Scholars and academics consider Bigfoot, and alleged evidence, to be a combination of folklore, misidentification, and hoax rather than a living animal.
The cast was taken on September 22, 2000, during a Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization (BFRO) expedition to the Skookum Meadows area of the Gifford Pinchot National Forest in Washington state, during filming of the Animal X television show.
The cast, which measures 3.5 by 5 feet (1.1 m × 1.5 m) and weighs approximately 400 pounds (180 kg), is of a partial body imprint left in mud.
[1] As seen during the Animal X episode, the Skookum cast was scanned onto a computer for further analysis and also studied in person by physical anthropologist Grover Krantz, wildlife biologist John Bindernagel, and others.
[2] Monster Talk podcaster Blake Smith writing for Skeptoid in 2014 concluded the BRFO cast "was under a lot of pressure to produce substantial evidence for the television crew of Animal X" though Smith does not suspect hoaxing, but that people with "strong motivations that could easily lead to confirmation bias".
Physical access to the cast has been limited, and the "BFRO nor Meldrum and his credentialed associates have explained by what means they were able to rule out an elk as the cause of the impression.