Bumps in the night

[Wise Old Owl]

[Derek81pci]

My imagination is probably the scariest thing I can think of put in the woods alone, at night!

[Pedaling Fool]

This happened to me two weeks ago...Solo trip from Unicoi to Dicks Creek Gap.

I just had lunch and I started coming down from Powell Mountain. I had come to an area that was a nice flat run. I was even able to look around a little while I walked because the trail was nice and clear, a softly winding dirt path. I was looking down to my left side, admiring a beautiful flat, grassy area that someone had recently used to camp when I heard it.

On the mountain next to me, at about my same elevation, came an extremely loud, horrid rumbling gutteral noise, like an alligator but deeper and more masculine...almost oozing with testosterone (if you can imagine that). It was a powerful noise with it's strength almost vibrating my very insides and making every hair on my neck and arms stand on end. I froze in my tracks, not even breathing, and stared intently in the direction of the noise, waiting to see or hear any possible movement. Then, to my left, just around the ridge, came a noise very much like the first, but it sounded feminine????

There are NO ALLIGATORS in the mountains, and there sure aren't male and female sounding ones for sure. What the heck were those things? I don't know. I didn't hear them again. I stood there for several minutes, wishing my camera wasn't deep in my pack. I really hoped I wouldn't regret it being inaccessible! But nothing else happened and I saw nothing of interest relating to these noises. It actually was strangely silent on the trail after that. Not even birds. It was strange in a way I can not begin to explain. I wasn't the least bit afraid. That was even stranger.

This reminds me of an encounter I had in Maine.

When I was 16 I did a SOBO thru-hike of Maine starting June/July ‘81. This encounter happened on the first day of the hike, we (father, uncle & me) were going up Katahdin from the north to Knife-edge, starting from Roaring Brook Campground, going up the Helon Taylor trail (IIRC).

I’m not sure how long into the hike we were, but I know we were still a good way from tree-line, in the dense foliage. All I remember was hearing this deep sounding roar, sort of like hearing an African lion in the zoo. It caused us all to stop dead in our tracks. Never saw anything, but heard some rustling in the brush and a second growl, then it was gone. It was scary as hell, now when I hear the term, "freeze in your tracks" I think of that moment. I was – we all were – stopped in our tracks with great concern for whatever that was.

At the time we just assumed it was a black bear. However, now I'm not too sure. I’ve read a lot about bears and the sound they make and from what I gather they don’t make the sound we heard, at best they make a weak roar/growl, this was no weak roar/growl, it was a very powerful roar. I’ve heard recordings of mountain lions and this was no mountain lion, too deep of a sound, that’s why I say it reminds me more of an African lion, but not quite.

I even saw a video of two male bears fighting (I think it was on Bear.org) and they were making weird sounds, but nothing coming close to the sound of a roar, much less the roaring sound we heard that day.

[Pedaling Fool]

...
I even saw a video of two male bears fighting (I think it was on Bear.org) and they were making weird sounds, but nothing coming close to the sound of a roar, much less the roaring sound we heard that day.

Here it is: http://www.bear.org/website/bear-pag...ars-growl.html in the below video two bears fighting.

And when you read the page it talks about growling as a sound one may attribute to black bears, doesn't sound much like growling to me. But as I said before this was a roaring sound, not growling.

It was loud and very threatening sounding, very primal sound. And we thought it was a bear

[MJGreen]

I think I would have eaten that porcupine. I hear they are really good eating!

I wonder if that's true. At least you'd have plenty of toothpicks available.

[Gambit McCrae]

Janice Balza messed with me at Vendeventer Shelter last winter. My friend in another tent had the same experience later in the night

[Gunner1776]

While on my southbound thru-hike, staying at Spalding Mtn. Lean-to alone, a fisher cat killed a hare on the snow behind the shelter while I was asleep. It sounded like a lady screaming. In a sleep stupor, I stumbled back there with my headlamp in time to see the fisher cat slink into the woods. Being from Florida, I had no idea what I had just seen. I described it to a local when in town and he told me what it was. Funny thing, though, I didn't get really scared until after it happened. Then I thought "Why in the world did I go back there?" Fisher cats are vicious. There was blood everywhere on the snow.

What the hell is a fisher cat? Those sound vicious. Is it a bobcat?

[Hikes in Rain]

What the hell is a fisher cat? Those sound vicious. Is it a bobcat?

Member of the weasel family, not really a cat.

[Theosus]

Had a screech owl go off down the valley from us one night. Sounded like someone getting murdered slowly and painfully.
The coolest one was when we did an out and back night hike along a ridge line. Something was trailing us on the way back. It was pitch dark and we were using headlamps, and for about 100 yards, something sounded remarkably bipedal was about 40 yards off trail paralleling us. The side of the trail was a steep downhill grade with some brush and a blanket of leaves. No way it was a human moving through that terrain with NO light, keeping up with us. Sure, it could have been a bear or something, but it sure sounded like something big with two feet.

