Jamie and Bubba (sometimes reality just seems too good to be true) Stock of Texas are claiming they’ve caught a chupacabra or, as we’ve come to endearingly call them on this podcast, ‘Chupy‘.

While most chupacabras are referred to as vicious goat-suckers that attack livestock and occasionally people, the photo of the alleged creature must be the exception to the rule…

Unless its disarmingly ‘please love me’ face is a ruse to get closer to its next human victim.

Why do they believe it’s one of the elusive cryptids?

Because when Jamie Stock came to look at the creature that Bubba had captured she identified it right away:

“Bubba that looks like a baby chupacabra.”

Furthermore, “the Bubba’s” neighbor stated:

“I hunted racoons for 20 years with dogs and I ain’t ever seen anything that looks like that right there.”

So there you have it.

Based on all the evidence and the expert testimonials? A Texas family has captured a chupacabra

Please say you’re getting the sarcasm.

[Independent UK]

Workers unearthed a skeleton from under the floor of an “sinister house” and the first thing that crossed their minds was “Chupacabra”. It apparently has a cat-like head and a rat-like tail and is terrifying the neighborhood.

“In the city of Pucón, Chile, workers were stopped dead in their tracks as they accidentally dug up a bizarre skeleton. The remains are said to be out of this world. Described as having a cat-like head and the tail of a rat, the remains were accompanied by other smaller skulls of local rodents.”

[La Cuarta via GhostTheory]

Our eyes locked. Each one of us trying to stare down the other. A mortal man versus a cryptological enigma. My goal – satisfying scientific curiosity. His goal – to hide in the shadows until his blood rage send him into the night in search of more prey. In the end, he would win. But not without a sacrifice.

For the first time we present a Weird Things exclusive. Photo and video of the Chupacabra taken by me when I went on a walk in a South Florida park.

We’ve decided to not reveal the location of the park in order to protect this creature’s habitat. Should he prove a nuisance and begin to prey upon household pets or children, we reserve the right to take action. Until then, he’s free to prey upon whatever comes into his domain, including the elderly.

I came upon the creature in broad daylight. The hairless body, odd gait and features that harken back to a time when mammals and reptiles were much more closely related, immediately struck a cord. 30 yards in front of me, I knew what I was looking at: The Legendary Chupacabra. Sensing another hunter, it darted into the bushes. I gave chase and followed him into his lair.

Despite the tangled brush I managed to take out my iPhone and capture several photos and video you to see.

Some of you may look at these photos and claim it’s just a mangy raccoon. I suggest an alternate hypothesis: The Chupacabra is a shape shifter and he chose the form of a mangy raccoon. The burden of proof is on you.

This is the path where I first saw him as he tried to stealthily avoid my notice.

A chameleon like predator, he has the natural ability to blend into his background. Can you see him?

Here’s a close up shot of the beast we’ve nicknamed ‘Chupy’. Notice the cunning look to his eyes.

Andrew Mayne is publisher of WeirdThings.com. His latest book, The Grendel’s Shadow is available for the Kindle at Amazon.com.

Apparently el Chupacabra looks even more like a coyote when still alive.  I love how the article describes them as the “legendary hairless creature.”

[ABC 15]

We mentioned Benjamin Radford’s new book Tracking The Chupacabra both on the blog and in our YouTube series but now the man has put his money where his mouth is.

To briefly recap: Radford makes two major claims via his book research. First, the modern Chupacabra legend was born in 1995. Chiefly, the name Chupacabra and the description of it as a vampiric, reptilian creature. Second, it was likely inspired by 1995 action/thriller Species.

Although his second point might forever be up for debate, the first can be disproved pretty concretely if someone found the right evidence. So that’s why Radford has put up $250 of his own cash (plus a signed copy of the would-be invalidated book) if anyone can find him a published account of a creature named Chupacabra that bares a similar description from before 1990.

