🎙️ Episode 29: In the Shadow of Big Red Eye: Bigfoot with Mike Familant

The Florida woods hold secrets, and tonight we’re venturing straight into them. On this episode of Dark Florida, I, Brooke Moreland, sit down with full-time Bigfoot researcher and investigator Mike Familant.

Mike’s story begins right here in the Sunshine State, where a strange encounter in 2011 changed the course of his life forever. Since then, he has dedicated himself to uncovering the truth about Bigfoot through countless expeditions, late-night investigations, and hours of analyzing mysterious evidence. He’s the producer and lead investigator behind the long-running docuseries In the Shadow of Big Red Eye, which documents his raw, unscripted adventures into Bigfoot territory. He’s also the creator of Squatchables, a series that helps new researchers learn how to take their very first steps into the field.

In this conversation, Mike shares his journey from that first eerie encounter in Florida to years of chasing Bigfoot across the Eastern United States. We talk about what it’s like to live the life of a squatcher—what really goes on during a night in the field, and the moments that have left him convinced that Bigfoot is out there. He also opens up about the challenges of being both a researcher and a storyteller, balancing skepticism with passion, and what it takes to keep going after more than a decade of searching.

Whether you’re a longtime believer or just curious about the unknown, this episode will make you look twice at the shadows between the trees. 👣🌲

🔗 Connect with Mike Familant

• Mike's YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@shadowofredeye
• Mike’s Website: https://www.youtube.com/@shadowofredeye

🌌 Connect with Dark Florida

• Instagram: instagram.com/darkfloridapodcast
• YouTube: youtube.com/@darkflorida411
• Email: darkfloridapodcast@gmail.com
• Support the Show: buymeacoffee.com/darkflorida

📅 Upcoming Live Events

I’ve got a busy fall ahead with some incredible events, and I’d love for you to join me! From Bigfoot to the paranormal and everything in between, I’ll be sharing stories, research, and strange encounters across Florida:

➡️ September 20 – A Day of Florida High Strangeness, Ocklawaha, FL

➡️ October 11 – Moonlit Legends Cryptids Expo, Homeland, FL

➡️ October 18 – Charlie’s Beyond Belief Expo, Tropical Lodge #56, Fort Myers, FL

Come say hi, share your own experiences, and let’s step into the unknown together. 👻🕯️✨

✨ If you enjoyed this episode, please follow the podcast, leave a review, and share it with a friend who loves spooky stories and strange encounters. Every little bit helps keep the lantern lit as we explore Florida’s darkest mysteries together.

Episode 28: Strange News - Florida Skunkape Sighting, UFO's, Antarctic Anomalies, and the Alien Threat

In this episode of Dark Florida, host Brooke Moreland takes you deep into the shadows of mystery, cryptids, and the unexplained. The journey begins with a chilling new Bigfoot sighting out of Florida, followed by the startling claims surrounding the “discovery” of an alleged Bigfoot body. From there, the focus turns skyward and seaward as we explore the possibility that UFOs may not just be coming from distant galaxies but emerging from the depths of our oceans. 🛸

The mysteries don’t stop there. A strange anomaly picked up on Google Maps off the coast of Antarctica raises new questions, suggesting the presence of something far from ordinary. Perhaps even a UFO hiding in plain sight. Brooke also shares her own personal UFO encounter, adding a firsthand layer to the conversation that connects the dots between cryptids, the skies, and the deep unknown. Finally, the episode unpacks 3iatlas and the eerie suggestion of a potential alien craft heading toward Earth, leaving us to wonder just how close contact might really be. 🌍🛰️

If you’ve ever questioned what lies hidden in our swamps, beneath our oceans, or in the skies above, this episode will leave you both thrilled and unsettled.

📸Instagram: @darkfloridapodcast

💌Email: darkfloridapodcast@gmail.com

☕Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/darkflorida

🎬YouTube: youtube.com/@darkflorida411

Episode 27: Bigfoot, Thunderbirds, Airship Mysteries, and High Strangeness in the Uwharrie Mountains with Michael Kirkpatrick

Step into the shadows with me as I sit down with researcher and experiencer Michael Kirkpatrick, also known as MK Ultra, for a chilling journey into the strange world of the Uwharrie Mountains. We uncover the high strangeness tied to this region and the chilling legends that refuse to fade.

Our conversation begins with the latest Small Town Monsters documentary, Bigfoot: The Monster of Morris Mountain, now streaming on YouTube. The film follows investigators Jessi and Joe Doyle of Hellbent Holler, along with local researcher Michael Kirkpatrick, as they trace the footsteps of a hiker who may have crossed paths with Bigfoot himself. But the story doesn’t stop with Sasquatch. The deeper you go, the stranger it gets.

