Our Encounter ...

     Howdy, y’all!  This here is my second post … and I’ve added some of my pictures to help break-up the monotony of my marathon-esque story-line.  This is kinda like one of them “This Happened To Me” stories from Outdoor Life, ‘cept a Hell of a lot longer.  Y’all please remember that bein’ a graphic designer … I’m a visual sort and sometimes pay too-dang much attention to the details.  This’ll prob’ly be about a two-beer read; but as always, I tells it like I sees it …

 

     In June of 2009 my (then) thirteen year-old son and I were fishin’ the Caddo Lake Wildlife Management Area off of Big Cypress Bayou.  The lake-water level was high, which allowed us to fish a few areas that were normally too shallow to navigate in our 1,300 lb. bass boat.  On Monday mornin’ … June 8^th, we had left our friends' dock at 5:45 A.M., and by 6:15 the visibility was already gettin' clear & sunny.  I had turned off of Big Cypress into a small channel, and my son had his video camera out filmin’ our boat ride along the way.  At one point about half-way through the slough, we passed an area that smelled awful; almost as if somethin’ out there had died out in them woods.  You can actually hear me on his video sayin’, “Damn … somethin’ smells nasty!”

 

     We made it through the secluded channel where I shut-down the Yamaha and began trollin’ towards an open area with an abundance of lily pads.  

 

This area is only accessible by boat; we weren’t talkin' or makin' much noise despite me catchin' a couple of small bass.  It was peaceful; the only sounds that we heard at that time were cardinals, wrens and frogs.  It was now after 6:30 A.M. and I noticed that my son was filmin' me catch those bass on top-water lures.  I had just told him to put his video camera up and pick-up his rod and fish … ‘cause that was what we were there for!  That was a huge mistake ...

 

     After trollin' past the open area, there was a small berm to our right, with dense flooded woods beyond it.  I was castin' at the edges of the vegetation under the tree-lined bank, when all of the sudden, we heard a loud splashin' about 30-yards over the berm, which sounded like someone was quickly walkin' through the water.  I thought, a hunter, maybe?  The brush was so thick that all I could see through that vegetation was a very large wake.  Now remember, this was June … and ‘cept for hogs, there really ain’t a season for any kind-of wild game.  Whatever was walkin’ out there was doin’ it on two legs, so I thought that maybe it was a poacher!

 

     I loudly whispered for my son to get his camcorder back out.  He put his rod down and stepped from the back of the boat, over the fold-down seats into the floorboard.  Our gear bag, which held both of our cameras was under the side-console.  Our boat is carpeted and we were both barefoot ... so he didn’t make much noise movin' about to get down to the bag.  About that time I also noticed that some crows overhead were cawin' loudly and seemed to be circlin' directly overhead.  As my son was gettin' his camcorder out, whatever it was that was walkin' through the water had stopped.

 

     I was standin’ up on the on the castin’ deck workin’ the foot-controlled trollin’ motor.  On the floor of the boat, my son now stood a good foot-and-a-half lower than me (on top of already bein’ a foot shorter) which put his line of sight right-at eye-level just over the top of the berm.  In a loud whisper he said, “Dad … I can see it!”  Lookin' into the thicket toward the source of the wake, I asked, “What do you see?”  In a louder whisper, he replied, “I can see its legs! They’re this big!” he exclaimed, holdin’ his hands out about the size of a bucket.  My next thought was that it may have been a black bear … but they really don’t walk on two legs for any great distance.  I asked, "What color are they?" in which he replied, "Kind of a brownish-gray."  I immediately thought to myself, “Oh, sh¡t!”

 

     At that point, whatever it was immediately started walkin' away from us through the flooded forest; the sloshin' became louder, and it was definitely movin' faster, as if in retreat.  As my son tried to find his target on the camcorder screen, we then heard brush crackin' and limbs breakin'.  I said, “Can you still see it?  Did you get it on film?”  He replied, “No, I don’t think so … I can’t focus; it’s too thick!”  We heard whatever it was movin’ further into the brush, and then all was silent except for the crows.  They kept cawin' … but further away; they seemed to follow whatever was movin' through the flooded thicket.