We aren’t quite sure he’s choosing 1990 as the line in the sand and not 1995. But, them’s the rules.

To the library!

[Cryptomundo]

[Tracking The Chupacabra on Amazon]

Did the Chupacabra mythos start as fan art for the 1995 Sci Fi thriller Species?

That is the assertion of Benjamin Radford who tracked the legend to it’s roots on the island protectorate of Puerto Rico. According to new research, all Chupacabra references can be traced back to a newspaper article in the second week of August in 1995. The alleged eye witness Madelyne Tolentino who provided the illustration depicted a lanky bobble headed creature with spikes jutting from the spine area.

Radford’s theory is that the creature might have been inspired by the 1995 erotic, science fiction thriller Species. In that film, a shape-shifting alien Natasha Henstridge attempts to mate with a human male. Her true form most notably bares resemblance to Tolentino’s drawing in the spikes and boney hands.

Which might be no coincidence, since according to Radford, Tolentino admits that she saw the film before penning her illustration and confesses that it might have inspired her final product. Species was released in theaters on July 7th, only a month and a half before the original newspaper report.

[Live Science]

“In the last 10 years chupacabra just means anything weird,” Radford said. “It means some dead animal of some sort that we can’t identify.”

It might be a fake chupacabra but it definitely got real murdered on a front lawn in Kentucky.

[Fox News]

In Kentucky, being unidentifiable and having no fur in winter can be a deadly combination.

Mark Cothren shot and killed an animal on Dec. 18 because he said he feared what it was, since he did not recognize it. He said the animal walked from the woods onto his front yard around 3 p.m. Cothren lives on Mount Carmel Church Road in Lebanon Junction.

“I was like: ‘every animal has hair, especially this time of year!’ What puzzled me is how something like that could survive through a winter with no hair,” Cothren said.

[wave3]

Most Chupacabra sightings/corpses can be easily identified as mangey, feral dogs who unpredictably roam desolate areas attacking livestock. But why are these dogs being transformed into legendary monsters?

We might have an answer!

In a recent “Monster Talk” podcast posted on Skeptic magazine’s website, OConnor explained that the mite responsible for the extreme hair loss seen in “chupacabras syndrome” is Sarcoptes scabiei, which also causes the itchy rash known as scabies in people. Human scabies is an annoyance, but not usually a serious health or appearance problem, partly because our bodies are already virtually hairless and partly because the population of mites on a given person usually is relatively small — only 20 or 30 mites.

Does this mean we can now we can consider Chupacabras as a werewolf equivalent to dogs? Once they’re bitten is there any coming back?

This just go so much more awesome.

[Science Daily]

[Monster Talk on iTunes]

Someone print a t-shirt! Thanks to Weird Things reader Katy for sending this in.

[WFAA]

You know, you see enough bizarre animals and after a while it probably just gets tiresome calling them all proof positive of urban legends. Just ask Adair, Oklahoma. They went and found themselves a mangey raccoon and try as some locals might to cite the frightened critter as an example of the legendary Dry Gulch Chupacapra, most folks just aren’t buying it.

Scheffel says they believe it’s a raccoon that has an advanced case of mange, but that’s not stopping people in the area from calling it something else.

He says it’s known as the Dry Gulch chupacabra, after the legendary animal that supposedly sucks the blood of goats.

The experts at Wild Heart Ranch say the animal will grow its hair back so it will again look like a normal raccoon.

OR the regeneration of hair is proof that they’ve found the legendary Dry Gulch Raccoon That Was Bit By A Werewolf Once.

[News on 6]

Cryptomundo is rightly frustrated by new Chupacabra images floating around. The mangy creatures pictured all walk on four legs. Here is the one item long cheat sheet for any potential cryptid hunters: if the beast does not walk on two legs, it is not the same monster which famously made a name for itself stalking about the hills of Puerto Rico.

Just come up with a new name? Like Quad-racabra. In fact, don’t call it that until I can register the domain.

[Cryptomundo]