directly, are manufactured under sterile conditions, sealed against contamination, and chemically optimized for the preservation of biological material and its contained DNA through the collection, transport, and storage process. Each tube should be handled only while gloved, opened only immediately prior to use, and sealed immediately after sample deposition. Label the tube before you open it, not after — handling a labeled tube that has already been sealed is far safer than attempting to label an open tube in field conditions.

Glassine Envelopes — Multiple Sizes
For dry biological samples — most notably hair samples, which represent the most commonly collected and most scientifically significant category of biological evidence in the Sasquatch field research record — glassine envelopes represent the preferred collection and storage medium. Glassine is a smooth, semi-transparent paper that is manufactured to be pH-neutral, acid-free, and minimally chemically reactive with biological materials — making it far superior to ordinary paper, plastic bags, or any other improvised container for the storage of dry biological samples. The smooth inner surface of glassine minimizes mechanical abrasion of delicate hair samples during transport, reducing the physical damage to the hair shaft and its associated root material that can compromise subsequent microscopic and DNA analysis. The pH-neutral chemistry of glassine minimizes chemical interaction with the sample that could accelerate biological degradation over time.

Glassine envelopes are available in multiple sizes from archival supply companies and from laboratory supply sources, and your field kit should contain a generous supply of at least two or three different sizes to accommodate whatever form the evidence you collect takes. As with DNA collection tubes, glassine envelopes should be labeled before use rather than after — use a soft pencil or a permanent marker on the outside surface of the envelope, never inside — and should be sealed immediately after sample deposition.

Sterile Tweezers or Forceps — Multiple Pairs, Sealed
Hair samples and other small biological samples should never be handled with bare fingers, even gloved fingers, if a mechanical collection tool can be used instead. Sterile tweezers or forceps — sealed in sterile packaging until the moment of use — provide the most precise and most contamination-controlled means of collecting hair samples, transferring them to glassine envelopes, and handling any other small biological materials encountered in the field. Use a fresh, unopened pair of sterile tweezers for each distinct sample you collect — never use the same tweezers for two different samples, as cross-contamination between samples is just as scientifically damaging as contamination from the researcher. Pack a minimum of ten pairs per field outing.

Sterile Cotton Swabs
For collecting trace biological material from surfaces — the interior of a footprint, the bark of a tree bearing apparent contact marks, a rock surface showing signs of recent contact — sterile cotton swabs provide an effective and easily deployable collection tool. Moisten the swab with sterile water immediately prior to use — a dry swab collects far less trace biological material from a surface than a moistened one — and roll the swab across the collection surface using a consistent, thorough technique that maximizes contact area coverage. Immediately after collection, break the swab handle at the collection point — to prevent the handle from re-contaminating the collection tip during storage — and deposit the swab in a sterile DNA collection tube. Label the tube immediately and seal it.

Sterile Water — Small Sealed Vials
For moistening cotton swabs prior to surface sampling and for any other field application requiring a sterile aqueous medium. Use only vials that have been sealed in laboratory conditions — never use water from field sources, which will be carrying the DNA of every organism that has contacted that water source.

Permanent Markers and Soft Pencils
For labeling sample containers immediately before and after use. Permanent markers for glassine envelopes and DNA collection tubes. Soft pencils as a backup and for any application where marker ink might interact with the container material. Label everything, immediately, without exception.

A Dedicated Field Notebook — Waterproof
Your field notebook is the physical embodiment of your chain of custody documentation — the permanent, contemporaneous written record of every observation, every measurement, every photograph, every sample collected, and every step of the handling process from the moment of discovery through to laboratory submission. This notebook is as important as any physical sample you collect, because without it the physical sample has no documented context, no verifiable chain of custody, and significantly diminished scientific credibility. Use a waterproof notebook — the field conditions in which you are most likely to find significant evidence are also the field conditions most likely to involve rain, mud, and stream crossings that would destroy a conventional paper notebook. Write in permanent ink.

A GPS Device or Smartphone with GPS Capability
The geographic coordinates of your evidence collection site are a mandatory component of your documentation record and must be recorded with the greatest possible precision at the time of collection. A standalone GPS device or a smartphone with a reliable GPS application provides coordinates to within a few meters — sufficient precision for re-locating the site and for contextualizing the evidence within the broader geographic distribution of encounter and evidence data. Record the coordinates in your field notebook immediately upon collection, and cross-reference them with your sample labels.
A Camera or Smartphone with High-Resolution Camera Capability
Comprehensive photographic documentation is the first and most foundational step in the evidence collection process — preceding physical sample collection, preceding any other form of documentation, and establishing the permanent visual record of the evidence in its original, undisturbed state that will serve as the baseline reference for all subsequent analysis. Your photographic documentation should be systematic, comprehensive, and methodical — not a few quick snapshots taken in the excitement of discovery but a structured visual record that captures the evidence from multiple angles and distances, documents the environmental context, and provides sufficient visual detail to support independent assessment of the evidence's character and significance.

A Tape Measure
For recording the precise dimensions of any physical evidence — footprints, nest structures, tree markings, or any other physical feature of potential significance — as part of your comprehensive documentation record.