Michael shares his own incredible encounters, from a jaw-dropping sighting of a Thunderbird to a UFO encounter that defies explanation. We peel back the layers of anomalous phenomena, possible portals, and otherworldly activity that seem to bleed into the fabric of the Uwharrie. Along the way, we dig into the mystery of the NIMZY Air Club, the strange saga of airship sightings, and the unsettling connections between Missing 411 cases and Thunderbird legends.

This episode is for those who dare to look into the dark corners of reality and wonder if all of these mysteries are part of the same tangled web. 🕸️

📸Instagram: @darkfloridapodcast

💌Email: darkfloridapodcast@gmail.com

☕Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/darkflorida

🎬YouTube: youtube.com/@darkflorida411

26: Saltwater Electrolysis with Ashish - Swapcast with The Occult Rejects

In this special swapcast episode, I join my friends over at The Occult Rejects, where I’m proud to be a fellow Reject and contributor, for a mind-expanding conversation with Ashish about a topic that might just change the way you look at ancient history: saltwater electrolysis. ✨

We explore the possibility that the Great Pyramids of Giza weren’t tombs at all, but instead sophisticated machines with an energetic function and what role saltwater electrolysis may have played in their true purpose. Our conversation ventures into the mysteries of megalithic structures around the world, including the Grand Canyon, where strange and anomalous patterns raise more questions than answers. We also dive into India’s forgotten place in ancient technology and cosmic history, and how these stories may have been buried or rewritten over time.🔺⚡

The construction of the pyramids. Lost technologies. Suppressed truths. Tune in and let your mind wander through time, across continents, and into the unknown.

This is an episode for the thinkers, seekers, and stargazers. 🧠✨ Whether you're deep into ancient mysteries or just curious about what might lie beneath the surface of mainstream history, this one is for you.

🎙 Dark Florida is hosted by Brooke Moreland

💌 Got a story, sighting, or theory? Email me: darkfloridapodcast@gmail.com

☕ Like what I do? Support the show: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/darkflorida

📸 Follow on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/darkfloridapodcast

📺 Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@darkflorida411

🎧 Check out more from The Occult Rejects here: https://www.youtube.com/@TheOccultRejects/featured

https://www.instagram.com/theoccultrejects/

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-occult-rejects/id1550794130

🎙️ EPISODE 25: Appalachian Whispers, Bigfoot, Hat Man & Shadow People with Natalie Smearman of Relic Films 👣👻

In this episode of Dark Florida, I’m joined by Natalie Smearman of Relic Films—a storyteller, investigator, and someone who’s had experiences that will send chills down your spine.

Natalie shares her journey growing up in the heart of West Virginia, surrounded by Appalachian folklore, ghost stories, and the legends passed down through generations. From a young age, she was no stranger to the unknown. In fact, she started seeing spirits as early as three years old. That early connection to the other side laid the foundation for a life deeply intertwined with the supernatural.

Our conversation travels through the shadowy woods of the Everglades and the Ocala National Forest, where Natalie had class B Bigfoot encounters that left lasting impressions. But Bigfoot is just the beginning. We also talk about her spine-tingling experience with the Hat Man—a dark figure known in paranormal lore for making terrifying appearances during sleep paralysis episodes—and mysterious orbs that have followed her along the way.

Natalie opens up about her involvement with Relic Films and their upcoming documentary The Vanished, a project that aims to shine a light on the people and mysteries the world tries to forget. Her work and experiences are not only powerful, but deeply inspiring—especially for women navigating the world of fringe research.

To wrap things up, we talk about what it means to step out of your comfort zone and follow your calling, no matter how strange or wild it may seem. Natalie leaves us with a message of encouragement and strength: you can do anything you put your mind to—and sometimes, walking into the unknown is exactly where you’re meant to be.

💬 Ready to believe? Tune in now.

Rate, review & share if this one gave you chills... or hope. 🌙

📬 Got a story or want to be a guest? Email me: darkfloridapodcast@gmail.com

📲 Follow on IG: @darkfloridapodcast

☕Support the show: buymeacoffee.com/darkflorida

🎬Follow on YouTube: Dark Florida - YouTube

🎧 Subscribe & listen wherever you get your podcasts.

🎧 Episode 24: Watched in the Wild: Bigfoot in the Rockies

👣 with special guest Rachel

In this episode of Dark Florida, I’m joined by the brilliant and bold Rachel. A triple science major with an academic background in biology, genetics, microbiology, and geology. Whose lifelong curiosity about the natural world led her straight into the heart of high strangeness.

