These pics are all you need to know about Red Cross in central IL

Last year, we…

Helped over 1,531 people after they experienced the devastation of a home fire.

Billy, Preschooler, and Safety Scholar

As a Red Cross Youth Instructor, I travel to locations in Peoria, Tazewell, and Woodford Counties to teach classes involving a host of safety topics. Many of these locations differ in multiple ways, but their commonality is the great kids at every location I visit. These students ranging from preschoolers to high schoolers oftentimes help me teach the class–brilliant discussions often happen at each grade level.

Earlier this month, I was teaching at a Washington, IL classroom affected by the Nov. 17^th tornado. Several of the students had lost their home during the tornado. This topic was a review of tornado safety, all the while necessary as we are approaching the tornado season. The kids in the classroom didn’t just listen to me talk. They were quick to raise their hands to ask questions. One boy, about the age of five, told me everything his family did during the tornado.   Billy (not his real name), helped me teach the class. He became a co-teacher as he shared the decisions that kept Billy and his family alive.

It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s a chupacabra?

I think I have talked about where I live before, it is an old farmhouse in the kinda country.  I live on the edge of town in Morton, IL and my house is 75% surrounded with fields.

Ye ole farmhouse

As you can imagine, along with the location comes critters.  We have the occasional opossum that wants to live in the barn, field mice, rabbits and coyotes.  And now we can add a “chupacabra” to the list.  For those of you who have no idea what a chupacabra is, according to Wikipedia, it is a legendary cryptid rumored to inhabit parts of the Americas.  Physical descriptions of the creature vary. It is reported to be a heavy creature, the size of a small bear, with a row of spines reaching from the neck to the base of the tail or an evil-looking, dog-like animal with long snout.  They pray on small livestock like goats.

Here is a drawing from an eye witness. Ohhh Spooky!

I know what you are thinking… Erin has lost her mind and watches way too much SyFy, but check out the pic of what has been roaming around the house over the last week.

Ugly lil “chupacabra”, isn’t he???

It looks like an evil, dog-like creature, doesn’t it? Many experts have investigated sightings and say they are coyotes with mange.  I really don’t know, but I have lived in central Illinois my entire life, and have never seen the likes of this.  When we first saw it running around, this was the exchange of words in the kitchen as we were all pressed against the window…

Me – What in the world is that???

My boyfriend – Is it a hairless coyote?

Me – I don’t know.  Maybe it is one of those ugly dogs with no hair that people spend way too much money on. 

My boyfriend – It could be a dog with mange that got dumped.

My 16 year-old son – No way! That looks like a chupacabra!

So, that is how our latest bit of wildlife got it’s name.  We had hoped that it would just move on, but with daily sightings, I started to worry that it could be sick or that we could accidentally surprise it sometime, forcing it to defend itself.  I decided it was time to call the professionals.

Yesterday, I called animal control who referred me to the police department who referred me to DNR.  Long story short, none of them had a clue what this thing was for certain but guessed it was either a hairless fox or a hairless coyote.  All of them said the same thing, I could try to trap it or I could just make a lot of noise whenever I saw it to scare it off.  Not really the answers I wanted, but it is what it is. We decided that we would be very aware of our surroundings when outside and be loud when we see it.  In the interim, I decided to see what the Red Cross had to say about dealing with “chupacabras”.

I started to research and found a fab little class we teach called Bow Wow Ow.  It trains children about how to be safe around dogs and what to do to avoid dog bites.  Sure it was a stretch, but “chupacabras” are reportedly dog-like.

The class addresses more than 12 common situations where children could have a negative experience with dogs and then illustrates the proper behavior children should possess while in each situation. These teaching points, along with common sense and adult supervision, go a long way in preventing dog bite-related injuries.

• For example, kids want to know why dogs want to bite us when we just want to pet them and the response is they don’t want to bite us, it is just the way dogs express themselves and they maybe scared of humans.  So noted… I will not attempt to pet the chupacabra.
• Another lesson teaches children why dogs bark so much, it is just their way of telling you how they feel. Got it… the chupacabra is not barking because it doesn’t really care to tell me how it feels.  That’s okay with me.

In all seriousness, the Bow Wow Ow class is pretty awesome for young kids and it’s free, so you can’t beat that.  Our instructors go to area schools and teach children about being safe through tons of classes. (Click here to see all that we offer.) Fall class scheduling is now open, so feel free to let your child’s teacher know they should contact Monica.Grugett@redcross.org to schedule their free classes. I do not recommend asking her for “chupacabra” safety training though, her office is next to mine and she thinks that I have completely lost my mind. 😉