I am working on a calendar for a year long contest. I will be submitting a picture each month based on a different cryptozoological beast of North America. I've been wanting to give back to my loyal friends and watchers, and I figured, what better way than to offer you a free calendar. You may download this image for free, for personal use only. Please do not abuse this privilege. When all is said and done, at the end of this year, I hope to make a printed version with dates available in time for 2015. (If this works out well and you guys like it, I may do a world-wide version next year in time for 2016. I know that is a long way off!)

This month's monster is the Lake Champlain Monster known as Champ. There were a lot of sea creatures/lake monsters I could have chosen, but it was really between Ogopogo and this guy for me. I chose Champ because he is pretty much America's Nessy. Some believe that Champ may be a plesiosaur similar to “Nessie”, claiming the two lakes have much in common. Like Loch Ness, Lake Champlain is over 400 feet (120 m) deep, and both lakes were formed from retreating glaciers. Believers also claim both lakes support fish populations large enough to feed a supposed sea or lake monster. I based my rendition off of the most famous photo of Champ, the Mansi photo of 1977.

I challenged myself with this one and tried playing with perspective. It was difficult and I'm still not sure I pulled it off. : /

You can learn more about Champ here- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Champ_.....yptozoology%29