African Lion Hunt Ends
Posted by: Loren Coleman on July 15th, 2008
Crews called off the search for an African lion in a rural part of El Paso County, Colorado, late Monday afternoon (July 14, 2008), believing that the animal in question may just have been a big dog.
But they don’t know.
Three individuals reported an African lion, complete with mane and brush on the long tail.
One official was quoted as saying the tracks were not cougar, not dog, but large felid tracks.
A red mane was seen.
And then there is the cellphone image capture.
Here are various renderings of the photograph of the Mystery Animal:
Will this be another “maned phantom feline” story that disappears into cryptid history?
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
A long time ago there was talk about resetting the natural order of things by releasing large predators into the wild. The plan was called Pleistocene re-wilding and is intended to be a proactive approach to conservation.
Basically giving the lazy North American deer and pronghorn population something to worry about.
In theory there are some good ideas about what they wanted to do. Introducing endangered species into a large environment that closely resembles their home is smart. Providing security would be a big concern, but I think it would also create jobs and tourism.
Hopefully someone didn’t read the article about this and decide to start the Mega-Fauna reintroduction a tad too early.
I do think the idea of this animal being a dog is not far-fetched. Apart from the tail which IMO looks more canine than feline, If you zoom the image, you can discern what appears to be the pointy ear in the head.
Kinda looks like an Akita on it’s way to subdue a BigFoot….
Looks to me like a Chow Chow dog. See for yourself, here.
Seems like both this creature and the Bray Road Beast are Chows…..just a thought 😉
Keep lookin’ peeps…..they are out there!!
To be honest, Loren…Yes.
Could be a hybrid of lion with something else also, Red_Pill_Junkie.
We’ll never know, will we?
This is a heck of a week for animals in Colorado Springs. The lion sighting and the bear adventure (bears are very rare intruders into the city, and this was a well-built-up area), had the DJs on 106.3 FM this morning saying things like, “I’m waiting for the chupacabra sightings” and “Where’s the Loch Ness Sasquatch in all this?”
“Bear from Circuit City should be on its way home
July 15, 2008 – 11:51AM
By LANCE BENZEL
THE GAZETTE
A black bear burst through a glass window and into a Circuit City department store on 7670 N. Academy Blvd. this morning after firefighters used water from a firehose to dislodge it from a tree, authorities said.
The animal – a young adult male – briefly stayed inside the breezeway before darting back out the broken window and running to a tree behind the building, said Colorado Springs police spokesman Lt. David Whitlock. The episode just after 7 a.m. also involved police and a representative of the state Department of Wildlife. The bear was not injured”
@ btgoss highooooooh! 🙂
yeah, its does look like a chow.
I get what you are saying, MattBille.
My favorite animal attack of this week (not in Colorado) involved a 77-year old woman standing up to a rabid fox.
The thing attacked her while she was gardening. She actually managed to hold the fox down long enough to call her grandson next door and have it shot.
Tough lady.
cool, a lion “)
If it were to be discovered that this was truly a feral lion, one that had somehow escaped detection and capture for some time and had adapted to live off of the existing conditions, I would be very pleased. The restoration of North America’s inventory of animals prior to the 12.9 k extinction event is a process that would be beneficial for the overall ecological health and diversity of one of the world’s great ecosystems cut short by cosmic disaster (quite literally in this case) and the arrival of humans and their traditions of hunting big game.
Establishing a separate genetic pool of animals still hanging on in Africa and Asia but who are (were) endemic to North America would also serve as a buffer and reserve should ecological disaster strike the other ecosystems. Return the elephants, zebras, camels, cheetahs and giant tortoises to restore something approximating the rich diversity for which the continent and its still existing ecological potential is waiting.
We shouldn’t forget the human beings living here. Or that there hasn’t been a ‘natural’ environment in the Americas for many thousands of years.
Vicuna, tortoises, maybe even some Indian elephants would be interesting, as long as they didn’t create problems for the ranchers. Genus Bos is aleady heavily represented.
Heaven to betsy nature should inconvenience of threaten the life of a human at any time. That’s why we should just tell ’em to stay in their nice safe cars (only 40K killed last year) all the time or as much as possible.
As for genus Bos. Not just represented, but over-represented and managed in such a way that they compromise the water supply, reduce the number of niches for other species acting as an almost reverse-keystone species. A few well situated prides of lions would do wonders for the health of the system.
In my opinion, that is not a dog…The shape of the nose and muzzle, the mane, the tail, even the hind legs all fit, not to mention eyewitnesses say Lion…..Possible it got loose from a nearby sanctuary, the sanctuary caught it, and denied it to avoid fines or loss of license? Chows are not that big, and the arc of the back and apparent length of that back do not look like a chow, and chows have smallish nose protruding outward not downward like a lions…in fact very few dogs have that snout…schnauzer, airdale, terriers…certainly we are not looking at a terrier.