[22 MAG]

For 12 seasons I hunted my uncles woods up in WI. I took 12 deer out of those woods and everything stopped on the 13th hunt.
That morning I started out for the blind and hour before light. I've walked that foot trail thru the woods many times over the years. I've seen and heard every critter that lived in the area and none has ever made my skin crawl until the 13th hunt. About 3/4's of a mi from the cabin I heard footsteps to my right. I never gave it no mind and kept going. About 150 yards from the blind this thing on my right gave out some kind of blood curdling cry of some kind. I kept going. About 50 yards from the blind the cry came from my back. I turned on my mag light and the woods became light up like daylight. 6 C batteries light the woods and I did a 180 and seen nothing. I shined my light up into the trees and nothing. All I know is that each time it gave out it's cry the hair on the back of my neck stood at attention. Never seen a deer that year much less put one in the freezer. To this day non of the farmers can say what it was that scared the crap out of me. Never heard it after that.

You heard mine. I'm sure there are more.

 

[BarkBuster20]

Unless you think it was a jag, it was a mountain lion. Have a Lion problem on my back hill right now, and i have had two encounters in the last three years. It is usually best to face the direction you think the cat is, and use any light you have available, try not to show any fear. Then slowly back away if they dont retreat after a minute or two.

 

[smokinfz1]

Heck, I didn't need to hear anything. I had driven a four wheeler to about 200 yards from the stand I intended to hunt that evening. About 1/2 way to the stand, in this sandy curve in the foot trail I was following stood out a very vivid cat track about the same size as my hand. I made it to the stand and hunted as late as I felt comfortable, which wasn't nearly as dark as normal. Made my way back to the wheeler and left in a hurry. It's amazing what a simple footprint can do to a grown man.

 

[kudu40]

The blood curdeling screams you heard could have been from a bob cat. Another creature that has raised the hair on the back of my neck more than once is a screech owl.
Over the years, I have had many scary hunts. Most of them involved misadventures while duck hunting and very easily could have become fatal, including one where I was hunting alone and got stuck in quick sand.

Kudu40

 

[BarkBuster20]

Would be a strange bobcat encounter.

 

[broom_jm]

I was duck hunting out on the salt flats of south San Francisco Bay when a light rain started to drop. Even though I'd seen it coming I didn't make it back to the road in time because it was so slick, I could barely walk on it. Those roads are just bay mud piled up into rows and when they're dry you have no problem on them. Sprinkle on a few raindrops and they become completely impassible. My old van got stuck and I had to walk nearly 3 miles, in full camo, to reach a phone. It was 2 days before I could get out there with a 4x4 to pull my van out and by then, my shotgun was badly rusted. (Salt air is brutal on guns)

I've told the story before, but my dad walked down a logging trail one morning and on the way back up noticed mt lion prints on top of his, for a couple hundred yards...so he'd been on the menu that day, but he never even saw the cat.

 

[tpv]

Alright, I have to bring this one up.
About 10 years ago, I was taking some hunters out to their stands early in the morning before light. We were in my old jeep without a top. We all saw it at the same time, but there was a giant fireball on the western horizon heading easterly straight towards us. I turned the jeep off and as it got bigger you could actually hear it and see the vapor or smoke trail as it passed over us and headed toward Dallas/Fort Worth about 90 miles away. At that time, I heard "God help us" from the back of the jeep because we all thought the world was about to end.
I fully expected to hear the explosion but after a few anxious moments, there was just silence.
The next morning we heard about the meteor shower that occurred the night before, but I don't know how many folks knew how close those meteors came.
Scared the bejeebers out of me.

 

[crazydave]

Yeah, I still remember the first time I heard a bobcat....

I'd describe the sound as "like a woman being murdered"....

 

[22 MAG]

I don't know what it was that scared the crap out of me. When I first heard it walking to my right I knew right there and then that it wasn't afraid of me because it was making to much noise with every step it took. I'm not saying it was T-REX but the steps in the dried leaves were heavier then a yote.

