Supernatural Friday: Holy Guacamole! It's the Chupacabra!

El chupacabra, or just chupacabra, is a legendary cryptozoology creature that has been haunting various areas of the globe from the initial reports from Puerto Rico in March 1995. The term “chupacabra” is derived from Spanish, with chupar meaning “to suck” and cabra meaning “goat.”

In March and August 1995, attacks on more than 150 farm animals left officials dumbfounded. Eyewitness accounts in local newspapers spoke of a creature with a “reptilian body, oval head, bulging red eyes, fanged teeth, and long, darting tongue.” Farm animals in Puerto Rico were found to be drained of blood with puncture wounds in the neck, with no meat taken from the animals’ bodies. The situation in Puerto Rico reached such a fever pitch that Mayor Jose Soto recruited volunteers to hunt the creature weekly for nearly a year, with no success.

When chupacabras are reported, they usually fall into one of two categories. First, and most common in connection to the Puerto Rico incidents, is a chupacabra that is reptile-like in nature, with leathery greenish-gray skin and spines running down the spine of the back. Most ties it was said to be approximately three to four feet tall and bipedal – standing and hopping like a kangaroo.

The second that is considered the more common version of the chupacabra is more like a strange breed of wild dog or coyote. This version lacks the hair of a dog, but features the pronounced spinal ridge or “spikes” similar to the reptilian chupacabra. This four-legged, dog-like chupacabra is also known for fearsome fangs and claws used for draining animal’s blood. The “mark” of the chupacabra on the victims is typically one to three holes, and in the shape of an upside-down triangle where the three holes are apparent.

While the chupacabra or “goat sucker” seems to be a recent cryptozoology finding, the Mayans may have encountered this cryptoid centuries ago. In

Mayan mythology, it was known as the death bat or vampire bat. Stories reveal a creature with a bat or lizard-like face, two arms and the ability to turn into a statue during the day. The creature’s sharp snout even lends itself as a device that could suck blood from victims. Even more findings identify terms like “goat sucker” found in Mayan literature as early as 1400 B.C. No doubt, this must be the vampire bat, as it did suck blood, most times from animals.

Supernatural Friday: Forget the Killer with the Hook--The Bunnyman is Scarier!

There are urban legends of the man with the hook in Lover’s Lane,  the Halloween campus murder, the babysitter story, and many more of serial killers that are not real. Or are they? But the Bunnyman is unique in that he wears a bunny costume. 



The myth first popped up in 1976. It had the Bunnyman responsible for the deaths of two children in Clifton, Virginia. Rumors of the disappearance of other children, plus the horrible mutilations of animals, circulated during the telling of the story that same year. No one dared go out at night, especially not near the bridge where this psycho is supposed to be hanging around. 


In 1992, more was added to the tale of the Bunnyman, where murdered children hang from a covered bridge and the supposed killer is an inmate escapee dressed in a bunny suit. The Bunnyman earned his nickname because he nourished himself on rabbits while perused by the police. Other variations of the tale had him hunting rabbits and using their pelts to make clothing for himself.


Years later, when people began to use the Internet, this terrifying legend got new rebirth. One widely circulated version on the Net has inmates from an insane asylum escaped in 1904 while being transferred to Lorton prison. One of the inmates was named Douglas J. Grifon. He murdered fellow inmate Marcus Wallster. He became the Bunnyman. The location, plus the names of several victims Grifon killed as the Bunnyman and dates of their murders are mentioned and says anyone can check the Clifton Town Library to verify the facts. Facts that are not true.


There’s no insane asylum in Fairfax County. Lorton Prison never came to be until 1910. And when it did, it was part of the District of Columbia corrections system, not Virginia’s. Neither Wallster nor Grifon appeared in any court records, and there is no Clifton Town Library. 


More is added to this tale of this murderer dressed as a Bugs Bunny from Hell. It says that a note found on the inmate, Marcus, who supposedly was found hanging from the tunnel entrance beneath Bunnyman Bridge. The words on the paper written, "You'll never find me no matter how hard you try! Signed, The Bunnyman." 