[Dogwood]

Does having a skunk put it's wet nose on your cheek while in your sleeping bag count? or being awakened by a black bear pushing in on your tent with it's snout? or being awakened by a marauding inquisitive foraging band of coatamundi with one standing on your legs while in your sleeping bag?
I so enjoy connecting with Nature while cowboy camping.

[Dogwood]

What the hell is a fisher cat? Those sound vicious. Is it a bobcat?

Member of the weasel family, not really a cat.

Looks like a ferret, also in the weasel family, but usually a bit smaller. I don't see that many of them at all but I did see one carrying away a squirrel that was larger than itself.

[rocketsocks]

Looks like a ferret, also in the weasel family, but usually a bit smaller. I don't see that many of them at all but I did see one carrying away a squirrel that was larger than itself.

Minks have made quite a come back in NJ.

[Pedaling Fool]

What the hell is a fisher cat? Those sound vicious. Is it a bobcat?

They can be mean little bastards http://www.wcvb.com/news/boy-12-atta...744016#!bzXYHx

[Rocket Jones]

Had a screech owl go off down the valley from us one night. Sounded like someone getting murdered slowly and painfully.

Had a screech owl living in the woods behind the house. Every time he let loose, I would jump, even though I knew it was coming. LOL

[lemon b]

Good eating

[TrippLite]

This reminds me of an encounter I had in Maine.

When I was 16 I did a SOBO thru-hike of Maine starting June/July ‘81. This encounter happened on the first day of the hike, we (father, uncle & me) were going up Katahdin from the north to Knife-edge, starting from Roaring Brook Campground, going up the Helon Taylor trail (IIRC).

I’m not sure how long into the hike we were, but I know we were still a good way from tree-line, in the dense foliage. All I remember was hearing this deep sounding roar, sort of like hearing an African lion in the zoo. It caused us all to stop dead in our tracks. Never saw anything, but heard some rustling in the brush and a second growl, then it was gone. It was scary as hell, now when I hear the term, "freeze in your tracks" I think of that moment. I was – we all were – stopped in our tracks with great concern for whatever that was.

At the time we just assumed it was a black bear. However, now I'm not too sure. I’ve read a lot about bears and the sound they make and from what I gather they don’t make the sound we heard, at best they make a weak roar/growl, this was no weak roar/growl, it was a very powerful roar. I’ve heard recordings of mountain lions and this was no mountain lion, too deep of a sound, that’s why I say it reminds me more of an African lion, but not quite.

I even saw a video of two male bears fighting (I think it was on Bear.org) and they were making weird sounds, but nothing coming close to the sound of a roar, much less the roaring sound we heard that day.

My guess would have been a mountain lion which you have already ruled out. Leopards have a pretty ferocious roar. Could it be possible you actually heard a African Lion? Here is a thought, sounds way out there, but what if inbreeding occurred back during that time era like what is currently happening now in NY as dictated in attached video and an African Lion or leopard was accidently released in the wild and never reported.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fh2RCAoJ9Q0

[Gunner1776]

They can be mean little bastards http://www.wcvb.com/news/boy-12-atta...744016#!bzXYHx

Oh man! Google'd some pics of it too! I am 33 and never even knew that animal existed. LOL

Learn something new every day.

[Dogwood]

My first night going SoBo on the LT there was a screech owl only 20 ft up in a tree next to the shelter. It would let out such a loud screech for hrs throughout the night just when you'd think it had left and you had begun falling back asleep. Finally the other hiker in the shelter got it to leave by throwing rocks and sticks near it. For such a small animal they are LOOOUD.

[Pedaling Fool]

My guess would have been a mountain lion which you have already ruled out. Leopards have a pretty ferocious roar. Could it be possible you actually heard a African Lion? Here is a thought, sounds way out there, but what if inbreeding occurred back during that time era like what is currently happening now in NY as dictated in attached video and an African Lion or leopard was accidently released in the wild and never reported.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fh2RCAoJ9Q0

That's always a possibility, I wouldn't rule out an African lion, http://news.google.com/newspapers?ni...g=5250,3460827 nor would I rule out a grizzly bear. All I know it was a very deep guttural-like sound. For years I always just assumed it was a black bear, but since retiring from the navy and doing my thru hike I always checked out info on animal encounters and I noticed that no one ever reported hearing a black bear roar. That's when I started researching it and found the site in post #64, which seemed to confirm my growing suspicion that it was not a black bear.

So that leaves a lot of stuff on the table, but only one animal I know of that is known to live in the area that supposedly can make that noise is interestingly enough a moose. Apparently a moose is reported to make a sound of an African Lion, but of the sounds I listened to the moose "roar" sounds more like a large volume of air being forced out instead to the deep guttual-like sound, but I don't entirely rule out a moose. BTW, from what I can tell it's generally only the female moose that makes this sound, especially when protecting her calf.

But then again I got time against me and the encounter was so short, followed by it thrashing thru the woods to get away. We never saw anything thru the dense foliage, but it was very close; I got the impression we startled it. It will forever be a mystery.

[78owl]

Bigfoot? Bigfoot!