We dive deep into her chilling Bigfoot sighting in the Colorado Rockies back in 2001, where she felt an undeniable presence... something watching, something waiting. Could Bigfoot have been playing a game with her that day in the mountains? We unpack that moment and how it shifted her understanding of the world.

But that was just the beginning. Rachel opens up about a new sighting, this time, involving her young son at Lithia Springs. And the eerie connection it shares with a Missing 411 case that happened in the same area 60 years earlier. We talk about what it means to be a "marked person" after these types of encounters, and whether belief itself makes you more open to the phenomenon… or if the phenomenon finds you.

We explore the science behind the folklore. From the truth hidden in old stories to the hard questions about DNA. What would it take for Bigfoot to be accepted by the scientific community? Why do so many alleged Bigfoot DNA samples only show mitochondrial DNA? Rachel shares her insights and theories with clarity, skepticism, and an open mind.

And just when you think it can’t get weirder, we head to a haunted hotel in New Orleans where Rachel had a terrifying, visceral encounter she still can't explain.

This episode is a wild mix of science, mystery, folklore, and fear. And it might just leave you wondering what’s really out there, lurking just beyond the trees.

🎙️LISTEN NOW

🕸️ Stay connected and support the show:

📸 Instagram: https://instagram.com/darkfloridapodcast

📧 Email: darkfloridapodcast@gmail.com

☕ Buy Me a Coffee: https://buymeacoffee.com/darkflorida

▶️ YouTube: https://youtube.com/@darkflorida411

Keep watching the woods… 🌲👁️

EPISODE 23: Ghosts, Graveyards, Cryptids & Bigfoot Conspiracies with Jason Tapp of Spooky Charlotte 👻

In this episode of Dark Florida, I sit down with Jason Tapp, the man behind Spooky Charlotte. To explore the eerie intersections of haunted history, conservation, and cryptid folklore.

Jason shares his work restoring old cemeteries and preserving forgotten pieces of Charlotte’s past, but the conversation quickly takes a turn into the paranormal. He makes some bold claims about the infamous Patterson-Gimlin footage. The legendary Bigfoot video filmed at Bluff Creek. According to Jason, the whole event may have been staged… and he believes the Bigfoot costume was created by none other than Charlotte’s own showman, Phillip Morris. Even more chilling? He says he got that information directly from Phillip Morris’s ghost. 👀

We also dive into the legend of Normie, the creature said to haunt the waters of Lake Norman. With a serpent-like body and the head of a horse, this cryptid may have ties to the Catawba tribe and the region’s deeper spiritual history. 🐉

And if that wasn’t enough, we also talk about a terrifying shapeshifter lurking in the shadows of Charlotte—a hybrid creature with the body of a panther and the wings and head of an owl. 🦉

Ghosts, conspiracies, cryptids, and forgotten graves—we cover it all in this one.

Follow Dark Florida for more strange stories and haunted encounters:

📸 Instagram: instagram.com/darkfloridapodcast

📧 Got a story or want to be a guest? Email: darkfloridapodcast@gmail.com

☕ Support the show at: buymeacoffee.com/darkflorida

📺 Watch more on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@darkflorida411

Links to Spooky CLT:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/spookyclt/

🕯️ Disclaimer: The claims and views shared in this episode are the personal opinions of the guest. I encourage open discussion, but please keep all comments and conversations respectful. We welcome curiosity and critical thinking—just keep it kind. 💬✨

Episode 22: The Mysterious White Mountains Watcher with Jeb Scruggs of Squatch Hunters International

In this episode, we take a journey far beyond the swamps and Spanish moss of Florida and head deep into the White Mountains of New Hampshire, where something wild and possibly not human, is still being seen. I’m joined by Jeb Scruggs, founder of Squatch Hunters International, an avid outdoorsman and researcher who went from skeptic to believer after a personal and unforgettable encounter in the mountains.

We dive into Jeb’s boots-on-the-ground experiences, what he believes Bigfoot is and what the terrain and energy of the White Mountains reveal about this elusive creature. Plus, we even dip into another cryptid mystery: Champ, the legendary lake monster of Lake Champlain 🐉🌊

Whether you're a seasoned squatcher or just getting into the weird and wild, this episode is full of personal stories, intriguing theories, and that signature spooky Dark Florida vibe.

🔗 Follow and support the show:

📸Instagram: @darkfloridapodcast

💌Email: darkfloridapodcast@gmail.com

☕Buy Me a Coffee: buymeacoffee.com/darkflorida

🎬YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@darkflorida411

🎤 Follow Jeb Scruggs and Squatch Hunters International: 👉 https://www.instagram.com/wwsquatchhunter/

Hit play, turn the lights low, and let’s explore what’s really hiding in the forests of the Northeast… and maybe in the water, too. 🌕👀