A pair of eyes emerged from the bushes in the darkness. There had recently been a mountain lion sighting in the area, so I raised my rifle and looked through the scope. What I saw wasn’t a mountain lion. It looked like a red wolf.
I lowered the rifle.
That encounter has stayed with me for years, and it opens a new episode of Dark Outdoors®, “The Night I Had a Red Wolf in My Crosshairs.” The episode explores that experience, other strange wild canine encounters and the fascinating story of an animal that once roamed Texas and Louisiana but came perilously close to disappearing forever.
There is another fascinating chapter to this story.
Researchers studying wild canines along the Texas Gulf Coast have discovered animals carrying significant amounts of red wolf ancestry. That raises intriguing questions about whether genetic remnants of the wolves that once inhabited this region have survived within coastal coyote populations.
I explored that story in a video examining Texas coyotes, red wolf genetics and the remarkable possibilities scientists are considering for conserving those genes.
The red wolf (Canis rufus) is one of North America’s great wildlife conservation stories.
Red wolves once occupied portions of the eastern and south-central United States, including Texas and Louisiana. By the 20th century, persecution, habitat changes and hybridization with coyotes helped push them toward extinction in the wild.
A small number of animals were captured along the Texas-Louisiana Gulf Coast to establish a captive breeding program. Those animals became the foundation for an effort that prevented the red wolf from disappearing completely.
Today, the only recognized wild population exists in eastern North Carolina.
That makes the discovery of red wolf ancestry in Gulf Coast canines especially fascinating. The wolves themselves may have disappeared from Texas, but some of their genetics apparently did not.
What Was in My Crosshairs?
I’m not claiming that the animal I encountered that night was a genetically pure red wolf.
There was no DNA test. I didn’t capture it. I didn’t have a biologist standing beside me.
I can only tell you what happened.
I saw those eyes emerge from the bushes. With a mountain lion recently reported in the area, I raised my rifle. When I got a better look at the animal, what I saw looked like a red wolf.
So I lowered the gun.
Years later, as research began revealing the surprising amount of red wolf ancestry surviving in some Gulf Coast coyotes, encounters like mine became even more interesting.
Could I have encountered an animal carrying substantial red wolf genetics?
I don’t know.
But unlike a lot of mysterious wildlife stories, we now know there really are wild canines along the Texas Gulf Coast carrying genetic echoes of the red wolf.
And that makes this story worth another look.
Hear the Full Story
In the complete Dark Outdoors episode, I tell the story of that night and explore other unusual encounters I’ve had with wild canines over the years.
Listen to “The Night I Had a Red Wolf in My Crosshairs”:
A man walked outside his Texas home and discovered a huge cat inside his chicken coop. It wasn’t a bobcat, and it didn’t look like a mountain lion. The animal he described looked like an African lion.
That encounter is at the center of a new episode of Dark Outdoors®, examining one of the strangest categories of wildlife reports I have investigated over the years: big cats that don’t seem to belong where people are seeing them.
For decades, I have investigated reports of unusual cats in Texas and across the South. Mountain lions are responsible for some of them. Bobcats, especially when seen briefly or under unusual conditions, can account for others. Misidentification is a legitimate part of investigating any unusual wildlife report, and it should always be considered before looking for a more exotic explanation.
But occasionally a report comes along that doesn’t fit comfortably into those categories. The chicken-coop encounter is one of them. The witness described an animal that appeared to be an African lion. That’s an extraordinary claim, and without photographs, DNA or other physical evidence, there is no way to prove exactly what stood inside that coop.
The possibility of an exotic cat appearing in Texas, however, isn’t as impossible as it might initially sound. Texas has a long history of privately held exotic wildlife. Animals escape, and historically some have been deliberately released. In some cases, an exotic animal could potentially survive unnoticed for a period of time, particularly in remote country with abundant cover and prey.
That doesn’t mean every report of an unusual cat is an escaped exotic. It simply means the possibility shouldn’t automatically be dismissed when examining a credible report.
The Giant Tracks
The lion report isn’t the only strange big-cat case I discuss in this episode. I also recount one of my own investigations involving enormous cat tracks that immediately caught my attention because of their size.
Photo by Chester Moore
I’ve spent much of my life around wildlife and studying animal sign, and these tracks appeared far larger than what I expected to find from a native cat in that area. That doesn’t automatically make them evidence of some exotic predator. Tracks can be deceptive. Mud can distort a print, a paw can slip and multiple impressions can overlap.
Those possibilities always have to be considered, but when unusually large tracks begin showing up in the same broader conversation as reports of unusually large cats, the subject becomes much more interesting.
Could Exotic Cats Be Roaming Texas?
Texas is enormous, with millions of acres of forests, swamps, brush country, ranchland and river bottoms where an animal can remain surprisingly difficult to detect. Mountain lions themselves demonstrate how effectively a large predator can move primarily at night, avoid people and cover tremendous distances without being seen by most of the people living around it.
Now consider an escaped exotic cat behaving in much the same way. Could a lion, leopard or another large captive cat survive for some period of time in the wild? Under the right circumstances, it’s certainly possible. The much harder question is whether that possibility explains any particular sighting.
That’s where evidence matters. A witness report can begin an investigation, but tracks, photographs, video, hair, scat or DNA can move a case into an entirely different category.
But unfortunately A.I. has changed this to a large extent because it’s very difficult to believe any photo or video evidence.
The Mystery Cats of the South
Stories of strange cats have circulated through Texas, Louisiana and other parts of the South for generations. Some witnesses report oversized mountain lions. Others describe black cats they call panthers. Still others report animals whose size, coloration or physical appearance doesn’t seem to match any native species.
There is a temptation to put every one of those reports into the same box, but I don’t think that’s useful. Some are undoubtedly misidentifications. Some may involve actual mountain lions appearing in places where people aren’t accustomed to seeing them. Other reports simply don’t contain enough information to reach any conclusion.
