Eyewitnesses use various words and phrases for the featherless flying creatures observed. Consider the following list:

• prehistoric bird
• dinosaur bird
• flying dinosaur
• dragon
• pterodactyl
• flying creature

In Papua New Guinea, we also encounter various names:

• ropen
• duwas
• kundua
• wawanar
• indava
• kor

The following brief excerpts from sighting reports include what words were used for the creatures observed, although none of these use the exact phrase “prehistoric bird.”

California (“Taradactyl”)

I have been haunted for close to 20 years by what I saw in the desert. I have never told anyone due to the fact that I was afraid I would be thought nuts. . . . I caught the sight of it with the corner of my eye and looked up, it was soaring along the side of a plateau not far from us. We knew what it looked like. In fact I remember saying ‘Oh . . . ! That looks just like a Taradactyl.’

England (“dragon”)

The sky was clear and I was watching the stars when something caught my eye. It was a glowing object which seemed to open up to what I thought looked like a dragon. I was too shocked to tell my father as we were waiting for my mother to finish and I never told anyone about this until I met . . . my now husband.

Georgia (“pterydactyl”)

The path it took was up and then swooping down, as if it were dive-bombing  my car. As it crossed my path, in front and slightly above me, I saw it had a head that was curved, like a hammer; the head had a crest on the top that was solid, not feathery at all . . . The tail was long, had a ridge that ran along the underside, and ended in a thick, heart-shaped pad. . . . I called a buddy whom I knew was up . . . at that hour. . . . I flat out told him I’d seen a pterydactyl.

Kentucky (large bird)

Today I opened my back door around 4:30 pm. to smoke a cigarette and I noticed a large bird in the sky flying above me. I thought it seemed strange because I seen a tail with a spade like end also the wing span was a lot larger than any bird I have ever seen around here. The wings did not flutter rapidly each wing stroke was steady and powerful. The bird seemed to have a set destination as well cause it did not waste any time moving through the sky.

Papua New Guinea (prehistoric creature)

The creature I saw one early morning in Bougainville is etched in my memory. . . . I can still hear that slow flapping sound in the stillness of an early tropical morn, on the road from Panguna down to loloho on Bougainville Island in 1971. . . . When I looked up, trying to see what was making this sound, i saw a very unusual creature. Firstly, it was very big . . . It certainly looked prehistoric, in that it did not look like any other bird that I have seen before or since. Why prehistoric? Well, maybe my memory has been influenced by the intervening years, but I recall seeing this creature with a longish narrow tail . . . no feathers in sight . . .

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Sketch drawn by the eyewitness Eskin Kuhn (Gitmo, Cuba)

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Pterosaur Sightings in the USA

Can we determine whether or not modern pterosaurs migrate in North America? What exactly is migration? The dictionary definition refers to travel from one country or region to another. We think of birds that migrate hundreds of miles. Here’s a catch with pterosaurs—they are not even acknowledged as presently existing, according to standard Western biology. How can a biologist be expected to put a collar on the neck of an animal that is not supposed to exist?

Flying Creature in Georgia

[In] July of 2010, My wife and I were sitting outside when motion from above the tree tops to our left caught my attention; it’s very hard to explain how I felt at that moment. We were looking at two extremely large birds flying together and heading north . . . I can only guess to be 15-20′ wing spans and the motion of their wings as they flew was very slow. The head was long and ended in a point; wings ended in a point and appeared to be featherless . . .

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The eyewitness described a pair of long-tailed “ropens” in Southwest Washington state, in a rural area that he desires to keep secret. Here is part of his testimony, and more is expected in the upcoming second-edition of the book Live Pterosaurs in America.

I was riding my bike home from a friends house around 5 pm . . . I heard a strange noise . . . looked to my left, and on a wood plank fence were two of the biggest bird like creatures I could ever imagine! . . . the first thing I noticed was their heads . . . could they be dinasours? . . . They were Huge! There ft wrapped around a 2″x6″ plank . . . they’re heads I would have to say it was maybe 4ft long with the beak.

Additional information is available from a source of whom I have complete confidence (I don’t refer to the eyewitness himself, although he seems OK). What follows, I believe, is a secondary sighting of the same two flying creatures, in the same general area, by the same eyewitness, some time later.

When they took flight they both still kept an eye back onto me. They only flew far enough to where I wouldn’t see them.  They have slow head movements, as if they were rotating there heads with the heads in the downwards position.

Dinosaur bird (by name) or “flying creature”

It seems that some eyewitnesses of modern pterosaurs have another problem besides risking their reputations by telling others about what they saw: How do you spell “pterosaur?” Some eyewitnesses may search on Google with “flying creature” or “dinosaur bird.” That is unfortunate, for those searches, with those words, will bring up many irrelevant pages, not likely pages of the cryptozoology researchers who have specialized in modern living pterosaurs.

[Please note: I tried “Dinosaur Bird” with Google early in the morning of August 9, 2010; other than the page you are now reading, nothing else came up, on the first 10 pages of Google, relevant to living pterosaur cryptozoological investigations.]

I would like to suggest some pages that are most informative and interesting and relevant to the research that has been going on for the past 6-12 years.

Are Reports of Living Pterosaurs Anecdotes?

“A short account of a particular incident”—that is one definition of “anecdote.” But the connotation includes more than “short,” for “anecdote” is the word more appropriate when an event is witnessed by only one or a few and the report is second hand at best. Regarding eyewitness accounts of living pterosaurs, I have found that ”anecdote” has been eliminated as a valid word for some of the reports.

American Ghost Lights

. . . Some of these owls can turn on a glow on their underside. In fact, the whiteness of some of their feathers is explained by this intrinsic glowing capability: White feathers allow light to pass through.

So how do glowing owls relate to reports of live pterodactyls? In Papua New Guinea, the ropen is seen usually from a distance at night. How is it seen? It glows, sometimes brightly, as it flies. How can anyone conclude that it is a pterosaur? When it is seen up close, it is seen to be one.

Monsterquest “Flying Monsters” Television Episode

. . . the MonsterQuest expedition on New Britain Island, in early 2009, was not itself a serious living-pterosaur investigation . . . video footage from previous expeditions was shown with little mention of those expeditions. Nevertheless, this episode introduced many Americans to the possibility of extant pterosaurs. In that sense, it was a success.

For those using a search engine like Google, I suggest using “modern pterosaur” or something similar (like “living pterosaur”) rather than “dinosaur bird.”