It is claimed that if you walk all the way down the tunnel at around midnight (which believe me isn’t much of a walk, as I’ve been there), the Bunnyman will snatch you before you get a word out and hang you from the entrance of the bridge. Then you’ll swing back and forth like a Halloween decoration left over after the spooky night itself.


Another story told in 2001 has a guide and six local students (no mention if they were in high school or college) had found parts of mutilated rabbits strewn around, heard noises, and thought they saw figures moving in the woods. Frightened, they left the area.


There are many stories told by young people about Bunnyman. The Internet is a great breeding ground for the Bunnyman legend where once it was spread by word of mouth, except now the world learns of this scary being, where before it was just the localities of Northern Virginia and lower Maryland. 


In Reston, Virginia, there used to be a dirt road leading off of Sunset Hills Road, just before it intersected with Reston Avenue. The kids in town knew that it led to the Bunnyman’s house. Supposedly, one Halloween night he dressed up in a bunny costume, shot his wife and kids, then opened the door to trick-or-treaters all night with the corpses of his family still in the house.


Another tale has a guy in a bunny costume standing in the middle of the road at the bottom of a hill in Clifton. As cars came down the hill, he would throw an ax at the vehicle and somehow, he always killed the person or persons inside.

There’s the tale of a mental patient that escaped from a bus transporting patients when it crashed in the woods near the bridge. The authorities were called in, but when they searched for the man, they never found him. Later, carcasses of rabbits began to be found, scattered around the bridge. It seems that the mental patient was living in the woods, surviving off of the meat of the rabbits. But when they discovered some teenagers gutted and hanging from the bridge, the local authorities put out a manhunt for "the Bunnyman,” as the local children called him. The story goes that they eventually caught up with him. Just as they were about to apprehend the Bunnyman, though, he jumped in front of a train roaring down the tracks. Since then, it is said that the Bunnyman’s spirit haunts the bridge, and that on Halloween at midnight, his spirit becomes visible right over the bridge that bears his name. Drunken teenagers can always be found at the base of the bridge at midnight on Halloween, waiting to see if the spirit of Bunnyman will appear.


Another take on the legend has a young man from Clifton, Virginia who came upon the bridge while traveling. Later, he killed his parents and dragged their bodies into the woods to hang them from the bridge, and then committed suicide. In 1943, three teenagers, two men and a young woman, went to the Bunnyman Bridge on Halloween night. The next morning they were found dead, hung from the bridge, their bodies slashed open. Notes were found attached to their feet, with the words written," You'll never catch the Bunnyman!"


One witness claims to his own personal experiences with Bunnyman Bridge. He has been out there about a dozen times, since it’s about fifteen minutes from his house. Most of the time, he and his friends hang around the bridge, waiting to see if anything would happen. Nothing does, but they feel as if someone or something is watching them. Even though the bridge is located about twenty-five miles from Washington D.C., it is still in the middle of nowhere. Only a few houses nestle within the woods that surround the bridge and railroad tracks. If you drive through the tunnel, only one car at a time, as it is small. The last time he and his buddies went out there, they heard voices that came from the woods, whispers that sounded as if they originated twenty feet from where the young men stood. Frightened, they bolted.

So scary is the Bunnyman, that he inspired a cult horror flick,Donnie Darko.

Supernatural Friday: Slendar/Tall Man

The Slender Man is an urban legend of a mythical creature often depicted as a tall, thin figure wearing a black suit and a blank face. According to the legend, he can stretch or shorten his arms at will and has tentacle-like appendages protruding from his back. Depending on the interpretations of the myth, the creature who seems to be no unlike the men in black ufo stories, can cause memory loss, insomnia, paranoia, coughing fits (nicknamed “slendersickness”), make photograph/video distortions, and can teleport at will.  Where he comes from is as much a mystery as what he wants. All that is known is that there is evidence of him existing for far longer than one would expect. Those who see him often wind up missing or worse, their mutilated bodies are impaled upon a tree, their organs removed, and then replaced in a systematic way. Supposedly sightings of this creature have been seen in many places around the world, including the United States, Norway and Japan. The story goes that those who have seen him are frequently found to be maniacally writing strange messages, and drawing mad scribbles of a dark, faceless figure. It is advised that one stops investigating too much, otherwise will find that you become the subject of unwanted interest. There is even a mock documentary in vogue of “Blair Witch” you can see at Youtube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysgQ9spsphk&feature=player_embedded.