Then there are the cases that remain difficult to explain. Those are the ones that have kept me interested in this subject for decades.
Something That Isn’t Supposed to Be There
The goal isn’t to turn every strange animal sighting into a monster story. It’s to investigate what people report and ask the right questions. What did the witness actually see? Does the description match known wildlife? Could an exotic animal have escaped in the area? Are there tracks, photographs, hair, scat or other physical evidence? Have independent witnesses reported something similar?
Those questions are far more interesting than simply declaring every unusual sighting impossible or, on the other extreme, believing every extraordinary claim without evidence. Most wildlife mysteries probably have ordinary explanations.
But every once in a while, somebody walks outside, looks into a chicken coop and sees something that isn’t supposed to be there.
That’s when things get interesting.
Chester Moore
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The phrase conjures images of people living beyond civilization—hidden deep in forests, mountains and other wild places. Online, the term has become associated with everything from strange figures spotted in remote forests to stories that sound more like folklore than documented human behavior.
But the reality may be far more complicated.
In this special episode of Dark Outdoors®, “Law Enforcement Feral Human Encounter,” I explore what the term feral human could actually mean and examine a bizarre account involving law enforcement, a helicopter and thermal imaging in rugged Oklahoma country.
First, I am not suggesting there is some scientifically recognized population of mysterious wild people secretly inhabiting America’s forests.
That’s not what this is about.
For Dark Outdoors, the concept is broader. There are people who deliberately disappear into wilderness areas. There are people living transient lifestyles far beyond normal population centers. There are fugitives, criminals and individuals who simply choose to exist outside the boundaries most of us consider normal society.
Then there are encounters that aren’t so easily categorized.
That’s where things get interesting.
The Oklahoma Thermal Encounter
At the center of this episode is an unusual story from Oklahoma involving law enforcement and a helicopter equipped with thermal imaging.
During the incident, a human figure was detected moving through rugged, isolated country below.
The technology could establish something important: there was a person down there.
What it couldn’t explain was who that person was, what they were doing in such an isolated location or the circumstances that brought them there.
And that is where I think discussions about “feral humans” become more interesting than internet legends.
We don’t have to invent monsters.
Human beings are strange enough.
The complete account—and the details that make this encounter particularly unsettling—are in the podcast.
Our Award-Winning Feral Human Investigation
This isn’t the first time Dark Outdoors has investigated reports of mysterious people living or moving through remote wilderness.
Our Dark Outdoors feral human documentary won Best Video Storytelling from the Press Club of Southeast Texas, and it takes a deeper look at the subject through firsthand accounts and investigation.
The goal isn’t to prove internet folklore or force unexplained encounters into a sensational explanation.
It’s to investigate what people are actually reporting.
Some encounters may have ordinary explanations. Others involve genuinely strange or disturbing human behavior. And occasionally there simply isn’t enough evidence to determine exactly what happened.
The Human Factor
People tend to think about outdoor danger in terms of animals—bears, mountain lions, venomous snakes and feral hogs.
But one of the recurring lessons of Dark Outdoors has been that some of the strangest—and potentially most dangerous—encounters in remote places involve other human beings.
That doesn’t mean every person living in the wilderness is dangerous. There are countless legitimate reasons someone might be deep in the backcountry.
But awareness matters.
If you encounter someone behaving strangely in an isolated area, you don’t have to solve the mystery. Maintain distance, trust your instincts and remove yourself from the situation if something doesn’t feel right.
Hear the Oklahoma Account
So who was the person detected from that helicopter, and what were they doing in the Oklahoma wilderness?
We make no extraordinary claims about the answer.
But the circumstances surrounding the encounter are strange enough to deserve examination.
In 1997, my wife Lisa and I were driving to Pasadena, Texas, to visit a friend when we came upon a scene we would never forget. Police and investigators had converged near a retention pond, and although we knew something serious had happened, we had no idea what we had just driven into.
Laura Smither
We would soon learn that the body of 12-year-old Laura Smither, who had disappeared while jogging near her Friendswood home, had been discovered there that very day. Nearly three decades later, I returned to that moment for a new episode of Dark Outdoors® and began digging into Laura’s case, serial killer William Reece and the disturbing history of the Texas Killing Fields. What I found takes the story far beyond what Lisa and I witnessed that heartbreaking day that still has an impact on both of us.
I’m not going to tell the rest of that story here. I want you to hear it the way it was meant to be told. Listen to the new episode of Dark Outdoors® for our personal connection to the Laura Smither case and a deeper investigation into the Texas Killing Fields.
Follow and subscribe to Dark Outdoors® so you don’t miss what’s coming next—because the outdoors has a dark side.
And the timing of this episode could hardly be more remarkable. Just as it was being released, one of the most infamous chapters in Texas Killing Fields history suddenly produced major news after more than four decades.
Breaking News From the Texas Killing Fields
On Sept. 2, 2026, a Galveston County jury found James Dolphs Elmore Jr. guilty of manslaughter in the death of 16-year-old Laura Miller. The following day, Elmore was sentenced to 20 years in prison, the maximum punishment for the charge.
Miller disappeared in 1984, and her remains were discovered 17 months later in the infamous Calder Road field in League City. She was one of four women whose bodies were found at that location between 1984 and 1991, along with Heidi Fye-Villareal, Audrey Cook and Donna Prudhomme.
The Elmore verdict is historic. More than four decades after Miller disappeared, he became the first person convicted in connection with the death of any of the four women whose bodies were discovered at the Calder Road site.
The development puts new attention on cases that have haunted the Houston-Galveston area for decades. The term “Texas Killing Fields” has been applied more broadly to a string of murders and disappearances involving girls and young women along the Interstate 45 corridor between Houston and Galveston. Authorities have investigated numerous cases in the region, and the evidence has pointed not toward one predator responsible for everything, but potentially multiple killers operating across different periods.
That is one of the things that makes the history of this region so disturbing.
