I live in Pueblo, Colorado. I moved out here when I was six and have since heard stories of the praire devil, the pig man and the mini-rex….

Me and my friend were riding dirt bikes….when we observed something move across the clearing in front of us. It was three to four feet long, greenish with black markings on its back, and a yellowish-orange underbelly. It walked on its hind legs, never dragging its tail. Its front limbs (I call them limbs because they were more like arms than anything) were smaller in comparison to the back ones, and it had four or three claws....It also had some kind of lump or horn over each eye. When it noticed our presence, it let out a high pitched screech…Immediately, we rode back to my house for a camera….We took a picture of its tracks…one of my other friends said he had a few pictures of the creature, so I took a look at them, and to my surprise, I saw pictures of the exact same thing I saw... North American Bio Fortean Review.

Could the Southwest be home to a mysterious new species of reptile? Nick Sucik, a private researcher from Minnesota, thinks it's possible. Sucik has been tracking sightings of an elusive lizard-like creature ever since hearing tales of "river dinosaurs" from those involved in the legally sketchy "reptile trade." The "dino" is said to walk exclusively on its hind legs; to stand about 3 feet tall; and to have armlike appendages instead of forelegs. The reptile usually is seen near a wet environment and moves swiftly, with grace, Sucik said.

Reports of sightings trickled in, first in Pagosa Springs in 1982, then in Pueblo, Sucik said. And, he said, the same thing happened here in Cortez — "But it was kind of unexpected how we heard about it."

An Unsolved Mysteries episode had featured the story of a Cortez couple who had been visiting in Arizona. While there, the couple apparently saw the body of a reptile unlike any they had ever seen before. "It looked like a toy to them," Sucik said, and when they told their tale, "No one took them seriously." Except, perhaps, for Sucik himself.

In an attempt to follow up on the story, Sucik wrote the Journal and later placed a classified ad, seeking communication from anyone who might have seen the enigmatic reptile. The letter netted a response from Northern California, but the ad brought results from closer to home. According to Sucik, a woman and her daughter emailed him details of a similar sighting that took place in 2001 as they were driving in the Yellow Jacket area.

"Suddenly, this thing runs out. At first, they thought it was a young deer, because of its size," Sucik said.

The women described it as having a long neck and skinny legs like a bird. However, it had no feathers and its "arms" seemed to go out of its upright neck rather than its body. The women estimated that the creature would measure about 5 feet, if stretched from neck to tail.

"It looked to them like a cross between a bird and a dinosaur." When they got home, each drew a picture of the creature and realized they had each seen exactly the same thing, he said.

The description matched that of other sightings, and the women happened to have been near an irrigation creek. "Every reference we've heard usually affiliates them with water," Sucik said. "That's where the term 'River Dino' comes from."

Sucik discovered it wasn't the first sighting in the area. In March or April 1996, a local woman said she saw something similar near her home at the Kampark outside Mesa Verde.

"I was sitting on the couch, and looked out the front door," the woman, who did not wish to be identified, told the Journal. "I saw something, not a lizard, really, about 3 1/2 feet long and 3 1/2 feet high. It moved very fast. As far as I remember, there were only two legs that seemed to balance it."

She said the creature moved very swiftly, and had a cone-shaped nose and a tail that extended about 2 feet out from its body. It had come from a pond area.

"It was kind of unusual," she said "I didn't know if I was seeing things, or what. I never had anything like that happen before. "I thought, 'Maybe it's someone's pet', I wasn't frightened; I just thought it was unusual."

She checked reference books, but could not find anything similar to what she'd seen. Jeff Thulin of the Reptile Reserve told her it might have been a monitor lizard, however, monitors could not live throughout the winter locally.

Thulin said others have since mentioned that they have seen "a large lizard running around. I don't know any specifics at all except that it's large and looks out of place."

"It doesn't match anything," he said of the description. The woman said she has tried to put it out of her mind. "Some people think you're nuts."

Sucik isn't sure what people have seen. A lizard, he said, "is a reptile on four legs. These reptiles are always on their hind legs. The only reptile to fit that morphology is a dinosaur—that kind of creates extra interest. It's not strange. It's like a new species that hasn't been classified in the area."

Originally posted by severdsoul
quite the interesting post OP,
A new species would not surprise me at all
as much of the desert area that is not discovered.

But i have to ask the obvious question...
what is that shadow next to the person in
the first pic? it looks like a giant version of what
she is holding up...

Would be cool if science got a hold of one of these if
they exist and tested them to see if the dna matches that
of the t-rex's of years ago..

Although one has to wonder, if these are running around
undetected, will they grow larger? say in 100 years or so
we actually see large human or larger size t-rex's running
around.. Now that would be mind blowing.

Better go buy your T-rex hunting tag's *lol*

Congratulations!