In Puerto Rico and in Hispanic America it is generally described as a heavy creature, reptilian and alien-like, roughly the size of a small bear, and with a row of spines reaching from the neck to the base of the tail, while in the Southwestern United States it is depicted as more dog-like.

The name is attributed to Puerto Rican comedian Silverio Pérez, who coined the label in 1995 while commenting on the attacks as a San Juan radio deejay.

Eight sheep were discovered dead in Puerto Rico, each with three puncture wounds in the chest area and reportedly completely drained of blood.

[7] Puerto Rican comedian and entrepreneur Silverio Pérez is credited with coining the term chupacabras soon after the first incidents were reported in the press.

[7] In 2019 a video recorded by Mundo Ovni showed the results of a supposed attack on chickens in the Seburuquillo sector of Lares, Puerto Rico.

[8] A five-year investigation by Benjamin Radford, documented in his 2011 book Tracking the Chupacabra, concluded that the description given by the original eyewitness in Puerto Rico, Madelyne Tolentino, was based on the creature Sil in the 1995 science-fiction horror film Species.

[9] Radford revealed that Tolentino "believed that the creatures and events she saw in Species were happening in reality in Puerto Rico at the time", and therefore concludes that "the most important chupacabra description cannot be trusted".

Dr. David Morales, a Puerto Rican veterinarian with the Department of Agriculture, analyzed 300 reported victims of the chupacabra and found that they had not been bled dry.

[14] The most common description of the chupacabra is that of a reptile-like creature, said to have leathery or scaly greenish-gray skin and sharp spines or quills running down its back.

Thus, the same theory can be applied to many of the other 'chupacabra' attacks: that the dry weather had created a more competitive environment for native predators, leading them to prey on livestock to survive.

Evidence of such is provided in page 179 of Benjamin Radford's book, Tracking the Chupacabra: The Vampire Beast in Fact, Fiction, and Folklore.

A very likely explanation for this phenomenon is that individuals who had heard of the newly popular chupacabra had the creature's name fresh in their mind before they happened to see a strange looking animal.

For example, some scientists hypothesize that what many believe to be a chupacabra is a wild or domestic dog affected by mange, a disease causing a thick buildup of skin and hair loss.

Forensic experts opined that street dogs were responsible for mass killing of domestic animals and poultry after studying the remnants of a corpse.