May 21, 2009
Three Patagonian maras were being reported in Summerville, South Carolina, during April of 2009. One is pictured above in these Post-Courier photographs.
Now reporter Mike Gellatly writes today of a “strange animal sighted in the Aiken area” in South Carolina.
It seems to be a Patagonian mara or hare or cavy (Dolichotis patagonum). It was spotted around the outskirts of the Savannah River Site. Five years ago, a very similar animal was spotted in the same area.
We saw it in North Augusta on our way… back towards Evans. There was just one, running down the side of the road. We thought it was a dog, a big Chihuahua maybe. When we got close it ran into ditch, but it came back up on the road. We had no clue (what it was). We came home and tried to Google anything I could think of. We thought it looked something like a rabbit, a deer or a kangaroo. But nothing like it came up,
said Lori Smith, who, along with her family, spotted the animal on May 20, 2009.
I have not seen the photograph yet of the Patagonian mara taken by the Smith family.
🙂 Thank You.
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.
Filed under Cryptotourism, CryptoZoo News, Out of Place, Photos, Weird Animal News