Where Civilization Meets Isolation
The geography itself is part of the story. Interstate 45 runs through heavily populated communities, but not far from the freeway are marshes, bayous, fields, industrial areas, drainage systems and isolated stretches of road. Development and wild country can exist remarkably close together.
For most people, these are simply pieces of the Gulf Coast landscape. For someone with predatory intentions, however, an isolated road or forgotten field can offer something entirely different: access, concealment and a quick route back toward a major highway and millions of people.
That is also why this story belongs on Dark Outdoors®.
We often think of outdoor danger in terms of wildlife. Bears, mountain lions, sharks and venomous snakes command our attention because they represent predators we instinctively understand. Yet some of the darkest stories connected to woods, marshes, trails, rural roads and isolated places involve a very different kind of predator.
Human beings.
The Texas Killing Fields are an extreme example of what can happen along that boundary between civilization and isolation. You don’t necessarily have to travel deep into wilderness to become vulnerable. Sometimes the darkness exists only a few turns off a busy highway.
A Story That Isn’t Over
The conviction of James Elmore is a reminder that even after four decades, investigators and families have not necessarily reached the end of these stories. Advances in forensic science, renewed investigations and people willing to keep asking questions can bring movement to cases that once seemed destined to remain mysteries.
There are still unanswered questions surrounding the Texas Killing Fields, and there are families who have waited decades for answers. The Calder Road cases represent only one part of a much larger and darker history along the I-45 corridor.
For me, though, this story will always lead back to that day in 1997 when Lisa and I drove toward Pasadena and unexpectedly found ourselves on the edge of something terrible. At the time, we didn’t understand what we were seeing or how that moment connected to a much larger story.
Nearly 30 years later, I went back to it.
Hear that story—and much more—in the new episode of Dark Outdoors®.
I’ve spent a large portion of my life going into places most people would consider remote.
I’ve traveled into mountain country looking for wildlife, walked swamps and forests, spent countless hours around Gulf Coast marshes and ventured into isolated areas with cameras, fishing rods and sometimes nothing more than curiosity and a desire to see what was around the next bend.
One thing I’ve learned is that the outdoors usually gives you information before it gives you trouble.
The problem is we’re not always paying attention.
Situational awareness isn’t about walking through the woods afraid of everything that moves. In fact, fear can make you less observant because you’re interpreting every sound as a threat. Awareness means understanding what should be happening around you well enough to notice when something doesn’t fit.
Here are five things I don’t ignore when I’m in remote country.
1. Human Activity That Doesn’t Match the Location
This is probably at the top of my list.
If I’m somewhere genuinely remote and suddenly start seeing an unusual amount of human sign, I pay attention. A few boot tracks aren’t concerning. Neither are ATV tracks in an area where people commonly ride or hunters have access.
It’s the context that matters.
A heavily traveled trail in a place where there shouldn’t be much foot traffic gets my attention. So do repeated vehicle tracks leading into an isolated area, makeshift camps in unusual locations, large amounts of trash or other evidence suggesting people are spending considerable time somewhere that doesn’t seem to have an obvious recreational purpose.
I learned this lesson firsthand when I once stumbled into an area associated with a meth lab.
That changed the way I view human sign in remote places.
I’ve spent much of my career writing about wildlife capable of hurting people, but an encounter with a criminal who thinks you’ve discovered something you shouldn’t have can be far more unpredictable than an encounter with an animal.
I don’t investigate suspicious activity simply because I’m curious. If something genuinely doesn’t look right, creating distance is usually a better option than finding out exactly what is happening.
2. Wildlife Suddenly Acting Differently
Wild animals notice things long before we do.
Anyone who hunts understands this. A deer staring intensely into cover has probably detected something. Birds giving alarm calls might be responding to a predator. Squirrels barking repeatedly aren’t necessarily upset about you.
I pay particular attention when several animals seem focused on the same area.
That doesn’t mean Bigfoot is standing behind the nearest oak tree. There are plenty of perfectly ordinary explanations. A bobcat, coyote, fox, snake, hawk or human can change the behavior of animals around it.
The important thing isn’t immediately identifying what’s causing the reaction. It’s recognizing that something has changed.
People sometimes talk about the woods suddenly becoming completely silent as if it is proof that a major predator is nearby. Nature isn’t quite that simple. Temperature, weather, time of day and countless other factors influence animal and insect activity.
But if I’ve been listening to normal woodland activity and there is an obvious behavioral shift around me, I’m going to notice it.
The animals might know something I don’t.
3. Fresh Predator Sign Where I Didn’t Expect It
Finding a predator track doesn’t automatically mean you’re in danger.
I’ve photographed and studied predators for decades, and one of the biggest mistakes people make is assuming the presence of a predator means an attack is imminent. Most wild predators want absolutely nothing to do with us.
Still, fresh sign deserves attention.
A bear track around a campground means something different than an old track several miles down a trail. Fresh mountain lion sign near a kill deserves considerably more attention than an isolated print. Coyote tracks are common across huge portions of America, but repeated sign around a campsite where food has been left accessible tells you something about animal behavior.
The details matter.
How fresh is the sign? Is there food nearby? Are there cubs or young animals involved? Is the animal repeatedly using the same location? Does it appear to be associating people with food?
I don’t panic when I find predator sign.
I use it as information.
Knowing what’s sharing the country with you allows you to make better decisions about what you do next.
4. Something That Has Been Deliberately Hidden
This one immediately gets my attention.
There is a difference between finding something somebody lost and finding something somebody obviously didn’t want discovered.
An abandoned backpack beside a popular trail might have an innocent explanation. Something carefully concealed deep in brush is different. So are containers, equipment or other objects deliberately hidden in places where they don’t seem to belong.
I don’t start opening things.
There are too many possibilities, and some of them aren’t good.
The object could be related to hunting or someone’s legitimate outdoor activity. It could be old trash. It could also be connected to illegal activity, hazardous material or something authorities would rather have examined without somebody handling it first.
