Some say it resembles a prowling hyena, others a ferocious wolf.

While there are those who have seen the mysterious creature menacing Buckshaw Village and describe it as a terrifying cross between a wild boar and some kind of big cat.

Whatever it is, it has been blamed for mauling several deer to death, and one resident’s Alsatian dogs were left quivering with fear after a particularly close encounter.

Now one intrepid villager has taken a photograph of what locals have dubbed the Buckshaw Beast, sparking a feverish online debate about what exactly it might be.

Residents of the ‘village’ – actually a modern estate on the edge of Leyland, Lancashire – have been reporting sightings of the shaggy, hulking creature for months.

The initial consensus was that it is a wild boar forced out of the countryside by the cold weather as it strives to find food, but experts have said one would be unlikely to kill deer.

Resident Tony Kenvig caught sight of the beast as it rifled through his bins late one night, and described it as resembling a dark-coloured hyena.

‘All the rubbish was strewn over my garden,’ he wrote in an online forum.

‘This happened on a few occasions, and one night I heard snuffles and looked out of my window and saw some kind of hyena standing rigid on its back legs.’

Another, calling himself Shelley Levene, also disturbed it late one night.

‘I’ve seen it too,’ he wrote. ‘It’s not a dog. I have two Alsatians, both ex-police dogs. I saw it going through my bins.

‘I couldn’t understand why they weren’t barking, so I went down to investigate and they were shaking and cowering in their kennel.

‘Just the scent of this thing must have been enough to spook them.’

He warned fellow villagers to be on their guard.

‘I no longer walk the streets of Buckshaw alone at night anymore and would advise all other residents to start to be vigilant.

‘This beast in dangerous.’

If it is a wild boar, it would not be the first driven into built-up areas by the recent big freeze – last week the Daily Mail told how two had been spotted rooting through rubbish bins in the similarly-named Buckshaft in the Forest of Dean.

But another concerned local resident, John Russell, managed to photograph the beast using his camera phone, and he is convinced it is some kind of carnivore, blaming it for the deaths of three deer savaged on nearby parkland.

‘I can’t work out what it is,’ he wrote on the forum.

‘This was no boar. I saw it move and it had a feline movement. They say it’s to blame for the recent deer slayings.’

Whether there really is a savage beast marauding through the village, or if it is a case of mistaken identity or even an elaborate hoax remains to be seen, although local police have received no calls about it.

And Chris Bailey, from nearby Chipping Wild Boar Park, said that while it was possible that a hungry boar would attack a deer, it was unlikely.

‘There is lots of countryside around there that they could go into, so it is possible,’ he said. ‘But I’m surprised. I have heard of cases like this before – but only when they are very hungry and looking for food.’

After examining the picture, Mr Bailey said the animal’s features did not appear to match those of a wild boar.

‘Unfortunately, the picture isn’t too clear, but from what we can see, the nose seems shorter and the back legs are different. They look similar to that of a dog.’

Source: dailymail.uk.co

Jerry Ayer, a teacher at the Blanco Taxidermy School in Blanco, Texas, told TV station KSAT that he’s never seen anything like it.

“Different, that’s for sure, very interesting,” said Ayer.

The find comes amid a number of strange sightings in the area. The animal is gray in color with leathery, hairless skin and large fangs.

“The front legs seem to be a little bit longer than a typical coyote, very irregular and never seen any that have legs like that,” said Ayer.

Similar animals have been spotted across the country and deep in South America.

“I don’t know what to call it, I’ll just call it a chupacabra too,” Ayer told KSAT.

He said he came across the animal because a former student of his didn’t know what it was either and sought advice.

“It got into his cousin’s barn and they thought maybe it was a rodent tearing things up, and they had no idea since they’ve never seen it,” said Ayer. “He got out some poison, and this is what they got the very next day.”

Ayer said he plans to preserve the animal with taxidermy. He also said he hopes a local museum will take it for display so everyone can marvel at the strange animal.

“It’s definitely something I don’t want to throw away,” said Ayer. “I think it will be an interesting mount and a tremendous conversation piece.”

The chupacabra myth began not long ago in the 1990s when eyewitnesses claimed to have seen it in Puerto Rico. Farmers there said sheep were found with puncture wounds and were drained of blood. A total of 150 farm animals were reportedly killed by the beast. Since then, sightings have been reported from Chile to Maine.

