Cattle Mutilations Phenomenon

Cattle mutilation refers to a pattern of livestock deaths, concentrated in the western United States from the mid-1970s onward, in which animals are found dead with specific organs missing, no blood at the scene, and no sign of struggle. Investigators recorded roughly 700 reported mutilations across 15 western states in the 18 months before January 1977¹, including more than 180 cases in Colorado in 1975 alone². Jacques Vallée said mutilations are often reported at the same time and in the same area as sightings of Unidentified Flying Objects (UFO)³, and identified three broad positions taken on the cases: that the animals died naturally and were mutilated by predators or isolated sensation-seekers; that a secret organisation was responsible, whether as part of a witchcraft cult or a secret government testing programme; or that UFOs and their occupants caused the mutilations⁴. Not every observer accepted that a mystery existed at all: James Stewart, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of South Dakota at Vermillion, said that belief in cattle mutilations was the result of collective delusion⁵.

Across the reported cases, investigators repeatedly noted the same features. Carcasses showed no evidence of struggle⁶, and there were no tracks or blood near the bodies, although circular depressions and pod-like marks were sometimes reported nearby⁷. The organs most often removed were the eyes, ears, tongue and genitals, organs associated with communication and reproduction⁸. Some carcasses showed evidence that the Rokitansky technique, a standard autopsy procedure for removing the viscera as a single unit, had been used⁹, and in one case a scalpel of ordinary military-surplus type was left at the scene¹⁰. Carl Whiteside, an investigator with the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, said the removal of sex organs and other body parts was definitely not made by predators¹¹, and later said that trying to catch the culprits was like chasing a ghost¹². Some carcasses appeared to have been airlifted and dropped in locations that maximised the chance of discovery¹³.

Sheriffs and investigators across several states described similarly puzzling incidents. Jim Hileman, sheriff of Adams County, Idaho, said he had been around livestock all his life and had never seen anything like the mutilations¹⁴. In Garfield County, Colorado, officer Hart disclosed that on 1975-09-13 a Hereford cow was found across the county line in Mesa County missing its sex organs, rectum and an ear¹⁵. George Yarnell, sheriff of Elbert County, Colorado, described his most memorable case as one in which an udder was neatly cleaned out and then tightly packed with several gallons of sand¹⁶. In California, Baron Hankes, a Mendocino Sheriffs Investigator, said after studying seven mutilated cattle in Mendocino between November 1976 and January 1977 that it was as if someone had wanted them to find the carcasses¹⁷. A Holstein calf was found mutilated on 1975-10-28 near Middleton, Idaho¹⁸; according to local law-enforcement authorities, its sexual organs, rectum and tongue had been removed¹⁹.

The heaviest concentration of incidents occurred in Colorado, clustered in Elbert County near a string of military installations including Ent Air Force Base, Fort Carson, the Lowry Air Force Base bombing range, the Buckley Air National Guard Base, the Rocky Mountain Arsenal and Rocky Flats²⁰. This cluster is now referred to as the 1975 Cheyenne Mountain area cattle mutilation wave. It included a cow due to calve within two months, mutilated on 1975-07-06 next to the entrance gate of North American Air Defense Command (NORAD) on a military reservation posted with prosecution warning signs²¹, and a female buffalo weighing approximately 680 kilograms, mutilated at Cheyenne Mountain Zoo on 1975-10-21, with an udder, an ear and about 0.4 square metres of hide removed and its vagina cut²². Frederick W. Smith, in his book Cattle Mutilation, described a mutilation at a hillside site directly overlooking the underground NORAD facility, which he said protected thousands of military buildings, hundreds of aircraft and helicopters, and approximately 20,000 soldiers²³. Vallée suggested that dropping a mutilated cow at the main entrance to NORAD might indicate that somebody was calling the government’s bluff on UFO censorship²⁴.