I’ve always had a strong investigative streak. It’s part of what led me into journalism and wildlife work in the first place.
Remote country, however, is not the place to let curiosity override common sense.
If someone went through considerable effort to make sure an object wasn’t easily seen, I don’t assume they were hoping I’d come along and investigate it.
5. My Own Instinct That Something Has Changed
This one is difficult to quantify, but I don’t dismiss it.
People sometimes describe getting a strange feeling in the woods. The hair stands up on the back of their neck. They suddenly feel watched or simply become convinced something isn’t right.
That doesn’t mean anything paranormal is happening.
Our brains constantly process information we’re not consciously concentrating on. Maybe you heard a sound that didn’t register clearly. Perhaps movement occurred at the edge of your peripheral vision. Maybe the normal background noise changed, or you noticed a smell you couldn’t immediately identify.
Sometimes your brain puts those pieces together before your conscious mind does.
I’ve learned not to automatically dismiss that reaction.
At the same time, I don’t let imagination take control. Being alone in darkness can make an ordinary raccoon sound enormous, and exhaustion can make familiar surroundings feel completely different.
The key is using that feeling as a reason to become more observant rather than more frightened.
Stop for a moment and look around. Listen. Check the wind. Look behind you. Pay attention to what wildlife is doing and see whether there is anything tangible that explains why your level of awareness suddenly increased.
Maybe you’ll discover nothing.
That’s fine.
Situational awareness isn’t about proving that danger exists. It’s about noticing potential danger early enough that you still have options.
Pay Attention to What Doesn’t Fit
The outdoors isn’t inherently sinister.
I’ve spent enough time in wild places to know the overwhelming majority of strange sounds, tracks and movements eventually have completely natural explanations. An unexplained scream might be a fox. Eyes glowing beyond the fire could belong to a raccoon. The huge animal crashing through brush might turn out to be an armadillo making considerably more noise than something that size should be capable of producing.
But I’ve also learned not to ignore things simply because I can’t immediately explain them.
The most important outdoor skill isn’t necessarily shooting, tracking, fire building or navigation, although all of those can matter tremendously.
Sometimes it’s simply paying attention.
Notice the trail that shouldn’t have that much traffic. Watch the animals that suddenly become alarmed. Examine the fresh tracks before walking farther. Don’t handle the object somebody obviously tried to conceal, and don’t automatically dismiss the internal warning telling you to pay closer attention.
You don’t have to be afraid of remote country to respect it.
You just have to remember that when you’re miles from the nearest road, noticing something five minutes earlier can make a tremendous difference in what happens next.
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Reports of black panthers have circulated through Texas for generations. From the Pineywoods to South Texas, people have described large, long-tailed black cats crossing roads, slipping through creek bottoms and appearing in places where conventional wildlife wisdom says they shouldn’t exist.
Most of these encounters leave little behind beyond a story. But occasionally a report comes from an experienced outdoorsman who gets a good enough look at the animal to make the account difficult to casually dismiss. My friend David Cleaver had one of those encounters, and what he describes sounds remarkably like one of the most impressive cats on Earth—a black jaguar.
Hear David’s complete firsthand account on the new Dark Outdoors® episode “Black Ghost: A Texas Jaguar Encounter” on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
David is a dedicated outdoorsman and hiker, and I consider him a highly reliable witness. His encounter wasn’t simply a fleeting glimpse of something dark disappearing into the brush. He describes a large black feline whose size, build and overall appearance didn’t match the animals normally encountered in Texas.
The possibility of a jaguar deserves consideration because jaguars aren’t strangers to Texas. They are part of our natural history and once occurred in the state. Texas Parks and Wildlife Department information lists the jaguar as endangered and considers it possibly extirpated in Texas, while acknowledging the possibility of a rare wandering animal arriving from Mexico.
That is a long way from saying jaguars are secretly breeding somewhere in Texas. There is no evidence of that. But an individual jaguar wandering into the state is biologically possible, and jaguars have continued to appear north of Mexico in the American Southwest.
But What About a Black Jaguar?
This is where David’s encounter becomes especially mysterious.
Black jaguars are real. Melanism can produce jaguars that appear almost completely black, although their characteristic rosette pattern can often still be seen under the right lighting.
There is a significant problem, however, with putting one in Texas. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reports that melanistic jaguars have never been documented north of Mexico’s Isthmus of Tehuantepec. A black jaguar appearing in Texas would therefore be an extraordinary occurrence requiring extraordinary evidence.
So what are people seeing when they report black panthers in Texas?
There probably isn’t a single answer. Some sightings undoubtedly involve domestic cats, dogs, otters or other animals seen under poor conditions. Mountain lions can also appear extremely dark in certain light, although there is no scientifically documented population of truly black mountain lions.
But that doesn’t mean every report should automatically be discarded.
I’ve investigated unusual wildlife reports for years, and I’ve learned that the important questions are often simple ones: Who saw the animal? How close were they? How long did they see it? What characteristics could they clearly identify? And how experienced is the witness with wildlife?
David Cleaver’s encounter deserves to be considered in that light.
I can’t tell you that David saw a black jaguar. There is no photograph, DNA or other physical evidence that could prove what the animal was. But knowing David and hearing the details of his encounter, I believe he saw something extraordinary.
And considering that jaguars once roamed Texas, the possibility of an occasional big cat appearing where we least expect it is a mystery worth investigating.
I can’t tell you that David saw a black jaguar. There is no photograph, DNA or other physical evidence that could prove what the animal was. But knowing David and hearing the details of his encounter, I believe he saw something extraordinary.
Jaguars once roamed Texas. Whether one of their darkest forms could ever return is another question entirely.
For now, the black ghost remains just that—a mystery.
Chester Moore
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Most people walk into parks, trails and open country looking for something positive.