The mythical beast also found its way into popular culture and television. CNN’s Ed Lavandera called the chupacabra the “bigfoot of Latino culture.” The animal gets its name from Spanish, chupacabra literally means “goat sucker.”

Finds like the one in Blanco have appeared on the History Channel’s “Monster Quest,” they were subsequently determined to be dogs or coyotes.

Source: wpbf

If you’ve seen any hulking hairy beasts or unexplained gigantic footprints lately, a group of sasquatch seekers wants to hear from you.

The Western Canadian Sasquatch Research Organization hopes a newspaper advertising blitz this summer will help sniff out reports from witnesses who have encountered the legendary hairy giant.

“Many reports are not brought forward because many people who have a story to tell do not want to be ridiculed,” said Roman Forczek, a Lacombe welder who specializes in conducting field research for the sasquatch group.

“We do receive a lot of stories that you just have to dismiss. That is unfortunate, because we do treat the research seriously.” The sasquatch group has already collected nearly 700 accounts dating back to the early 1800s of footprints, sasquatch sightings, strange animal vocalizations and suspicious physical damage in the woods.

Its researchers, which include a Calgary chemist and lab owner, have analyzed hair samples, shot photographs and video and travelled to secluded sasquatch hot spots in their quest to prove the legendary creature exists.

The group was founded in 1999 under the name Central Alberta Sasquatch Research. It now has 33 members and covers Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Yukon and the Northwest Territories.

“We are trying to unravel this mystery,” Forczek said.

“We don’t claim to have any concrete evidence or indisputable evidence.” But Forczek hopes that proof isn’t far off.

Already, about a dozen people have responded this summer to the group’s advertising blitz in community newspapers, mostly in towns along the front range of the Rocky Mountains. Ads have appeared in Jasper, Grande Cache, Rocky Mountain House, Edson and Coleman, and the group is organizing more ads in Alberta and B.C.

Strange bedding That advertising caught the attention of an avid hunter and outdoorsman, who told Forczek on Monday about a shelter and strange bedding he found 20 years ago in a remote cave in the Rocky Mountain foothills.

“This fellow strongly believes this bed that he found inside of the cave was not made by bear or deer or any such creatures,” Forczek said.

“It is in an area that has had numerous sighting reports over the past 30 or 40 years.” Calgary organic chemist Brian Baillie can’t wait to set up a sasquatch search in the area sometime over the next month.

“The best chance of us getting more evidence is someone coming forward and saying, ‘Hey, I saw one,’ or ‘I saw some tracks,’ and us getting out there to see what we can verify.

“We’ve got hidden cameras that we set up in trees and all over the place. We haven’t been lucky enough yet. We’ve got lots of pictures of deer and things like that,” Baillie laughed.

There has even been sasquatch evidence around Edmonton, with reports of giant footprints along the river valley and sightings near Hobbema, Baillie said.

In 1969, numerous unrelated witnesses reported a spate of sightings near Nordegg, including five construction workers who reported seeing an enormous creature at the Big Horn Dam.

The brother of one of those workers recently contacted Baillie as a result of the sasquatch group’s ad campaign. Baillie interviewed the man and went through his brother’s sasquatch scrapbook.

“His brother, to his deathbed, swore that is exactly what he saw.” Field trips Neither Baillie nor Forczek has seen a sasquatch. However, both said they have seen evidence the creatures exist during separate field research trips to verify earlier sasquatch reports.

Forczek said he heard cracking branches, guttural grunting and high-pitched screams outside his tent in the middle of the night during a sasquatch research trip southeast of Big Horn dam in August 2005.

A search the next day failed to turn up any physical evidence.

And Baillie said he saw massive, human-like footprints from a creature with a huge stride in April 2005, when he checked out a forestry road north of Nordegg where a man had reported seeing a sasquatch two weeks earlier.

The research group is serious about weeding out hoaxes, Baillie said. There certainly have been some unbelievable reports and at least one crazy request, he added.

Quite a few years back, one woman wrote to the group “looking for love,” Baillie laughed.

“She was looking for a sasquatch because she wanted to mate. We never got back to her.”

Source: canada.com