If you're a believer, you might think you have to travel far out west to catch a glimpse of Bigfoot.
One group thinks the famed creature of folklore might be closer to home.
California-based Searching for Bigfoot traveled to Youngstown this week after a man claimed he took a photo of a sasquatch there, WKBN reports.
In fact, Xavier King told the Youngstown television station he saw Bigfoot twice.
"I had seen something, I don’t know what it was, I had seen something, that’s all I know," King told WKBN. "I got out and took a picture."
Scientists widely discredit sightings as misidentification or outright hoaxes. People sometimes mistake black bears for the mythic creatures, experts say. Other hoaxes have involved people wearing fake suits, including a man hit and killed by a car four years ago.
T.J. Biscardi, director of operations for Searching for Bigfoot, told WKBN he gets more reports from Ohio around this time every year because sasquatches migrate north.
The creatures, he claimed, follow rivers and patches of forest.
The state is apparently fertile ground for folklore: Ohio hosts an annual Bigfoot Conference at Salt Fork State Park Lodge. The conferences feature television personalities, academics, local and national Bigfoot investigators. This year's event is May 20.
Searching for Bigfoot has a $1 million bounty competition, which started April 2 and runs through Christmas Day. The money is for "anyone brave enough to deliver information leading to the capture or delivery of a bona fide Bigfoot."
Because King's photo is part of the competition, the group wouldn’t show it to WKBN.
The group planned to spend the weekend camping in Girard, Ohio, hoping to spot a sasquatch.
"With the team ready, we’ll get to capture one of these creatures and bring it back and prove to the world that they exist," Biscardi said.