Supposedly, in June 2009, a “’paranormal pictures” photoshop contest was launched on the ‘Something Awful’ Forums. The contest required participants to turn ordinary photographs into creepy-looking images through digital manipulation and then pass them on as authentic photographs on a number of paranormal forums. Something Awful users soon began sharing their faux-paranormal creations with layered images of ghosts and other anomalies, usually accompanied by a fabricated witness account to make them more convincing. One of the forum users on June 10^th had posted two black and white photographs of unnamed children with a short description of “Slender Man” as a mysterious creature who was stalking the kids in the photographs. Another user of the forum reused the Slender Man character for his own story. The original thread, which still remains active today, extends for 46 pages as of June 2011.

The creation of “Slender Man” may have inspired an ongoing series of amateur adventure games titled “Chzo Mythos.” Published by Ben ‘Yahtzee’ Croshaw in 2003, one of the main villains is called Cabadath. It is also referred to as “Tall Man.” Making his first in-game appearance in Trilby’s Notes, the character was portrayed in the third installment as a tall, thin man dressed in a long, black, high-collared coat with tails that reach to the floor and having a blank face.

But this slender man or tall man has more far reaching stories from old legends. There is Der Großmann, German for “The Great Man,” is often translated as The Tall Man, too. It is rumored to be a German folklore concerning a tall boogeyman existing since the 16th century. The Tall man also abducts children, just like the Slender Man is supposed to. There is a horror film about the Tall Man, called “The Tall Man,” that came out in 2012: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1658837/. Even the fiend in the Phantasm movies is called the Tall Man. No doubt, the game developers took this being and using “Slender Man” for the name of their villain, put him into their game.

From what I could find, there is some old legends for the Great Man or tall Man, but I suspect that the Slender Man has been fabricated on more and more in modern times, with help by the Internet, not unlike the Bunnyman of Virginia. 

But just in case I am wrong, if you see a extremely tall, thin man dressed all in black not far from a children’s playground, maybe you should take heed. Especially before you forget. . .

The Bunnyman, the Urban Legend

There are urban legends of the man with the hook in Lover’s Lane,  the Halloween campus murder, the babysitter story, and many more of serial killers that are not real. Or are they? But the Bunnyman is unique in that he wears a bunny costume.



The myth first popped up in 1976. It had the Bunnyman responsible for the deaths of two children in Clifton, Virginia. Rumors of the disappearance of other children, plus the horrible mutilations of animals, circulated during the telling of the story that same year. No one dared go out at night, especially not near the bridge where this psycho is supposed to be hanging around.


In 1992, more was added to the tale of the Bunnyman, where murdered children hang from a covered bridge and the supposed killer is an inmate escapee dressed in a bunny suit. The Bunnyman earned his nickname because he nourished himself on rabbits while perused by the police. Other variations of the tale had him hunting rabbits and using their pelts to make clothing for himself.


Years later, when people began to use the Internet, this terrifying legend got new rebirth. One widely circulated version on the Net has inmates from an insane asylum escaped in 1904 while being transferred to Lorton prison. One of the inmates was named Douglas J. Grifon. He murdered fellow inmate Marcus Wallster. He became the Bunnyman. The location, plus the names of several victims Grifon killed as the Bunnyman and dates of their murders are mentioned and says anyone can check the Clifton Town Library to verify the facts. Facts that are not true.


There’s no insane asylum in Fairfax County. Lorton Prison never came to be until 1910. And when it did, it was part of the District of Columbia corrections system, not Virginia’s. Neither Wallster nor Grifon appeared in any court records, and there is no Clifton Town Library.


