Bigfoot Trap Applegate Lake southern Oregon June 2009

Southern Oregon is home to what is most likely the only official Bigfoot trap in the world. The ten by ten structure was built back in the early 70s by special permit. A wildlife research team out of Eugene, Oregon was inspired to build the structure by sightings from far back as the late 18-hundreds to up to the time they constructed the trap.

It wasnt an early task. In 1974, Applegate dam that now impounds Applegate lake didnt even exist and the hike up to the construction site was a long and hard one from the valley below.
Fortunately today access to the trap is a relatively comfortable hike. The Collings Mountain Trail, is named for one of the pioneer mining families that came to Southern Oregon in the 1850s.
The Collings Mountain Trail (No. 943) is easy to spot just about 300 feet past the Hart-Tish Park entrance. The Bigfoot track on the trail marker on the right hand side of the road lets you know you are at the trailhead.
Hiking video.
The trail follows Grouse Creek for about roughly three quarters of a mile through stands of Douglas fir, bigleaf maple and madrone and an abundance of poison oak.
This miners cabin or watchmans cabin also housed an electronic alarm that would be activated if Bigfoot or anything else tripped the door in the trap. It wouldnt take long to get to the trap if the alarm went off it is just about two hundred feet up a spur trail off the of the main trail.
There are hefty 12-inch wide and two-inch thick planks that form the ceiling, floor and four sides of the Bigfoot trap. Then there's the heavy expanded metal grate and telephone poles that anchor the 10-foot by 10-foot wooden cage to the ground. The steel door trap was locked open in 1980 to end its era of an active Bigfoot trap.
Time and weather are taking their toll on the Bigfoot trap. Inside the thick wooden beams have given way to the winter rains that have leaked through the roof signaling the trap will one day end up like the miners cabin below.
The Bigfoot trap is a popular hike and is well worth it just for the flora and fawna but seeing what may well be the only Bigfoot trap of its kind in the world and now the only non-functioning Bigfoot trap of its kind. is certainly the icing on the cake. I'm Scott Walter Reporting.
The Bigfoot trap is about 26 miles south of Medford. To reach it, take Highway 238 west to Ruch, then turn left on the Applegate Road to the Applegate Dam. Drive past the dam and the Hart-Tish Park entrance.
Stop several hundred feet past the park at the Collings Mountain Trailhead on the right. It's marked by a sign, with a footprint insignia on it. There is also a U.S. Forest Service Office at Star Gulch... about 8 miles before you get to the trailhead. They are very helpful inside.