Reports of cattle mutilation go back as far as the early 1960’s when incidents begin occurring in Pennsylvania and Kansas. It remained largely unknown to the general population until an incident in Pueblo, Colorado where the local newspaper did a report on a mutilation and was picked up by the wider press and distributed nationwide. Interestingly enough, this was the first incident to speculation that extraterrestrials and UFO’s were somehow associated with the mutilation. By the late 1970’s there were reports of cattle mutilations all across America and even the FBI was asked to investigate what was going on.
Though the exact nature varies from case to case, mutilations can have any of the following:
- The removal of eyes, udders and sexual organs very cleanly with surgical precision
- The removal of the lips and tongue.
- The removal of only one ear.
- The removal of major organs with no obvious entry/ excision marks.
- The stripping of hide and flesh from the jaw and the area beneath the ear.
- Lack of any signs of predators (i.e. teeth marks, tearing of the skin or flesh) around the carcass.
- No signs of scavenging.
- Many cases the majority of the blood has been drained from the animal. What is left may not coagulate for several days.
- As previously mentioned, the animal appears dumped or dropped in a secluded area, with no tracks leading to or from the site.
- Strange marks or holes in the ground around the carcass.
- Some eyewitnesses report seeing aerial objects in the vicinity of cattle at the time the animal goes missing.
The more popular theories include either government or military experimentation or aliens and UFO’s. There have been reports of seeing “black helicopters” in the area of the mutilations. Black helicopters are basically unmarked military helicopters with no identification whatsoever. There was one reported incident that two unmarked aircraft opened fire on a farmer driving his tractor near a mutilation site in Iowa, though the validity of this story is questionable.
And finally various theories suggest cattle mutilations have been committed by aliens for the purpose of gather genetic material for some unknown reason. These theories are based solely on the idea that such clean and precise dissections in such a short amount of time with no evidence could not be performed by earthly means. Some even think that since cows make up a significant part of the human diet, a study is being carried out on this part of the food chain.
Most of these occurrences have occurred in the Midwest, but there have been some reported in California as well. A few years ago there was a rash of cattle mutilations in the Red Bluff area and the cause was never determined. This has me wondering if there have been any occurrences of mutilations in the Central Valley. The foothills are known for their cattle ranches and it wouldn’t surprise me if one or two cattle died of mysterious causes and have yet to be reported.