Ogopogo: The Spirit of Okanagan Lake

In September 1926, dozens of people gathered along British Columbia's Okanagan Lake to watch something moving through the water. A local newspaper reported about 40 observers and attempts to photograph the mysterious visitor. But when the pictures were developed, they showed only ruffled water.

It was an early chapter in the legend of Ogopogo, one of North America's most famous lake monsters. Over the following decades, witnesses would describe enormous humps, serpent-like bodies and strange shapes cutting through the water. A handful even captured their encounters on film.

Two recordings became especially famous. One appeared to show an enormous creature moving across the lake. The other attracted national attention and competing interpretations from wildlife specialists. Decades later, both remain central to the Ogopogo mystery.

So what did people really see in Okanagan Lake—and how much of the story survives when we return to the original reports?

The Story Before Ogopogo

The Syilx/Okanagan people have long maintained teachings concerning a sacred water being associated with their territory.

The Okanagan Nation Alliance uses the name n̓x̌aʔx̌ʔítkʷ, also represented in English-language writing as N'ha-a-itk. These living teachings concern relationships with water, responsibility and respect, rather than the anatomy of an unidentified animal.

Later monster stories sometimes recast offerings associated with the water as attempts to appease a dangerous creature. Syilx cultural sources describe their significance in terms of ceremony and responsibility, a distinction explored by Syilx knowledge keepers.

Rattlesnake Island, off the eastern shore of Okanagan Lake near Peachland, became famous in later retellings as the monster's supposed home. Stories of underwater caves and a hidden lair added to its reputation, although no such animal dwelling has been established.

How the Ogopogo Legend Took Shape

Susan Allison's Strange Encounter

One of the earliest frequently cited settler witnesses was Susan Louisa Allison, who recalled an unusual experience on Okanagan Lake during the nineteenth century.

After a storm, Allison said she watched something resembling a large log moving northward through the water, apparently against the wind and waves. She also remembered hearing that a man named Smitheram at the Mission had seen something strange.

Allison's account, published in the Princeton Star in August 1926 and preserved by the Princeton and District Museum, does not specify the exact year. Later histories place the encounter at different points in the 1870s, but the recollection itself offers no definite date.

Her description was not of a dramatic monster rearing above the water. What caught her attention was something log-like that seemed to move in a way she could not explain.

How a British Song Named a Canadian Monster

Ogopogo sounds like an ancient name, but its popular use for the lake creature arose in the twentieth century.

The name came from a British novelty song, “The Ogo-Pogo: The Funny Fox-Trot,” circulating by 1924. A later historical account credits W. H. Brimblecombe with helping popularize the name after performing the song at Vernon's Kalamalka Hotel in August 1926.

By September that year, the name was appearing in regional newspapers. What began as a playful nickname would soon become inseparable from one of Canada's most famous mysteries.

The 1926 Sighting That Drew a Crowd

In its September 24, 1926 edition, the Summerland Review described an extraordinary scene near Mission, in the Kelowna area.

About 40 people had reportedly gathered to observe strange activity on the lake. Percy Armstrong and Robert Cummings were among those named. Witnesses described portions of something appearing intermittently above the water, although no clear head or complete animal was identified.

Some observers were convinced they had seen a large creature. Others caught only brief glimpses of whatever was disturbing the surface.

Photographs were taken, raising hopes that the mysterious animal had finally been captured on camera.

But according to the newspaper, the pictures showed ruffled water.

The incident became part of the creature's growing fame. It also revealed a problem that would follow Ogopogo into the age of motion pictures: witnesses could be convinced they had seen an animal without obtaining images that established what it was.

By the same period, references to Ogopogo and related novelty goods showed that the creature was already becoming a local celebrity.

Over the following decades, Ogopogo became more than a mysterious animal reported in the lake. The creature found its way into Kelowna's tourist attractions, public artwork and souvenir shops, becoming one of the Okanagan Valley's most recognizable symbols.

The 1968 Art Folden Film

In August 1968, Art Folden and his family were traveling along Highway 97 near Peachland when they noticed something unusual in Okanagan Lake.

Folden stopped and began filming with an 8 mm camera. The recording showed a dark shape and disturbance moving across the lake's surface. The object appeared and disappeared as Folden attempted to follow it.

The footage attracted attention from people who believed it might be the most convincing visual evidence yet obtained of Ogopogo.