Sealed Sterile Zip-Lock Bags — Multiple Sizes
As secondary containment for already-sealed primary sample containers during transport, providing an additional barrier against environmental contamination and against the physical damage that rough backcountry travel can inflict on fragile sample containers. Double-bag everything.

A Small Portable Cooler with Ice Packs
To be kept in your vehicle and accessed immediately upon return from the field. DNA degrades with exposure to heat — the sooner your samples are cooled after collection, the more biological material will remain recoverable at the time of laboratory analysis. Samples should be refrigerated or frozen as soon as possible after collection and maintained in cold conditions through transport and storage until laboratory submission.

The Evidence Collection Process — Step by Step

Step 1 — Stop, Assess, and Prepare Before You Touch Anything
The moment you identify a potential evidence site — whether it is a hair sample caught on a branch, a ground nest, a fresh footprint, or any other physical indicator of Sasquatch presence — stop moving immediately. Do not approach further. Do not reach for the evidence. Do not allow your excitement to translate into premature physical engagement with the site before you have taken the time to properly prepare yourself and your equipment for the collection process. Breathe. Take stock of what you are looking at from a distance sufficient to avoid inadvertent contamination through proximity. Then, and only then, begin preparing yourself for the collection process.

Step 2 — Don Your Protective Equipment
Put on your nitrile gloves — making sure to touch only the outside surfaces of the gloves during donning, never the inside surfaces that will contact your skin. Put on your face mask, ensuring that it covers both your nose and your mouth completely and that it fits snugly enough to prevent air bypass around the edges. If your hair is long enough to fall forward and potentially contact the evidence site during close-range work, tie it back or cover it. The goal at this stage is to minimize, to the greatest extent practically possible in field conditions, the amount of your own biological material that will be shed into the environment of the evidence site during the collection process.

Step 3 — Comprehensive Photographic Documentation
Before any physical contact with the evidence or its immediate surroundings, conduct a complete and systematic photographic documentation of the site. Begin with wide establishing shots that document the evidence in the context of its surrounding environment — capturing the vegetation, the substrate, the terrain, and any other environmental features that provide scientific context for the evidence. Move progressively closer, capturing intermediate-distance shots that document the specific location and immediate surroundings of the evidence, before finally taking close-up shots of the evidence itself from multiple angles and with scale reference — place your tape measure alongside the evidence for at least one shot in each series to provide unambiguous dimensional reference. If a footprint is present, capture overhead shots from directly above, oblique angle shots from multiple directions that document the three-dimensional depth and structural character of the impression, and macro shots of any areas of particular detail such as toe impressions or potential dermal ridge patterns.

Step 4 — Record All Environmental and Contextual Data
Open your field notebook and record, in real time and in as much detail as the situation permits, every piece of contextual information that will be relevant to the subsequent scientific assessment of the evidence. This record should include, at minimum, the precise GPS coordinates of the collection site, the date and time of discovery, the ambient weather conditions including temperature and precipitation status, the substrate type and condition, the elevation and general habitat description, the specific nature of the evidence and its precise location within the site, the apparent age of the evidence based on observable physical characteristics, any other physical indicators of Sasquatch presence in the immediate area, and any other observations that you believe may have scientific relevance. This contemporaneous field record is your chain of custody document — it begins now and must be maintained without interruption through to laboratory submission.

Step 5 — Prepare Your Sample Container Before Collecting
Before you collect the sample, prepare and label the container it will go into. Open a fresh glassine envelope or a sterile DNA collection tube — doing so while gloved and while holding the container in a way that minimizes contact between the container interior and any surface other than the sample it is about to receive. Using your permanent marker, label the outside of the container with a unique sample identifier that corresponds to the entry in your field notebook, the date and time of collection, and a brief description of the sample type. This labeling step must happen before the sample is deposited, not after — attempting to label a container that already holds a delicate sample introduces unnecessary handling risk.

Step 6 — Collect the Sample
Open a fresh, sterile pair of tweezers or forceps and use them to carefully and methodically collect the sample — working slowly, working deliberately, and maintaining constant awareness of the contamination risks associated with every movement and every contact in the collection process. For hair samples, grasp individual hairs as close to their base as possible — preserving the root bulb and any associated follicular material, which represents the richest source of DNA in the sample — and transfer them directly and immediately to the prepared glassine envelope. For trace biological surface samples, use a moistened sterile cotton swab as described above. For soil samples intended for eDNA analysis, use a sterile collection implement to transfer a sufficient volume of substrate — typically a few grams — directly into a sterile collection tube.

Never use the same collection implement for more than one sample. Never allow a used collection implement to contact any surface other than its target sample and its designated container. Never attempt to collect multiple samples in sequence without changing gloves between samples.

Step 7 — Seal and Label the Container Immediately
The moment the sample is in the container, seal the container immediately and completely — before setting it down, before picking up another piece of equipment, before doing anything else. A sample in an unsealed container is a sample at risk of contamination for every second that the seal is absent. Once sealed, perform a secondary check of the label to confirm that it accurately identifies the sample and corresponds correctly to your field notebook entry.
Step 8 — Double Bag for Transport
Place the sealed primary sample container inside a sterile zip-lock bag, seal the zip-lock bag, and if possible place that sealed bag inside a second zip-lock bag. This double-bagging protocol provides protection against physical damage, environmental contamination, and the consequences of container seal failure during the rough conditions of backcountry transport.