Maybe it’s a few miles of exercise, a chance to photograph wildlife or simply an opportunity to get away from traffic and noise. Hikers look for overlooks. Hunters notice tracks. Birders watch the trees. Those of us who have spent our lives outdoors develop a habit of looking at the ground for tracks, sheds, feathers and anything else that catches our attention.
Christine Ross was simply walking her dog, Ruca, across Albuquerque’s West Mesa on Feb. 2, 2009, when something caught her attention.
It was a bone protruding from an earthen trail.
Ross photographed it and sent the image to her sister, a registered nurse, who thought it looked like a human femur. Ross contacted the Albuquerque Police Department, and investigators soon confirmed the bone was human.
Then they started searching.
Police searching at the site.
What they eventually uncovered was almost incomprehensible. The skeletal remains of 11 women and an unborn child had been buried in makeshift graves across the mesa.
An ordinary walk outdoors had led directly into what became the largest crime scene in Albuquerque history.
For anyone who hikes, camps, hunts, fishes or explores remote country, there is something particularly disturbing about that.
When a Trail Becomes a Crime Scene
I’ve spent much of my life exploring places most people would consider remote, and one of the things I’ve learned is that wild and undeveloped landscapes can conceal things remarkably well.
Anyone who has tried to follow a blood trail through thick brush understands how quickly something can disappear. Hunters sometimes walk within yards of a downed deer without seeing it. A backpack dropped into thick vegetation can vanish from sight. An abandoned vehicle can sit surprisingly close to a road while trees and brush make it almost invisible.
Now imagine what time can do.
Vegetation grows. Rain moves soil. Wind changes exposed ground. Animals disturb objects and remains. Trails appear and disappear. Development changes access to places that were once isolated.
The outdoors doesn’t care whether something is evidence.
It simply keeps changing.
That’s one reason wilderness and undeveloped areas can become incredibly difficult crime scenes. A person can disappear into country that doesn’t look particularly intimidating on a map and become extraordinarily difficult to locate.
The West Mesa case demonstrates that in the darkest possible way.
They Were Beneath the Landscape
The remains discovered during the West Mesa investigation belonged to Monica Candelaria, Victoria Chavez, Virginia Cloven, Syllannia Edwards, Cinnamon Elks, Doreen Marquez, Julie Nieto, Veronica Romero, Evelyn Salazar, Michelle Valdez and Jamie Barela. Valdez was pregnant, and the remains of her unborn child were recovered with her.
Two of the victims, Syllannia Edwards and Jamie Barela, were only 15 years old.
These women had disappeared years before Christine Ross walked across the mesa with Ruca. Police believe their deaths were homicides, but the person responsible has never been identified.
That means people had undoubtedly passed through the broader landscape without realizing what was there.
I find that aspect of the case almost as disturbing as the discovery itself.
We tend to think that if something terrible happened near a trail, park or outdoor recreation area, somebody would notice. Surely a hiker would see something. Maybe a hunter would stumble across evidence or someone walking a dog would smell or notice something unusual.
Sometimes that happens.
Sometimes it takes years.
Why Remote Places Attract More Than Outdoorsmen
Isolation is one of the things we seek when we go outdoors.
It’s why people backpack into wilderness areas instead of walking around city blocks. It’s why hunters travel deep into national forests and why fishermen launch boats into places where they won’t see another person all morning.
We want solitude.
Unfortunately, there are people who seek isolation for very different reasons.
I’ve written before about the importance of paying attention to unusual human activity in remote country. I once stumbled into an area associated with a meth lab, and that experience permanently changed the way I view certain signs in the woods.
The overwhelming majority of people you encounter outdoors are simply doing the same thing you are. They’re hiking, fishing, hunting, camping, working or enjoying the land.
But criminals understand geography, too.
A secluded road can provide privacy. An isolated trail means fewer witnesses. Undeveloped property can offer places where vehicles aren’t immediately noticed. Deserts, forests and swamps can conceal evidence in ways an urban environment cannot.
That’s not a reason to be frightened every time you enter the woods.
It’s a reason to pay attention.
Hikers Find Things
There’s an interesting reality surrounding outdoor recreation that doesn’t receive much attention.
Hikers, hunters, fishermen and other outdoorsmen sometimes become accidental evidence finders.
Think about where we go.
Hunters deliberately leave established trails and move through brush where most people never walk. Shed hunters spend hours staring at the ground searching for pieces of bone. Anglers follow creeks into isolated areas. Wildlife photographers explore places where animals concentrate. Hikers investigate old trails, overlooks and forgotten roads.
We’re looking at places other people aren’t.
That’s why outdoorsmen occasionally discover abandoned vehicles, clothing, weapons, personal belongings and human remains associated with missing-person and criminal investigations.
Most of the bones you find outdoors will obviously belong to wildlife. Deer remains are common in many areas. So are hogs, livestock and countless smaller animals.
But every once in a while, someone realizes the bone they’re looking at doesn’t belong to an animal.
At that point, everything changes.
Don’t Become the Investigator
If you ever encounter something outdoors that you genuinely believe could be human remains, your job isn’t to solve the mystery.
Don’t start collecting bones.
Don’t rearrange objects so you can photograph them better. Don’t search pockets, move clothing or start digging to see whether anything else is underneath.
Leave the scene as you found it and contact law enforcement.
There are several reasons for this.
First, you may be looking at a crime scene. Objects that appear completely insignificant could have evidentiary value investigators understand better than you do.
Second, where something is located can matter as much as the object itself. Moving evidence destroys information about its original position.
And finally, you don’t know what happened there.
An isolated set of remains could belong to someone who became lost or suffered a medical emergency. It could be a suicide, accident or homicide. Until investigators determine what occurred, treating the location carefully protects both the investigation and the person whose remains you’ve discovered.
Take note of where you are so authorities can find the location, back away and make the call from somewhere safe.
What Else Is Still Out There?
The West Mesa case contains another element that should interest anyone who spends time in wild or undeveloped country.
Investigators have identified additional missing women they believe could potentially be connected to the case.
