Kicker: Mysterious mammal

NICK EICHER, HOST: Something strange is wandering the woods around Anchorage, Alaska. At first, some people mistook it for a moose, but it wasn’t a moose or a bear.

ROSS: I thought I smelled it the other day.

Anchorage resident Will Ross told KTUU television that an avid skier in the area named Eric encountered the mysterious mammal before he did.

ROSS: But he wasn’t able to take a picture of it, so it was kind of a myth.

Eric said no one believed him.

But Ross was able to snap a picture and finally get to the bottom of the mysterious sightings.

ROSS: It had just gotten dark and … it was a cow.

A large black cow named Betsy. As he later learned, Betsy is a 3-year-old rodeo cow who “busted out” of a pen at a Father’s Day Rodeo. And she’s been wandering and grazing on area trails ever since.

Rodeo promoter Frank Koloski told the Anchorage Daily News that he’s had crews out looking for Betsy, but he said he knows “deep down this cow doesn’t want to be caught.”

It’s The World and Everything in It.

(Photo/Associated Press,Meg Kurtagh) A rodeo cow named Betsy, pictured here on Dec. 26, 2018, has evaded capture for six months as she wanders the trails of Alaska’s biggest city. 

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.