More is added to this tale of this murderer dressed as a Bugs Bunny from Hell. It says that a note found on the inmate, Marcus, who supposedly was found hanging from the tunnel entrance beneath Bunnyman Bridge. The words on the paper written, "You'll never find me no matter how hard you try! Signed, The Bunnyman."

It is claimed that if you walk all the way down the tunnel at around midnight (which believe me isn’t much of a walk, as I’ve been there), the Bunnyman will snatch you before you get a word out and hang you from the entrance of the bridge. Then you’ll swing back and forth like a Halloween decoration left over after the spooky night itself.


Another story told in 2001 has a guide and six local students (no mention if they were in high school or college) had found parts of mutilated rabbits strewn around, heard noises, and thought they saw figures moving in the woods. Frightened, they left the area.


There are many stories told by young people about Bunnyman. The Internet is a great breeding ground for the Bunnyman legend where once it was spread by word of mouth, except now the world learns of this scary being, where before it was just the localities of Northern Virginia and lower Maryland.


In Reston, Virginia, there used to be a dirt road leading off of Sunset Hills Road, just before it intersected with Reston Avenue. The kids in town knew that it led to the Bunnyman’s house. Supposedly, one Halloween night he dressed up in a bunny costume, shot his wife and kids, then opened the door to trick-or-treaters all night with the corpses of his family still in the house.


Another tale has a guy in a bunny costume standing in the middle of the road at the bottom of a hill in Clifton. As cars came down the hill, he would throw an ax at the vehicle and somehow, he always killed the person or persons inside.

There’s the tale of a mental patient that escaped from a bus transporting patients when it crashed in the woods near the bridge. The authorities were called in, but when they searched for the man, they never found him. Later, carcasses of rabbits began to be found, scattered around the bridge. It seems that the mental patient was living in the woods, surviving off of the meat of the rabbits. But when they discovered some teenagers gutted and hanging from the bridge, the local authorities put out a manhunt for "the Bunnyman,” as the local children called him. The story goes that they eventually caught up with him. Just as they were about to apprehend the Bunnyman, though, he jumped in front of a train roaring down the tracks. Since then, it is said that the Bunnyman’s spirit haunts the bridge, and that on Halloween at midnight, his spirit becomes visible right over the bridge that bears his name. Drunken teenagers can always be found at the base of the bridge at midnight on Halloween, waiting to see if the spirit of Bunnyman will appear.


Another take on the legend has a young man from Clifton, Virginia who came upon the bridge while traveling. Later, he killed his parents and dragged their bodies into the woods to hang them from the bridge, and then committed suicide. In 1943, three teenagers, two men and a young woman, went to the Bunnyman Bridge on Halloween night. The next morning they were found dead, hung from the bridge, their bodies slashed open. Notes were found attached to their feet, with the words written," You'll never catch the Bunnyman!"


One witness claims to his own personal experiences with Bunnyman Bridge. He has been out there about a dozen times, since it’s about fifteen minutes from his house. Most of the time, he and his friends hang around the bridge, waiting to see if anything would happen. Nothing does, but they feel as if someone or something is watching them. Even though the bridge is located about twenty-five miles from Washington D.C., it is still in the middle of nowhere. Only a few houses nestle within the woods that surround the bridge and railroad tracks. If you drive through the tunnel, only one car at a time, as it is small. The last time he and his buddies went out there, they heard voices that came from the woods, whispers that sounded as if they originated twenty feet from where the young men stood. Frightened, they bolted.

So scary is the Bunnyman, that he inspired a cult horror flick, Donnie Darko.

To read more bout the truth and more about the Bunnyman, check out my book, Haunted Virginia: Legends, Myths and True Tales, published by Schiffer Publishing. Buy it at AMAZON, Barnes and Noble, Books A Million, and other brick and motar bookstores and online places.

The next time you decide to check out Bunnyman’s Bridge, especially on Halloween night, watch out for rabbits. Especially if one of those bunnies looks bigger than normal, and after standing up, and suddenly is clutching an axe: RUN!