|
El Pichucuate |
|
El Pichucuate is a little-known cryptid snake from New Mexico, said to be mainly found around rivers. It’s said to be a small viper with horned protrusions above its eyes & similar to a sidewinder but with no rattle. Newspaper writer Charles Fletcher Lummis collected southern lore & legend, & described el pichucuate in his 1897 collection “The King of the Broncos”: ‘But the deadliest snake in North America is the tiny and devilish little pichu-cuate, who quite matches the worst serpent of India. He is the only true asp on this continent and….is never found outside of New Mexico and Arizona……And he was more dangerous than the rattlesnake? Oh yes! A thousand times worse than Ch’a-ra-ra-deh! No one ever got well if the pichu-cuate bit him. As Chad Arment writes (in ‘Cryptozoology: Science and Speculation’, chapter 16), Lummis seems to be describing a small, burrowing viper, the likes of which doesn’t exist in the given area. As pichua-cuate is a generic name given to any venomous snake, we must look at what differs, & here it’s the mention of supraocular horns & the colouring. All taken into account, the description matches no known snake in that whole vast region. You can actually read Lummis’s book & the whole story here at http://www.archive.org/stream/broncoskingof00lummrich - entry provided by Stu, whiskybeast@hotmail.com
|