Ethnoknown is an important factor, and many of these examples (e.g. the coelacanth) were known by the locals. Debate between supporters and skeptics is not significant in determining if a cryptid is ethnoknown.

A new phylum of mud-borrowing marine worm would be sensational to a biologist, but not to me. I would still agree that it used to be a cryptid, but since no one was “looking forward” to its discovery and didn’t care when it was discovered I would just give it the boring name it deserves - a new phylum of mud-borrowing marine worm - and not proclaim it as an ex-cryptid.

Mothman being a cryptid would depend on whether or not the eyewitness felt it was a living organism, an apparition, or halucination.

I suppose I reserve the term “cryptid” to creatures seeable with the naked eye and which are noteworthy.

Bernard Heuvelmans defined cryptozoology as “The scientific study of hidden animals, i.e., of still unknown animal forms about which only testimonial and circumstantial evidence is available, or material evidence considered insufficient by some!” Now, I wonder, just how crucially important for our definition is Heuvelmans’ reference to “only testimonial or circumstantial evidence”

That is, are cryptids only such unknown or unidentified animals of which there are local traditions and legends, or which have been occasionally reported by hunters, campers, hikers, picknickers, sailors, etc.? Or, do they also include totally unsuspected species with no previous attached traditions that suddenly turn up, like the unknown carnivore recently photographed by an automatic camera in Borneo. I do not recall ever hearing of any local native Borneo tradition about such a carnivore. Likewise, the coelacanth found in the Indian Ocean near Africa in the 1930’s was not a subject of controversial native legends argued back and forth for years between believers and skeptics–though it DID turn out to be a creature believed long-extinct by scientists.

More specifically, should or should not cryptids be confined to what Willy Ley called “romantic zoology”? In other words, is a cryptid only a mysterious, controversial creature that captures the public imagination and the popular media, like Bigfoot, Yeti, Almas, Orang Pendek,”Nessie,” “Ogopogo,” “Champ,” “sea sepents,” Corwall’s “Owl-Man,” or the 1960’s West Virginia “Mothman”? Or do cryptids also include creatures that stir little popular or media
interest, like wild oxen known to Southeast Asian locals but unknown to official Western science until quite recently, or spider monkey species unknown to “norteamericano” zoology but long familiar to Amazon rain forest dwellers? As I once pointed out in an ANOMALIST article on “Too Many Anomalies, Too Little Time,” there is little popular or media interest, compared to Bigfoot or Nessie, in announcements of a new phylum of mud-borrowing marine worms or a new species of Amazon rain-forest tree-frogs. Few if any people would think of such worms or tree-frogs as “cryptids.” But, just exactly where would you draw the line?

Also, just what WOULD you call entities like “Mothman” or the Devonshire and Cornwall “devil dogs”? As you yourself just said of the Devonshire/Cornwall “devil dogs,” they are not “animals” or even “animate” in the accepted sense of the word, and thus only of marginal interest to scientific cryptozoologists. Thus, you do not think of these creatures as cryptids. However, what WOULD be a good term for them?

Just wondering,
T. Peter