Folklore from Northern Cambodia describes a large wild ox that natives insist is different from the two other species of wild bovines known to live in the area, the gaur and the banteng. For a long time scientists ridiculed these stories. Without even investigating the kouprey directly,........scientists decided to actually investigate the problem instead of making opinion-based pronouncements from their offices half a world away. The kouprey was not a hybrid. It was a new species, and it was so different from all other wild oxen that it was proposed that it should occupy a genus all its own, Novibos. Its status as a species became official in 1961. Today, the kouprey is still almost as elusive as a mythical animal. Scientists have only rarely been able to observe it in the wild, usually from a distance. Despite their status as an official species, koupreys have had more adventures in the field of cryptozoology since then