That raises an obvious and unsettling question.
Could there be another burial site?
Police have conducted searches in other areas during the years since the original discovery, but the murders remain unsolved.
That’s one of the harsh realities of missing-person investigations involving outdoor environments. Searchers can cover enormous areas and still miss something.
I’ve participated in enough outdoor activities to understand how deceptive terrain can be. You can look across an open area and think you can see everything, but depressions, vegetation and changes in elevation create countless blind spots.
Put the same problem into thick timber, mountainous terrain or swamp and the difficulty increases dramatically.
Searching isn’t simply walking through an area and looking around.
Sometimes what you’re searching for is only feet away and still invisible.
A Dog Found What Everyone Else Had Missed
That’s why I keep coming back to Ruca.
A dog walking across the mesa noticed something protruding from the ground.
That one discovery changed everything.
Had Christine Ross taken another route that day, someone else might eventually have found the remains. Development might have exposed them. Weather could have uncovered additional evidence.
But we don’t know when that would have happened.
A memorial to the women of West Mesa.
The landscape had already concealed the victims for years.
Today, the burial area has been transformed. Albuquerque dedicated Women’s Memorial Park there in 2020, creating a place that remembers the women whose remains were discovered beneath the mesa.
Their names deserve to be remembered: Monica Candelaria, Victoria Chavez, Virginia Cloven, Syllannia Edwards, Cinnamon Elks, Doreen Marquez, Julie Nieto, Veronica Romero, Evelyn Salazar, Michelle Valdez and Jamie Barela.
They weren’t simply part of a famous crime scene.
They were people.
Remember This the Next Time You’re on a Trail
I don’t tell stories like West Mesa to make people afraid of parks, trails or wild places.
Quite the opposite. I’ve devoted my life to getting people outdoors.
But I also believe outdoorsmen should understand the environments we enter, including the darker possibilities.
Pay attention to what you see.
If you encounter an abandoned pack in an unusual location, don’t immediately start rummaging through it. If you find clothing or personal belongings scattered somewhere that doesn’t make sense, remember the location. If you discover something that could be human remains, don’t disturb it.
And if you encounter human activity in remote country that seems completely inconsistent with the location, there’s nothing wrong with turning around.
Most strange things we encounter outdoors have innocent explanations. Most bones belong to animals. Most abandoned objects are simply trash somebody should have carried out.
But “most” isn’t “all.”
On Feb. 2, 2009, Christine Ross went outside with her dog for a walk.
Ruca found a bone.
Police eventually found 11 women and an unborn child.
It’s difficult to imagine a darker reminder that sometimes the landscape beneath our hiking boots contains stories we cannot see.
Chester Moore
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The New World screwworm doesn’t simply feed on something that’s already dead. Its larvae invade wounds and feed on the living flesh of warm-blooded animals.
That disturbing fact is part of what made the parasite such a nightmare for American ranchers and wildlife managers before it was eradicated from the United States decades ago. Now, in 2026, New World screwworm has returned to the U.S. mainland, and the battle to stop it has taken on new urgency.
But what if one of the next weapons against this flesh-eating parasite isn’t simply more traps, treatments or sterile flies?
What if it’s genetics?
That’s the subject of Episode 80 of the Dark Outdoors podcast, featuring a conversation between Chester Moore and Matt James of Colossal Biosciences about the potential for advanced genetic technologies to become part of the fight against New World screwworm.
For generations, one of the most effective weapons against New World screwworm has been the sterile insect technique.
Enormous numbers of sterile male flies are produced and released into areas where the parasite is present. Females that mate with those sterile males produce no viable offspring, allowing authorities to suppress the population.
It was an extraordinary biological weapon against an extraordinary parasite, and sterile insect releases remain central to the fight today.
But biotechnology has advanced dramatically since the original screwworm eradication campaign.
Colossal Biosciences has publicly discussed the potential for genetic biocontrol and gene-drive technology to be applied to New World screwworm. Instead of relying exclusively on repeated releases of sterile flies, advanced genetic techniques could potentially introduce traits designed to interfere with reproduction and spread those traits through a population.
That possibility is at the center of Moore’s conversation with James.
The discussion examines what these emerging technologies might mean, how genetics could potentially complement existing eradication methods and where the science could go from here.
Wildlife Could Pay the Price
This parasite is often discussed as a livestock problem, but cattle aren’t the only animals at risk.
New World screwworm can infest warm-blooded animals when female flies lay eggs in wounds. That puts wildlife in a particularly difficult position because wild animals can’t be routinely inspected the way livestock can.
A deer injured while fighting, a wild sheep wounded on the landscape or another animal suffering even a relatively small injury could potentially become infested.
The United States has already seen what screwworm can do to wildlife.
When New World screwworm appeared in the Florida Keys in 2016, endangered Key deer were hit hard. That outbreak remains an important warning about what can happen when the parasite reaches a vulnerable wildlife population.
The return of screwworm to the U.S. mainland makes the development of every effective control tool worth watching.
Genetics and the Future of Conservation
The larger question explored in Episode 80 goes beyond screwworm.
Modern biotechnology is creating possibilities for wildlife conservation that would have sounded like science fiction not long ago. Scientists are exploring genetics as a way to preserve endangered species, restore genetic diversity and address biological threats.
Screwworm turns that idea around.
Could some of the same rapidly advancing genetic technologies being considered to help wildlife also be used against an organism capable of devastating wildlife and livestock?
There are enormous scientific and ecological questions surrounding these technologies, and no single approach replaces the proven methods already being used against this parasite.
But the possibilities are fascinating.
The New World screwworm is back.
Could genetics help send it away again?
Listen to Dark Outdoors Episode 80: “Can Genetics Stop the Screwworm? A New Weapon Against a Flesh-Eating Parasite” on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Related Dark Outdoors Screwworm Coverage
New World Screwworm Resource Center Follow Dark Outdoors’ continuing coverage of the screwworm threat, wildlife implications, interviews and new developments.