Some interpretations suggested an extraordinarily long animal, with estimates exceeding 60 feet. The apparent movement encouraged comparisons to swimming serpents and other unusual aquatic creatures.

But one essential question had never been securely answered: How far away was the object?

Why Distance Changed the Investigation

A dark shape that appears several inches long within a camera's field of view could represent a very different-sized object depending on whether it is close to shore or far out in the lake.

That uncertainty became central to a later investigation involving skeptics and a prominent supporter of the Ogopogo hypothesis.

On February 6, 2005, investigators including Joe Nickell, Benjamin Radford and John Kirk participated in a field reconstruction using surveyed boat positions to reconsider the apparent distance and scale of the filmed object.

Nickell described the investigation in a 2006 Skeptical Inquirer article. The reconstruction challenged earlier assumptions that placed the object farther from the camera and therefore made it appear much larger.

The object could have been considerably closer than some interpretations assumed. That result did not establish what Folden had filmed, but it weakened one of the strongest arguments for an enormous creature.

Even John Kirk Reconsidered the Size

John Kirk, a cryptozoologist who has long argued that Ogopogo could represent an unidentified animal, later revised his interpretation of the recording.

In a 2013 statement, Kirk withdrew an earlier estimate exceeding 60 feet following the distance investigation. He continued to believe the film might show an animal, but no longer supported the enormous size he had previously attributed to it.

That revision is particularly interesting because it came from someone sympathetic to the creature's possible existence. Even among supporters, the evidence did not justify a single confident measurement.

The 1989 Ken and Clem Chaplin Videos

More than twenty years after Folden's film, another recording brought Ogopogo back into the spotlight.

In July 1989, Ken and Clem Chaplin observed unusual activity near the mouth of Bear Creek on Okanagan Lake. Using a video camera, they captured several sequences of a dark form moving through the water.

Contemporary accounts described four sequences totaling approximately three minutes and 43 seconds. Unlike a single fleeting photograph, the recording offered investigators repeated views of the object's movement.

The Chaplins believed they had filmed something remarkable. The images attracted national attention, with television producers and wildlife specialists taking an interest.

But the assessments did not all point toward an unknown creature.

Beaver or Otter? What the Experts Saw

In an October 5, 1989 Vancouver Sun report, journalist Moira Farrow described specialists who had examined the recording.

Viewers associated with an aquarium and the University of British Columbia favored an otter interpretation. Provincial wildlife viewers predominantly favored a beaver.

Wildlife official Bob Lincoln emphasized that the video quality prevented a definite identification. His interpretation involving a beaver and its tail movement also appeared in the Unsolved Mysteries investigation.

The disagreement was therefore narrower than later monster summaries sometimes suggest. Specialists differed over which familiar animal they were seeing, rather than agreeing that the footage showed something extraordinary.

A swimming beaver can leave a low surface profile, with its wake or tail movement appearing to extend its body. Otters can produce a similarly confusing image, particularly when more than one animal surfaces in sequence.

The footage is consistent with familiar aquatic wildlife, but its quality prevents a definite identification of the animal.

Why the Footage Attracted National Attention

National Geographic personnel expressed interest in the recording, and contemporary reporting discussed plans to enhance or examine the images.

The attention gave the footage a wider audience, but no available analysis established a reliable measurement of an enormous animal.

The most revealing detail is that the ordinary-animal interpretations were being discussed while the case was receiving national publicity. They were not explanations invented decades later to dismiss the legend.

Other Famous Ogopogo Sightings and Recordings

Other reported encounters and recordings continued to keep Ogopogo in the public eye, although many lack the documentation available for the Folden and Chaplin cases.

In October 1978, Bill Steciuk reported an unusual form near Kelowna's old floating bridge. He later participated in organized searches of Okanagan Lake.

During the 1980s and 1990s, other witnesses reported filming suspicious objects or disturbances on the water. Some recordings circulated among researchers, but their surviving documentation does not justify confident claims about the size or identity of the objects.

In 2011, Richard Huls recorded two dark forms from a viewpoint near West Kelowna. Researcher Benjamin Radford suggested that floating logs could explain their appearance.

Reports continue into the present century. In May 2025, Castanet reported on Lisa von Pander's video of unusual movement near Kalamoir Regional Park, another example of the sightings that still draw local media attention.

Sonar Searches and the Hunt for Physical Evidence

As interest in Ogopogo grew, investigators began searching beneath the surface rather than waiting for the creature to appear.