 

     In the couple of minutes that this all happened, the current had moved us quite a bit, so I trolled back around to the spot where we initially heard the sloshin'.  The channel that we were in was barely wide enough for us to turn our boat around.  As I maneuvered the boat, we both peered into the thicket.  I could see a very large pile of brush at the head of the berm, which consisted of large dead tree limbs, but did not appear to be the work of beavers.  They were piled-up around a couple of Cypress trees, and I noticed that it looked fairly dry there, but the rest of the forest was flooded.  It looked like the creek that this animal was wadin’ through fed from the main channel, which started from the tree line at the open area where we had begun fishin’ the lily pads.  The creek flowed for about 40-yards and then went under a very large fallen tree.  I ran the boat parallel to the berm and wedged it into the vegetation so we wouldn’t drift.

 

     I then asked my son to explain to me exactly what he saw.  He said that all he could see were two large hair-covered legs, but only from just above the knees to where they met the wake that it made while walkin' through the water.  He described them as being brownish-gray in color, and much bigger than mine.  We stayed there for at least 30-minutes, but saw or heard nothin' else.  We both kept askin' ourselves what it could have been.  My son is no stranger to wildlife, havin' killed his first hog at age eleven, and he’s seen plenty of deer as well.

 

     I had been huntin' and fishin' for well over forty years.  I’ve been in very close proximity to both deer and hogs crossin' water, and what we heard was definitely not a four-legged animal.  I know for a fact that what I heard was walkin' on two legs, and was very large.  I don’t quite know how to describe it, but whatever it was it just sounded heavy.  For example, I’m a heavy guy (okay, let’s be honest; I’m fat for my 5’8” height at 200+ lbs.).  Hell, I don’t even make that much noise wadin' back to a duck blind after settin’ out decoys prior to shootin' time.  We just stood there in the boat tryin' to figure out what it was …

 

     My son was so excited, he wouldn’t even fish; he just sat in the rear pedestal seat clutchin’ his camcorder for the next hour while I fished.  Needless to say, cell phone service (and sometimes even GPS) is sketchy at best in the swamp.  When I finally got a couple of bars, I called the friend that we were stayin’ with to tell him what had happened.  He was born and raised in Uncertain and his father was a commercial fisherman, so he knew exactly where we were when I described the area.  He said, “Aw … it was probably a couple of deer movin’ through the water in tandem; or a panther … or maybe that old bear people’s been seein’ back there.”  I immediately told him that it wasn’t deer or a cat, and unless “that old bear” could walk a good distance through floodwater on two legs, that he was dead friggin’ wrong!  He must have thought I was some kind of trippy-assed tourist and just laughed it off.  After I hung up, it hit me; I asked my son, “You think there could there be some tracks back there?”  We immediately stowed our gear, pulled-up the trollin’ motor and hauled back to the area of our little incident.

 

     When we arrived back at the spot, I ran our boat nose-first into the bank of the berm.  All we had for our feet were flip-flops, so from the castin’ deck on the bow of the boat we scouted the berm for snakes and poison ivy.  The ground around the berm was semi-firm, but our hopes were dashed when we discovered that most everything else was submerged.  I particularly didn’t feel the need to wallow ‘round in mud, so we looked around from the safety of the berm and then headed back to our friends’ place in Uncertain.  On the way out of that slough, we saw a small herd of deer to our left on higher ground.  I asked my son if what he saw had the same color hair as the deer, and he said absolutely not; the deer were more of a reddish-brown and what he saw was more of a brownish-gray.  He also said that the hair was longer, and that he was very sure of what he had seen.