Step 9 — Cool the Sample as Quickly as Possible
Upon returning to your vehicle, immediately transfer all samples to your portable cooler and surround them with ice packs. Document the time at which cooling began in your field notebook. If you will not be able to submit samples to a laboratory within 24 to 48 hours of collection, transfer them to a freezer as soon as possible and maintain frozen storage until submission.

Step 10 — Complete Your Field Documentation Record
Before you leave the field site, take a final set of photographs documenting the site after evidence collection — showing what was collected, from where, and the condition of the site following your work. Add any additional observations to your field notebook that you may have noted during the collection process but not yet recorded. Confirm that every sample container is sealed, labeled, and double-bagged. Confirm that the GPS coordinates, date, time, and environmental conditions are fully recorded in your notebook. Your chain of custody documentation is now established — protect it as carefully as you protect the physical samples.

Organizing Your Documentation — The System That Keeps Science Honest
The field notebook that you maintain during evidence collection is not merely a personal record — it is a scientific document, and its accuracy, its completeness, and its contemporaneous character are the foundation of the chain of custody that gives your evidence scientific credibility. Here is how to maintain it effectively.

Use a consistent, pre-established format for every entry — a format that you have practiced and internalized before going into the field so that completing it in the excitement of an active discovery requires no conscious thought about structure and allows your full cognitive attention to be directed to the substantive content of your observations. Your standard entry format should include the following fields in the following order: unique sample identifier, date and time of discovery, GPS coordinates, elevation, habitat description, weather conditions, substrate description, evidence type and description, apparent age of evidence, collection method, collector name, and any additional observations. Complete every field for every sample, every time, without exception.

Number your samples sequentially — Sample 001, Sample 002, and so on — within a numbering system that is unique to your field campaign and that cannot be confused with samples from previous or subsequent outings. This unique identifier connects your physical sample to its field documentation record and to its laboratory submission record through an unbroken chain of reference that allows anyone reviewing the evidence to reconstruct the complete history of the sample from the moment of discovery.

Photograph your field notebook entries alongside your sample containers before leaving the field — creating a photographic record of the documentation record that provides a backup in the event that the physical notebook is lost, damaged, or destroyed during the return from the field. Store these photographs in a cloud-based system that is backed up automatically and that will persist independently of any single physical device.

Submitting to Paleo DNA Laboratories — The Right Destination for Your Evidence
Dr. Disotell was explicit, emphatic, and entirely clear on this point during his Sasquatch Syndicate podcast appearance, and we want to convey his guidance with the same clarity and directness with which he stated it: biological samples collected from Sasquatch encounter sites should be submitted to Paleo DNA Laboratories — a dedicated ancient and environmentally degraded DNA analysis facility with specific expertise in recovering interpretable genetic sequences from exactly the kinds of challenging, low-quantity, high-degradation samples that field researchers most commonly collect. The website for Paleo DNA Laboratories is ancientdna.com, and we strongly encourage every field researcher in this community to review their submission guidelines, their sample handling requirements, and their specific protocols for Sasquatch-related sample submission before collecting any evidence, so that your collection and storage protocols are fully aligned with their laboratory requirements from the moment of collection.

Do not submit samples to general commercial DNA testing services. Do not submit samples to university laboratories without explicit prior arrangement and explicit confirmation that the receiving laboratory has the specific expertise and the specific methodological protocols required for degraded environmental sample analysis. And do not — as Dr. Disotell made abundantly clear — simply call him or mail samples to him directly. The science requires institutional rigor. Institutional rigor requires the right laboratory. The right laboratory, for this specific research application, is Paleo DNA Laboratories.

A Final Word — The Responsibility of the Field Researcher
Every researcher who goes into the field carrying a proper evidence collection kit, who follows rigorous collection protocols with consistent discipline, and who submits clean, well-documented samples through the appropriate channels is making a genuine and potentially consequential scientific contribution to one of the most important and most enduring biological research questions of our time. The next sample that definitively establishes the existence of the North American Sasquatch — and we believe at Sasquatch Syndicate that such a sample will one day exist — will be collected by a researcher who prepared properly, who handled the evidence with scientific rigor, and who understood that the difference between a sample that changes the world and a sample that proves nothing often comes down entirely to the decisions made in the first few minutes after discovery.
Don't blow it. Prepare. Protect. Document. Submit correctly.

The truth is out there, and it may be waiting for you.

Have you found biological evidence from a Sasquatch encounter site that you believe warrants professional analysis? Please contact us at [email protected]. We take every report seriously and will do everything we can to help connect serious field researchers with the scientific resources and the methodological guidance they need to ensure their evidence reaches the laboratory in the best possible condition.

BELIEVE

By Chuck Geveshausen, Founder & CEO Sasquatch Syndicate Inc.