 

[Helix]

A few years back I was on a hunt of a different kind. I was driving a team of SAR volunteers on a mountain road. We had two teenage girls lost that we were looking for. It was cold rainy night but we had to keep the windows open to listen in case the missing girls tried to flag us down. we came around a switchback and all 4 of us in the truck heard a blood curdling scream. thinking it was our missing hikers we all bailed out of the truck and started looking around. gave several shouts to see if we could get a response. got nothing. after a few minutes we figured we had surprised a mountain lion. Still remember that scream though.

 

[kudu40]

Exploding trees are fairly common when the temperature suddenly drops to double digits below zero. It sounds like a rifle shot.
On the TV show Mythbusters they tried to replicate it using liquid nitrogen in the lab but couldn't do it and called the myth "busted". I don't know what they were doing wrong but I have seen and heard it happen.

Kudu40

 

[mac266]

... it was a mountain lion. Have a Lion problem on my back hill right now...

Yep. Scary as all get-out. Fortunately they don't like human meat very much.

 

[shane256]

The scaredest I've ever been was deer hunting one time. My friend Rick and I had walked in along the trail and I stopped at the first stand and he walked on deeper in to another stand. About dark, I was waiting on him to come out to me and then we'd both walk out. I was sitting on the bank of a dry creek that was maybe 25 feet across with steep banks on either side maybe 8 feet or so tall where I was (trail came down to the creek and basically ended, my friend had then walked down the creek to my "right") and I heard something coming through the woods, heavy and slow whatever it was and it was coming from the left. Visibility was getting real low in the woods and this thing just keeps walking towards me and it's on the other side of the creek. I eventually saw a dark shape on the other side walking through the saplings and switch cane and it was probably 3' or so at the shoulder. I crouched around to the back side of the big pine I was sitting beside and got my gun ready, keeping the barrel pointed to the ground but ready to be shouldered quickly. It just kept walking and went on by, probably at the closest maybe 30 or 40 feet away. Rick eventually came out and I asked if he had seen anything and he said nope. I figure it must have been a black bear, which are very rare where I'm from but it was possible (they've been seen there before).

My dad tells a story of when he was walking out of the woods one night and four or five animals followed him out... stopping when he stopped and walking when he walked. Some took up a flank on either side and the rest followed. He never saw what they were but figured it must have been coyotes.

 

[Terry32shooter]

Good stories, I enjoyed them.

Terry

 

[Helix]

four or five animals followed him out... stopping when he stopped and walking when he walked. Some took up a flank on either side and the rest followed. He never saw what they were but figured it must have been coyotes.

That reminds me. One winter while I was in college I was staying at a lodge near Stampeed Pass WA for a weekend. I had made a run up to the Steven's pass Ski area to pick up some folks who had spent the day skiing but when I got there I could not find them and I realized I had forgotten my cell phone at the lodge. I headed back. Now this lodge is off the main road about a half mile and instead of plowing the access roads for cars they groom them for x-country skiing and don't allow you to drive it even though my old Bronco could have done it. During the day they ran an old snow cat down to the parking lot to pick us up but on this night time trip I had to walk the half mile to the parking lot and back. on the way out to the lot it was still light but when I was trudging back up the hill to get my phone the sun was long gone.

While walking along I started to hear running footsteps back in the trees on all sides. With the snow it was just light enough I could see the ground and not much else. well it didn't take long and I was sprinting up the hill. back in those days I didn't carry a handgun. All the way back to the lodge I could hear a number of animals following.

So then i had a real dilemma when I got to the lodge and got my phone. I had to go back out there and I didn't have a gun. I ended up grabbing my ice axe from the climbing pack I had brought along and figured it would make an OK deturrent for whatever had chased me up the road. I didn't want any of my friends to know I had been so freaked out on the way in. I made two more trips along that road that night and never heard another sound.

 

[Old Grump]

1972, New Mexico, late at night jack rabbit hunting by the light of a full moon with my H&R 922 22 caliber revolver. Female mountain lion steps onto the path about 50' in front of me and pauses while she looked me over. My Kerry Blue Terrier leaned up against my leg and was shaking as bad as I was. That 10 seconds was the longest 3 days of my life.

We walked back to the car, my dog stayed in physical contact with me till he could get in the car. I went home, and took a shower because it might have been sweat in my pants but I wasn't real sure. After that day I never went into the woods or desert with out at least a 357 on my hip. I learn slow but I learn.