 

     When we got back to our friends’ place … there was quite a crowd; his best friend was there, as well as both of his sons and their wives and/or girlfriends.  His older son had seen us night fishin’ near Jackson’s Arm the night before as he was headin’ out to go froggin’.  Just short of mass ridicule, we were told it was most probably just a couple of deer.  I think my son was a little uncomfortable arguin’ with our friends, but he’ll swear as to what he saw.  We visited a while, cooked & mowed-down on some lunch … then took a little power-nap.  Late that afternoon we headed straight back to “the spot”.  I shut-down the Yamaha well before the area where we had our little incident, and put the trollin’ motor down.  Within about 15-minutes of trollin’ before we even got to the open area with the lily pads, you’d never guess what we saw; deer … at least five or six of ‘em, movin’ through the waist to knee-deep water.  And when they saw us, they bolted; but even then, they sounded nothin’ like what we had heard that mornin’.  He actually filmed one of ‘em movin’ through the floodwater and climbin’ through the brush up the bank (notice how blurry the image is ... due to the thickness of the vegetation it was very difficult to focus the video camera).

 

     Since our encounter, we have scouted and even sat overnight (no fire) out there on that island.  We took plenty of pictures and recorded our entire night’s stay on an Olympus® sound recorder.  That was a night neither of us will ever forget, but I’ll save that experience for another entry to this blog.  Other than a possible limb-twist that I discovered in 2011, we haven’t found anything significant to show us what this critter might be, or if it's even still in that area.  However, we’ve had five Moultrie® infra-red game-cams out there (until I had to remove them on 09/14/13*) … and I’d change-out the batteries & SD cards every 4 months or so.  I’ve spent a bunch-of dang money on gas & gear for that 550-mile round-trip, which I’ve made well over a dozen times since June 8^th of 2009.  We’ve bought a night-vision monocular, digital sound recorder, a Canon® Powershot SX50 and a Wilderness Commander kayak.  We’ve been treatin’ this as if we were huntin’ … although I wouldn’t feel the need to shoot this animal unless I felt that we were in immediate danger.

     Contrary to what other amateur field researchers might do, we don’t tree-knock, vocalize, call-blast or bait (other than impalin’ apples about 6’ up in trees in front of our trail-cams).  I personally have never heard a tree-knock, and other than a strange, distant cry that we couldn’t identify (which was recorded durin’ Spring Break of 2010) I wouldn’t know what this critter’s vocalization would sound like.  I don’t want to spook it, nor would I wanna p¡ss it off!  If it happens to reside in that area, I’m sure that like most animals, it’s territorial; what its range is … I couldn’t really begin to tell you.  The way I look at it, we were quiet when we happened upon it the first time, so I try to keep a pretty low-profile each time I’ve gone back into that area.

     We really just want to know what this animal was.  From what-all that I’ve read and have heard from some of the locals, somethin’ has been out there in them woods for quite some time.  I personally believe that due to the flood of 2009 – 2010, the deer were pushed onto higher ground, and we may have interrupted this animal while it was stalkin’ those deer.  My son and I just happened to be at the right place at the right time … and because we were quiet, we were lucky (blessed) enough to get close to it.

     I hope I haven’t bored you or wasted any of your time.  If you’re interested … I’ve compiled the majority of our journeys (and some misadventures) along with plenty of photos of our trips to Uncertain.  I’ll be postin’ those from time to time, along with some field tips I’ve learned along the way.  And if we’re lucky enough to find somethin’ of any significance, be assured you’ll see it right here!  Until then, y’all take care …

Note:  Except for my son’s photo of the deer crossin’ high-water (posted here as a video-capture), the rest of my photos were shot on Sunday, September 27^th of 2009 when I returned to the area after attendin’ the Texas Bigfoot Research Conservancy (now known as the North American Wood Ape Conservancy) Conference in Tyler,Texas.

*Y'all stay tuned for my upcomin' blog entry, "OPERATION: Pull-Out!" ... and find out why my game-cams had to be removed.