Texas Faces Screwworm. The Key Deer Did 10 Years Ago Chester Moore talks with Dr. Roel Lopez about the devastating 2016 Key deer outbreak and what that experience could teach us about protecting wildlife today.
Flesh-Eating Screwworm Is A Huge Threat — And It’s Back In America Legendary wildlife biologist Larry Weishuhn discusses his firsthand experience with screwworm and why the parasite’s return deserves serious attention.
Dark Outdoors investigates terrifying encounters, unsolved mysteries, true crime and dangerous wildlife.
Hosted by award-winning wildlife journalist Chester Moore, the podcast explores the stories, threats and mysteries found where people and the wild intersect.
Because the outdoors has a dark side.
Chester Moore
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There are certain things you expect to find when you get deep into wild country. Game trails winding through timber are normal, as are tracks from hunters, hikers and fishermen in places where people have legitimate reasons to travel. An old logging road cutting through a forest or ATV tracks on public land aren’t automatically anything to worry about.
But sometimes the amount of human activity doesn’t match the location, and that’s when I start paying attention.
One of the most important outdoor safety lessons I can give anyone who spends time hiking, hunting, fishing, photographing wildlife or exploring remote country is to notice human sign that doesn’t make sense. If you’re miles from where you would expect much activity and suddenly encounter heavily worn footpaths, repeated tire or ATV tracks, unusual amounts of trash or makeshift camps in strange locations, don’t automatically assume you’ve discovered an interesting place to explore. There might be a perfectly innocent explanation, but sometimes the smartest move you can make outdoors is turning around.
I’ve learned that firsthand. Years ago, I was exploring an area when I began noticing things that didn’t fit. There was too much evidence of people for the location, and eventually I found out why. I had stumbled into an area associated with a meth lab.
That experience permanently changed the way I look at human sign in isolated places. Wildlife gets most of the attention when outdoor danger is discussed, but I’ve spent decades investigating dangerous wildlife encounters and strange situations in the woods, and some of the circumstances that concern me most involve people. A bear generally has a reason for what it does, and so does a venomous snake. A criminal who believes you’ve discovered something you weren’t supposed to see introduces an entirely different kind of danger.
When Human Sign Doesn’t Fit
People who learn tracking are usually taught to look for wildlife sign. Tracks, scat, rubs, beds and feeding activity can reveal an incredible amount about what animals are doing in an area, but I think outdoorsmen should learn to read human sign as well.
Context is everything. A well-used trail half a mile from a popular campground isn’t unusual, and tire tracks around a hunting lease during deer season aren’t mysterious. Beer cans around an easily accessible fishing hole might be disgusting, but they’re unfortunately not surprising. The situation changes when you’re deep in an isolated area where the amount or type of activity seems completely out of proportion with the surroundings.
Maybe you’re following an obscure trail and discover another path that looks far more heavily traveled than anything around it. Perhaps repeated vehicle tracks lead somewhere that doesn’t appear to have any recreational reason for traffic. You might find discarded supplies, unusual camps or other evidence suggesting people are spending substantial amounts of time in a place where you wouldn’t expect anyone to be.
None of those things automatically means criminal activity is occurring, and that’s important to remember. There can be perfectly innocent explanations for unusual activity in the woods, and you shouldn’t convince yourself that every piece of trash or tire track belongs to some criminal operation. At the same time, you aren’t obligated to satisfy your curiosity and find out what’s at the end of every strange trail.
That’s probably the biggest lesson I took from my own experience. When something doesn’t feel right, you don’t win anything by discovering exactly what’s happening.
You Don’t Need to Investigate
There is a natural tendency among outdoorsmen to explore. That’s part of why we’re out there in the first place. We want to know what’s over the next ridge, where an old logging road goes or what is around the next bend in a creek. I’ve built much of my career around that same curiosity.
But there are times when curiosity can get you into serious trouble.
If you encounter something that genuinely causes you to suspect illegal activity in a remote location, create distance and get out. You don’t need photographs, you don’t need to walk another hundred yards to see where the trail goes, and you certainly don’t need to confront anyone. Once you’re somewhere safe, authorities can determine whether what you saw deserves investigation.
Illegal activity in wild places isn’t limited to one thing. Over the years, law enforcement agencies have encountered clandestine drug operations, illegal marijuana grows, smuggling activity, stolen property and other criminal enterprises in isolated outdoor areas. Remote country provides exactly what criminals sometimes want: fewer witnesses and less chance of somebody accidentally wandering through.
The problem is that outdoorsmen do wander through. Hunters follow game, anglers explore creeks, wildlife photographers move off established routes looking for animals and hikers wonder where old trails lead. That sense of exploration is one of the things I love most about the outdoors, but it also means we can accidentally enter places where someone desperately doesn’t want visitors.
The Dark Side of Illegal Grows
Illegal growing operations provide a particularly disturbing example.
The marijuana landscape has changed dramatically in America, but legalization in various states did not make illegal grows disappear. Unauthorized cultivation has continued on public and private lands, and some operations have been associated with organized criminal activity. These sites can also have serious environmental consequences involving habitat destruction, trash, water diversion and chemicals that threaten wildlife and waterways.
For the person who accidentally discovers one, however, the immediate concern is much simpler: Who is protecting it?
I’ve collected frightening accounts involving people who encountered growing operations or suspicious activity in remote country. One of the areas that inevitably comes up in discussions of this subject is Northern California’s so-called “Murder Mountain” region, which became internationally known through the Netflix documentary series examining disappearances, crime and the underground marijuana economy surrounding Humboldt County.
One of the stories we’ve discussed through Dark Outdoors involves an encounter near that infamous region. Another account involved something that sounds like it came straight out of a horror movie—a trained dog being sent after a hiker who had discovered a growing area.