In September 1975, the largest force of law-enforcement manpower ever assembled in Colorado’s history was deployed to investigate the mutilations, and it failed to identify a single suspect²⁵; 60 officers from Nebraska, Wyoming and Colorado met in Fort Morgan, Colorado, to try to coordinate their efforts²⁶. In a news release dated 1975-09-18, Colorado Senator Floyd K. Haskell said he had discussed the mutilations with FBI Director Clarence Kelley and his chief assistant²⁷, but the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) concluded it had no jurisdiction to enter the case, since there was no evidence of interstate movement²⁸. The National Enquirer’s panel of UFO case investigators, drawn from leading civilian UFO research groups, decided that a link between UFOs and the mutilations was an idea whose time had not yet come²⁹. Decades later, according to the documentary The UFO Phenomenon, the FBI told an interviewer researching a book that there were 10,000 unsolved cattle mutilation cases across the United States³⁰; the phenomenon had become significant enough that congressmen demanded investigations by federal law enforcement³¹, which was never able to properly explain what had happened to the animals³².

Two rival theories circulated among investigators and ranchers. One held that a cult was responsible: prison inmate Albert K. Bankston wrote letters to authorities stating that he knew who the mutilators were, that they were members of a Satanic cult, and that he wanted to help arrest them but feared reprisals³³; under interrogation he said he had met a former Hell’s Angel in jail who referred to a secret organisation, the Occult (alleged Satanic cult), which Bankston said was responsible for the mutilations and used the animal organs in its rituals³⁴. Dan Dugan said the group also killed animals with tranquilizer pellets, took particular care not to leave tracks, and had discussed how authorities would eventually blame the killings on UFOs, which is what came to pass³⁵; he also gave investigators a list of names, including a Bell Helicopter employee already suspected of narcotics trafficking, burglary and fencing, an interest sharpened by frequent reports of unmarked helicopters at mutilation sites³⁶. According to Messengers of Deception, by late 1975 mutilation investigators agreed that cult involvement was more the exception than the rule, and that the real culprits were much more powerful³⁷. The rival theory pointed at the military: ranchers concluded it was responsible after repeatedly seeing flying objects resembling helicopters over the mutilation areas at night³⁸, and some began firing on helicopters leaving or returning to Fort Carson at low altitude, with several returning to base carrying bullets³⁹. It was never explained how a single group could be responsible for hundreds of incidents across several states⁴⁰; mutilations continued on stormy nights when helicopter flights would have been grounded by weather⁴¹, and ranchers kept nightly vigils, parking pickups on hilltops and staying in contact by citizen’s band radio⁴². Vallée said Major Murphy told him that the causes of human and cattle mutilations were not usually so simple⁴³, and Richard Dolan said that Richard D. Lamm called the mutilations “one of the greatest outrages in the history of the western cattle industry”⁴⁴ and that it was no longer possible to blame predators for them⁴⁵. According to Messengers of Deception, a preliminary intelligence report titled “Intelligence information regarding occult activities throughout the United States” was prepared in October 1975 for the US attorney in Minneapolis, and centred on cattle and human mutilations and their relationship to UFOs⁴⁶. More recent reports suggest the phenomenon continued outside the United States: in Australia, Mick Cook found a cow on his cattle station with an ear and part of a jowl surgically removed, with no blood on the hide⁴⁷, said he did not know of anyone able to remove a cow’s body part without blood everywhere⁴⁸, and observed no struggle marks at the site⁴⁹. Judy Cook said she considered the absence of struggle marks or blood at such sites to be unexplained⁵⁰; 15 of the Cooks’ cattle had died in similar circumstances since Mick Cook’s initial discovery, the most recent about eight months before the broadcast⁵¹, and Judy Cook said she believed the mutilations on her property were alien in origin⁵². More broadly, people across Australia have reported surgically precise cuts on animals that died in unexplained circumstances⁵³. One hypothesis for the pattern of organ removal centres on trace minerals: in cattle mutilation cases the liver, which has a high copper content, is often found missing⁵⁴, and bovine blood is rich in copper⁵⁵; Whitley Strieber said human blood has an even higher copper content than cattle blood, but believes the visitors avoid humans and use livestock instead⁵⁶. Vallée said the phenomenon remains unsolved⁵⁷.