The Truth About Chupacabra

The blood-sucking monster of goats (and cattle in general) whose name comes from the Spanish word Chupacabra. The Chupacabra has long been a mythical creature, but has recently been appearing in some countries. Is it a real blood-sucking monster or just a product of paranoia due to obsession with a horror movie shown in the mid-1990s?

Legend of the vampire

Scary blood-sucking "demons"

Radford, editor of Skeptical Inquirer Magazine , has published a book in the US, titled Tracking the Chupacabra: The Vampire Beast in Fact, Fiction and Folklore. In the book, Radford asserts that the Chupacabra is just an urban legend , which later became extremely popular around the world thanks to the internet.

The imaginary Chupacabra blood-sucking monster.

The author claims that the woman, named Madelyne Tolentino from Canovanas, Puerto Rico, was impressed by the 1995 horror film Species , which featured a monster . With a paranoid mind, she told the story to a local newspaper. In 1996, she was invited to appear on Univision TV's "Popular Talk" program, which broadcasts in Spanish for the United States and Latin America. After Tolentino appeared on TV, images of the Chupacabra became known throughout the Americas.

Tolentino described the beast as being 4 to 5 feet tall, with red eyes like an alien, long claws, and spikes on its back. According to Radford, the description is unreliable, from the number of toes to the genitals. In general, it looks very similar to the monsters in the movie.

Radford has spent years of his life researching the Chupacabra phenomenon . He has traveled to Puerto Rico and Nicaragua, meeting and interviewing witnesses. When he met Madelyne Tolentino, she confessed that she had seen the movie "Species" just two weeks before seeing the beast.

Radford, a psychologist, after analyzing Madelyne’s description, concluded that the woman had unconsciously influenced the monster elements in the film when describing the legendary animal from ancient times. Many people were obsessed with the legends of vampire bats and were willing to believe her story.

But José "Chemo" Soto Rivera, the mayor of Canovanas, where the rumors originated, and one of the organizers of expeditions to hunt the beast, dismissed Radford's theory. He said Tolentino had seen the creature after it killed a parrot. It's possible Madelyne made a mistake in describing the creature, but many others have seen and even shot the Chupacabra. The mayor believes the Chupacabra really exists, and added that he "won't bother " reading Radford's book.

The head of an animal that locals call Chupacabra in Cuero, Texas, USA.

But those who claim that Chupacabra is a fabrication argue that there is not enough scientific evidence to prove its existence. They absolutely do not believe it without the most specific evidence, the animal's DNA .

According to Radfford: "In the mid-20th century, all the myths people called "Chupacabra" such as the mangy coyote, the strange American raccoon carcass, ... even the dried up dead fish in Mexico, had nothing to do with Chupacabra".

To be considered a species, there would need to be at least 200 individuals. “If each of these monsters is as large as Madelyne describes, then there is no shortage of evidence of the Chupacabra’s existence on the tiny, densely populated island of Puerto Rico ,” Radford thinks.

The mysterious beast was first reported in Puerto Rico. The cattle that were killed, presumably by Chupacabra, had a deep puncture wound in the carotid artery, indicating that they were bloodsucking .

Because the “victims” were mostly goats, the monster was always called Chupacabra , which means “Goat-sucker” . The first attacks occurred in March 1995 in Puerto Rico. In this attack, eight goats were killed, each with three deep wounds on its chest and blood sucked from its heart.

While Madelyne Tolentino described the beast as looking like a kangaroo , other witnesses said it looked like a rabbit, a dog, and even a giant bat. During 1995-1996, up to 200 survey teams and hunting teams came to Puerto Rico to capture the monster but were completely unsuccessful.

Some ufologists believe that the Chupacabra could be a non-humanoid alien or a pet alien that escaped from a spaceship when it landed on Earth. Others say the beast arose from a genetic mutation because Puerto Rico was once used by the US to test radioactive weapons.

While the debate rages on, the problem continues. At least 19 sheep have been found dead at the Las Compras farm in Argentina. A neighbor of the farm (where a sheep was also found dead) said she saw dogs chasing the sheep away.