Think about how quickly the normal rules of outdoor safety change in that situation. You’re hiking through the woods, realize you’ve walked into someplace you probably shouldn’t be and suddenly your concern isn’t a mountain lion, bear or rattlesnake. It’s a dog being deliberately used against you by another human being.
That is an entirely different category of outdoor threat.
Sometimes People Are the Biggest Danger
A major part of what I do with Dark Outdoors involves examining the things that can go wrong beyond the pavement. Some of those stories involve wildlife, and I’ve investigated animal attacks and encounters with bears, sharks, big cats, venomous animals and other creatures capable of seriously injuring or killing a person.
I respect those threats, but wildlife behavior often has patterns we can learn. We can study bear behavior and understand circumstances that increase the potential for conflict. We can learn where venomous snakes are likely to be encountered. We can study how mountain lions hunt and what might cause one to behave unusually around people. Knowledge doesn’t eliminate danger, but it gives us tools for reducing risk.
Human beings are harder to predict.
Someone protecting an illegal operation might be frightened you’re going to report them. They might be under the influence of drugs. They might be armed, desperate, paranoid or violent, and you have no way of knowing what you’re dealing with.
That’s why recognizing the situation before you walk into the middle of it matters so much.
Read the Country Around You
I believe strongly in situational awareness outdoors. That means occasionally stopping and actually looking at what’s around you instead of moving constantly toward your destination.
Ask yourself what has changed. Are you suddenly seeing more human tracks? Is there vehicle traffic where you wouldn’t expect it? Has a barely visible trail become heavily worn? Are there signs people are staying in an isolated area for extended periods? Does something simply seem out of place?
None of these observations should turn you into a paranoid wreck every time you go into the woods. Millions of people enjoy America’s wild places without encountering anything remotely like an illegal operation. The point isn’t to be afraid of every footprint you find. The point is to remain aware of your surroundings and recognize when the evidence around you doesn’t fit the location.
Outdoorsmen already use this kind of thinking constantly. A deer hunter notices a fresh scrape and starts considering how recently a buck passed through. A fisherman sees nervous bait along a shoreline and starts looking for predators. A turkey hunter finds tracks crossing a road and knows birds are using the area. A wildlife photographer hears alarm calls and realizes something has disturbed the animals nearby.
We recognize patterns because patterns tell us what’s happening around us. Human patterns deserve the same attention.
Don’t Let Curiosity Make the Decision
I understand the temptation to investigate something strange better than most. My career has been built around asking questions, investigating wildlife mysteries, following unusual reports and going places where interesting things have happened. Dark Outdoors itself exists partly because I’m fascinated by the things that happen beyond the edges of normal civilization.
But there is a difference between investigating a story and blindly walking into a potentially dangerous situation.
If you’re alone in remote country and discover convincing signs that something illegal might be occurring, you aren’t law enforcement and you aren’t obligated to solve the mystery. Back out the way you came if that’s the safest route, avoid confrontation and don’t announce your presence. Don’t handle suspicious materials or enter structures simply to see what’s inside. Once you’re safely away, provide authorities with whatever useful information you can remember about the location and what you observed.
There is no discovery or story worth getting hurt over, and there is certainly no reason to risk a confrontation simply because you want to know what’s at the end of a trail.
The Trail That Doesn’t Belong
I still love finding obscure trails. There is something irresistible about an old path disappearing into timber or a forgotten road cutting through country that looks like it hasn’t changed in decades. Those places are part of what makes exploring the outdoors special.
My experience stumbling into an area associated with a meth lab, however, taught me something I’ll never forget. Not every trail is there for hikers, not every camp belongs to hunters and not everyone who chooses an isolated location wants to be found.
So when you’re deep in remote country and the amount of human activity suddenly doesn’t match the surroundings, pay attention before allowing curiosity to pull you farther down the trail. Sometimes the most important sign in the woods isn’t a bear track, mountain lion print or the impression of a big snake crossing the trail.
It might be a human footprint in a place where you weren’t expecting to find one.
Dark Outdoors investigates terrifying encounters, unsolved mysteries, true crime and dangerous wildlife. Hear more accounts involving illegal operations and other frightening encounters from the backcountry at https://linktr.ee/darkoutdoorspodcast.
Because the outdoors has a dark side.
Chester Moore
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For decades, people along the Texas coast reported seeing strange, wolf-like animals roaming the beaches and marshes of Galveston Island. Most dismissed the sightings as coyotes.
They were only partially right.
In this episode of Dark Outdoors®, Chester Moore investigates one of the most remarkable wildlife mysteries in America and explores how it unexpectedly intersects with one of the biggest scientific stories of our time: de-extinction.
Listen to the Episode
Want to hear the full conversation about dire wolves, de-extinction, and the science and ethics surrounding Colossal Biosciences’ controversial project? Listen on your favorite platform:
From the groundbreaking work of Colossal Biosciences and the renewed public fascination with the dire wolf to the incredible discovery of the “Ghost Wolves” of Galveston Island—wild canids carrying rare red wolf ancestry thought to have been largely lost—this episode examines the science, the mystery, and the conservation implications behind these extraordinary animals.
How did these wolf-like canids survive unnoticed for so long?
Could their genetics help recover one of North America’s most endangered predators?
And what does the growing field of de-extinction mean for the future of wildlife conservation?
Join Chester as he separates myth from reality while exploring a story where eyewitness reports, cutting-edge genetics, and conservation collide in ways few could have imagined.
In This Episode:
The science behind de-extinction
Colossal Biosciences amazing dire wolf project
The mystery of Galveston’s Ghost Wolves
Red wolf genetics and hybridization
How local sightings led to a remarkable scientific discovery
What this means for the future of wildlife conservation
Sometimes the greatest mysteries of the outdoors aren’t solved by folklore—they’re solved by science. And sometimes, that truth is even more remarkable than the legend.
Follow Dark Outdoors for more investigations into wildlife, true crime, conservation, history, and the unexplained—where the natural world meets mystery.
Chester Moore
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