This story came in via Tony Lucas at CFZ New Zealand. Thanks, matey.I live in the USA; in South Carolina. My question is `Do all birds have three toes?` I won't tell my full story now, but I will send some of my pictures. I will say that the tracks started (yes, that's right, STARTED)
in my yard, just like something just fell from the sky. The tracks were in clean snow. I made a large hunt for where it could come from. After I followed the track it was gone again.
It ended in clean snow then came back down about 1/8 of a mile away. It walked 
over to a tree with its feet about three feet apart.
It peed. The pee was like it was sprayed out. It was not a hard stream like a man would do. The thing then walked about four steps (which were about five feet apart) then left the snow into the air. I know this may not be what you deal with, but no-one else can help me find out what this is...
Mr H.
Looks like some species of cottontail rabbit.
ReplyDeleteI agree; those are the tracks of a rabbit or hare; the paired imprints are the front feet; the longer single one is where both back feet impacted one after another. Very likely this was a cottontail rabbit (really a hare, not a rabbit) out patrolling its territory, and you happened on the parts of its trail that were in snow, not on grass. The urine was simply a bunny scent-marking; nothing more.
ReplyDeleteYep... rabbit... distorted a bit by the sun.
ReplyDeleteCottontail rabbits are rabbits.
ReplyDeleteThey don't dig warrens like European rabbits do, but their young are born in nests. They have no fur on them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cottontail_rabbit
The only hare in the Eastern US is the snowshoe hare, which isn't found in South Carolina.
About 30 years ago, perhaps longer,I read an account of a father and his two daughters who encountered what is now known as the "skunk ape" not far near their home in rural Kentucky or Tennessee. The animal smelled bad and carried a dead dog under it's arm. The father and daughters retreated to the house and later drew a picture of the critter which they submitted to Fate Magazine. Fate published the picture and the story along with a picture of the plaster casts the town police chief made of foot prints left by the creature in the soft ground.
ReplyDeleteA few weeks later I was reading Gerald Hawkins' new book, Beyond Stonehedge, a follow up to Stonehedge Decoded in which the author tries to find astronomical alignments in the Nazca lines in the Atacama desert of Peru. I was much surprised to find a picture of the same cryptids, three of them this time, three toes, pointed ears and all, dancing on a Nazca terracotta vase that. for some reason, Hawkins had decided to include in his book. The likeness on the vase was almost a carbon copy of the pencil sketch done by the father and the two girls.
This strange coincidence has stuck in my mind all these years. I'm sure Fate Magazine could find a copy of the issue with this story if anyone wanted to check it out.
Nate
nateshafer@gmail.com