The witness was walking on a trail in Pinchot State Forest, PA when he observed a large, 2-foot-long, skink-like lizard, attack and eat a chipmunk. What was this creature?
I recently received the following account:
"Back in the summer of 2018, I was in Pinchot State Forest in Northeast Pennsylvania and was wandering along the trails when I saw a chipmunk run across the trail. It ran into the bushes and then immediately turned back to flee the creature pursuing it. In a split second, the creature had the chipmunk in its mouth. It stood there in the middle of the trail chomping the dead chipmunk while gaping its mouth to swallow it..
It looked like a very large lizard with four fully formed legs. It was almost 2 feet long and looked like a skink of some kind. In other words, a snakelike body, short stumpy legs, pale underbelly, with banding of red and yellow all along the length.
As I used to keep reptiles, I decided to try and catch this creature. It didn't look like it'd be venomous so I slowly moved towards it. However, it had had its eye on me from the moment it had snagged the squirrel and was waiting for me to try something. Faster than I could move, it darted back into the underbrush. I went right after it and chased it off the trail about 50 feet until it ran into a hole in the roots of a tree. I tried digging it out, but the hole was too deep to see anything and I didn't have a flashlight.
I gave up and never saw it again. Every time I visited this forest, I'd look for it around the tree with the hole, but it never reappeared. I often wonder what it was. I'm certain it wasn't anything supernatural. I have never found any description of a reptile that matched it.
The location was where the main Pinchot Trail crosses Sassafras Road. Have you ever heard of any creature like this, especially in Pennsylvania? K
NOTE: Even though it was unidentified, I wonder if it was someone's pet at some point. Any ideas? Lon
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