Man Reports Anomalous Canid Print Found in Lake Como, Wisconsin

Photographs of the print taken by Pavlatos using his hand and foot for scale. "You can see the grass between my fingers just to show that it was actually on the ground, so there was no doubt about the depth of field in the photo," he said. *(Dave Pavlatos)*

Wisconsin resident Dave Pavlatos contacted The Singular Fortean Society recently to report a mysterious animal print he’d found in the unincorporated community of Lake Como on July 11th, 2008.

Lake Como is less than five miles south of Elkhorn, where sightings of the upright canid known as “The Beast of Bray Road” gained national attention in the 1990s, and within a dozen miles of well-known “dogman” sighting areas like Richard Bong State Recreation Area and the southernmost units of the Kettle Moraine State Forest.

Investigator Tobias Wayland interviewed Pavlatos over the phone, after which a written statement detailing the sighting was sent to The Singular Fortean Society.

According to Pavlatos, he had come across the print in the mud along a path leading to his dock on Lake Como in Wisconsin.

"My boat was at the dock and needed to be bailed out because it had rained the night before, this was something that I had to do every time it rained due to an ill-fitting boat cover," he said. "I had travelled from my rental property about an eighth of a mile away to where my dock was located, and was in a rush to bail out the boat and still make it to work on time. I had walked down the path to the boat and noticed a print in the mud right before stepping onto the dock…the area right before the dock was worn down to the mud due to it being the last step before stepping up onto the actual wooden pier. I looked down and almost stepped onto what I saw as a HUGE dog-looking print."

"I’m aware of what dog prints look like because I worked at a vet clinic in Chicago where we would make prints in clay of dogs that had been euthanized," added Pavlatos.

Pavlatos didn’t have a tape measure on him, so he placed first his foot and then his hand next to the print in an attempt to provide an accurate scale.

"The print itself was about two feet from the actual shoreline with it being parallel to the shore with a slight turn towards the water," he said. "[The photos] show that the print was seven and a half inches long and almost five inches wide, [and] the depth was about one inch. This was not made in soft earth due to, as I had said before, this being the last area to step before getting on the dock, so this was constantly stepped on and packed down. The make-up of the area was mud with some sand and small pieces of gravel."

By comparison, the largest tracks of any canid, those left by wolves, are about five inches long by four inches wide.

Gosling feathers were “all over the ground” near the print, added Pavlatos, although he “cannot confirm that this animal had anything to do with that.”

Prior to leaving for work, Pavlatos broke off some sticks to mark the location of the print, hoping that it wouldn't be stepped on and destroyed.

Then, impressed by the print's extraordinary size, he contacted the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (WDNR) once he got to work.

Pavlatos said he was told, "Don't worry about it," by the officer with whom he spoke.

However, he said, "I pressed the issue that this print was abnormally large and convinced him to look at the pictures I had taken, along with pictures I took at work measuring my hand’s length and width. Within an hour I received a phone call from the officer asking for the exact location of the dock and print."

Pavlatos followed up with phone calls and emails to the WDNR, but said he never received a response.

He was concerned about what kind of animal might have left the print, since even in his dog-friendly neighborhood, he had "never seen a dog that could have made a track like this one."

After work, Pavlatos went back to look for the track but it had been trampled, along with the sticks he had placed near it.

The next day, he showed the photos of the track to his neighbor, who, he said, "didn't seem overly concerned."

His neighbor did show him prints left by his 90-pound Rottweiler, and according to Pavlatos, "they weren't even close to the same size."

"He never offered any info on seeing anything out of the ordinary [in the area]," said Pavlatos.

When he showed the photos to his friend who worked at a bar within view of the dock and mentioned that he'd called the WDNR, his friend remarked that he'd seen a WDNR truck parked near the lake the morning after the print was found.

"I asked him if he talked to them and he said no," Pavlatos said. "He then said that if I had showed him the pics ahead of time he would have."

When investigator Tobias Wayland reached out to the WDNR, he was told by Nathan Holoubek, a wildlife biologist for the organization, that “The print is a dog print. The nail marks indicate that it is a canine, and the very rounded shape is characteristic of a domestic dog.”

No mention was made by Holoubek of the print’s size when explaining his determination.

But the anomalous canid print wasn’t the only unusual experience had by Pavlatos around that time.

The day before he found the print, Pavlatos said his house was shaken by a huge "boom" that he couldn't explain.

I was sitting in my living room watching TV with my Golden Retriever, Lou, when there was a huge “boom” on the other end of my house. The closest thing I can compare it to was like when a hockey player gets “slammed into the boards.”
I remember it startled me and my dog [to the point] where he immediately started barking and running to that end of the house, [and] I then got up and followed. I looked out the back patio doors that looked out over my extra lot that was all fenced in with a three-foot-high chain link fence. I did not see anything out there, so with my dog still barking, I decided to let him out.
My Golden was a typical Golden that thought every living thing was his friend and would chase after any furry creature, not to attack, but to make friends...people were a “great” thing to him as he thought every person was put on this earth with the duty to pet him...so he didn’t really ever show fear of approaching anything or anyone. But in this case I opened the door, he stepped out, then backed himself up into the house and continued to bark…not a vicious bark, but one of “alarm."
I was not that scared of what was going on...now if I had seen that track beforehand, my concern may have been greater. Later that night before going to bed I did load and walk out onto my back porch with my shotgun, pressing my back up to the house because I didn’t want to have my neighbors see me [and] think I might be a “nut."
I didn’t notice anything out there, nor did my dog act any differently than normal of ‘’doing his business’’ and running back in to get his treat before going to bed.

Pavlatos doesn’t necessarily believe there was any connection between the events, but felt it was important to make any potentially pertinent details available.

"So, just to be clear, I don’t want to say that there was a correlation between the events of the night before I found the print, to what I heard at my house along with the response of the dog," he said. "I never saw what made the track, heard or smelled anything out of the ordinary. The feathers that I saw at the print sight may have zero to do with the print (along with [the fact that there was] no blood or remains of any goslings)…it’s just to put all I saw out there."

To report your own encounter with the impossible, reach out to us directly at the Singular Fortean Society through our contact page.

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