In August 1989, a search associated with John Kirk used a remotely controlled underwater camera. Contemporary reporting described the discovery of a tire and fish, but no giant unidentified animal.

Television expeditions followed around 1990 and 1991, while groups including Legend Hunters carried out further searches beginning in 2000. These investigations used combinations of underwater cameras, divers and sonar equipment.

Some participants reported large or unusual acoustic targets. But interpreting a sonar return requires knowing the equipment settings, lake-bottom conditions and movement of the survey boat. The available results have not established that those targets were unknown animals.

The 2009 Expedition and the Salmon Sample

One of the more unusual investigations took place in 2009, during an expedition involving divers, underwater equipment and thermal imaging.

The organizers reported recovering a small decomposed carcass, approximately 25 centimeters long, which was sent for DNA identification.

According to the expedition account, the sample was identified as salmon. The original laboratory findings have not been independently confirmed.

Later searches have produced additional claims and underwater imagery, including a 2023 expedition, without resolving the identity of the animal described in Ogopogo reports.

What Could Ogopogo Actually Be?

Okanagan Lake stretches for roughly 130 kilometers through British Columbia's interior and reaches depths exceeding 200 meters. Its long, glacially shaped basin offers plenty of open water where distance, wind and changing surface conditions make unfamiliar objects difficult to judge.

Different sightings may have different explanations. What someone saw from a boat in 1926 need not be the same thing captured in a blurry video decades later.

Beavers and Otters

The Chaplin footage makes these two mammals particularly relevant.

Both can travel with much of their bodies submerged, leaving a dark head, low surface profile or unusual wake. A beaver's tail movement may also be difficult to interpret in grainy footage.

Otters sometimes swim together, surfacing and disappearing at intervals. Seen from a distance, separate animals and their wakes can resemble several connected humps.

These explanations fit some reported movements without requiring an enormous unknown species, although they do not automatically explain every encounter.

Could Ogopogo Be a Giant Sturgeon?

Sturgeon are frequent suspects in lake-monster stories because some species can grow remarkably large and have prehistoric-looking bodies.

However, a resident sturgeon population in Okanagan Lake has not been established. Provincial fish-status documentation treats local occurrence as unconfirmed.

A giant sturgeon is therefore a proposed explanation, not an animal known to inhabit the lake.

Waves, Logs and Misjudged Distance

Okanagan Lake can develop overlapping wakes and wind-driven waves that seem to move independently of any visible boat. Floating logs can shift as waves pass underneath them, briefly resembling the back or head of a swimming creature.

Distance complicates the illusion. Without a nearby object for scale, a dark shape far from shore can appear enormous—a problem that became central to the Folden investigation.

These effects are also discussed in our guide to lake-monster sightings and misidentifications.

A Surviving Prehistoric Animal?

Ogopogo has inspired theories involving prehistoric marine reptiles, giant eels and ancient whales such as Basilosaurus.

But Basilosaurus belonged to an extinct marine whale lineage, while plesiosaurs were marine reptiles. Neither is known from a surviving freshwater population in Okanagan Lake.

The modern lake also lies in a landscape reshaped by glaciation, rather than an unchanged refuge from the age of those animals.

An unknown large aquatic species would need a reproducing population and a sustainable food supply. Over generations, biological traces would be expected, yet none have established such an animal in Okanagan Lake.

So, Is Ogopogo Real?

Something certainly happened on the shores of Okanagan Lake in September 1926. Witnesses watched an unusual disturbance, a crowd gathered, and people tried to photograph what they believed might be an enormous animal.

Decades later, Art Folden filmed a dark shape that inspired claims of a creature more than 60 feet long. But a later investigation challenged the distance estimates, and even one of the film's prominent supporters revised his interpretation.

The 1989 Chaplin videos brought another wave of excitement. Yet specialists examining the footage at the time saw possible beavers and otters rather than clear evidence of an unknown species.

Some observations remain unidentified, and the surviving recordings do not answer every question about what appeared on the water. But after a century of publicity and investigation, no authenticated specimen has established that a giant unknown animal inhabits Okanagan Lake.

Ogopogo's history is still remarkable: an old regional mystery acquired a name from a novelty song, became the subject of famous films and inspired generations of searchers.

And the scene from 1926 remains a fitting image of the mystery—dozens of people staring across the lake, convinced something extraordinary was moving beneath the surface, while their photographs captured only ripples.