US Border News is bringing back our popular list of the spookiest legends and tales from the borderlands just in time for Halloween!
Growing up near the Texas Border, I heard my share of spooky tales but only encountered one of them myself - well, maybe.
La Lechuza (Barn Owl Witch):
I’ve seen my share of Las Lechuzas (which means barn owls in Spanish), but some of my more superstitious friends warned me I may have been in the company of witches (brujas). As the story goes, an old woman (a witch) shape-shifts into a giant owl, La Lechuza, to take revenge on people who wronged her during her life.
La Lechuza was so feared that a giant owl actually made headlines in South Texas during the 1970s for terrifying residents of Alice, Banquete, and Robstown (where the local paper reported she liked to hang out in a wooded area west of town near Bosquez Street and Rabb Road). Eventually, she flew off to the residents’ relief and reporters’ disappointment.
El Cucuy or El Coco (The Hispanic Boogeyman):
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El Cucuy (who goes by many names in Hispanic Culture on many continents, including our own) also has a special place in South Texas folklore. He is the Hispanic equivalent of the “Boogeyman” and is said to lurk in closets, under beds, or deep inside South Texas mesquite thickets with glowing red eyes. This “monster,” according to tradition, will come to the house of disobedient children at night and take them away.
El Chupacabra:
Which brings us to the more famous tales of the feared Chupacabra - which literally translates to “goat-sucker.” The chupacabra has been variously described as a strange breed of wild dog or a reptile that hops around like a kangaroo. Most tales of Texas Chupacabras favor the dog-like form. Whatever shape it takes, everyone agrees it seems to favor goats, from which it sucks their blood.
Texas A&M University claims to have solved the mystery of the Chupacabra in a scientific paper that says the creatures are actually coyotes with severe mange. Still, the legend persists.
La Jauría del Diablo (The Ghost Pack of San Benito):
Deep in the Resaca communities near San Benito and Brownsville, elders whisper about La Jauría del Diablo—the Devil’s Pack.
Unlike the Chupacabras, which acts as a solitary predator, these are spectral, pitch-black dogs in a pack, with eyes that glow like burning embers. They are said to be the transformed familiars of a coven of brujas who lived along the Rio Grande in the early 1900s.
You never hear them bark; instead, they run silently through the agricultural fields and dirt roads at night. If they cross your path, it means a curse has been placed on your family line, and hearing them “whisper” or whine outside your window means a relative has sold their soul.