A few years ago I was sitting in a blind, 7 AM or so, and partly cloudy. Just as sun was rising I heard a strange mechanical sound - not a jet engine sound, but definitely mechanical. We are in the Brownwood MOA, so do hear lots of fighters and military ops around, but this was different. I couldn't explain the sound other than to say it was a high pitched growl that started and stopped a few times over a few minutes.

Well, I may have figured it out...today I was watching a youtube video of the F-35 and in some high angle turns the F-35 makes the noise I heard. Mystery solved...I think.

Anyone else have any similar experiences?

Something catching and killing a rabbit when I was about 12 in the deer stand before daylight. Scared the crap out of me.

I have seen and heard the same. At night it is nuts as you see afterburners making crazy movements in the air. Thought it was UFOs a few times. Seen this in north, central and south Texas.

Scream of a big cat in east Texas echoing through the woods before sunup. Wished I wasn’t up in a tree sitting on a 2x6.

Bow hunting you get very a tuned to noise. The sound of a rabbit, deer walking, armadillo, pig etc. One very still evening setting in a tree stand I heard what sounded like leaves slowly parting. Looking at the noise I finally spotted a 6' sidewinder. I usually let snakes go but this one was headed toward the tree I was in. Jumped down grabbed a big stick and wore his azz out.

SnakeWrangler would like to have a word with you out back.

Brother and I were hiking over a mountain before daylight during Arkansas deer season many moons ago. I was 13-14 and brother was 17-18. Something sneezed very close to us. Scared the ever lovin' crap out of both of us. Loaded rifles and sat down butt-to-butt until it was light enough to see. Never did figure out what it was...

15 years old - scouted out a turkey roost on public land not too far off the main road. Got there early and laid in a dried up riverbed 20 yards from where they crossed each morning. Before light some guys came with spotlights and started raining pellets all around me. Kept my head down until they had all their turkey and were gone. They got busted with something like 36 turkeys in the freezer at $500 each if I remember right (about 1980). It was no mystery but very strange for sure!

2 kids stalking me while bow hunting for javelina.

One afternoon in late deer season I was sitting on a tank dam that was a very large buzzard roost. They would come back and ride the thermals till dark then sit in the trees on top of the tank dam(was middle tank dam of 3 tanks in a row). While one buzzard was flying in the thermals a couple of Caracara's began to harass him by diving at him. Finally he went to the ground and they did also. He took off and started to ride the thermals again and another Caracara came from above and knocked the buzzard, then pinned him to the ground. The other 3-4 jumped on the buzzard then ate him alive. One those things I will probably never see again in my lifetime.
Same ranch I was bowhunting from a tripod set on a little rocky knoll south of a big stock tank. I heard what I thought was a vehicle slowly approaching from the west and it was getting closer/louder. It seemed like it was right on top of me when I looked down to see a 5"'+ rattlesnake crawling across a couple of dead catcus plants that were on the ground under the tripod. It went right under my tripod and towards where I had parked my 4 wheeler down the road about 100 yards. Made a tense trip to the 4 wheeler after dark and no flashlight .

We are under the MOA, too. The best one was watching an F-35 doing scissors with an F-18 through binoculars.

The first time I saw them drop flares was mesmerizing. Watching those flares fire off at dusk with no engine noise, it takes on a completely different feel.

Had an interesting situation hunting a buddies place this year that i hunt every year. They have started to have hog problems so I brought one of my hog traps from Louisiana to try and help. Stupidly I let them set it up when i wasn't there, they have never worked with traps before, and they set it up probably about 50 yards from one of our deer hot spots that we have baited. Well when I get there to hunt, I choose to hunt this stand without realizing and while walking out to the blind in the complete darkness I hear that cage loudly being banged around. It takes me a few seconds to realize what this is and the mistakes my friends have made baiting a trap so close to a deer hot spot. I turn on my red head lamp, as i do two hogs scatter a little in front of me, and I proceed, with little light to the trap. As i approach I see a four point with probably the sharpest head equipment i could've imagined. As I see him in the trap i immediately turn off my light to try and get as close as possible without him breaking his neck beforehand. This trap is rigged with a trip wire so I physically have to put my hand in the cage to pull the door open. At this point this deer is raising hell; physically lifting the cage up and trying to bolt. As soon as I put my hand in the cage carefully he starts ramming into the opposite end trying to escape. I grab the trip wire and quickly pull it open, but the deer just has his head pinned into one of the corners and does not move. At this point the deer starts yelling as loud as it could, kind of sounds like an angry cow. At this point i'm freaked out, given up not trying to ruin the hunt, I start yelling at this thing, even pick up a stick to try and scare him the other way back to the open door. Finally i realize that he got his head rack lodged in the trap wire. So while this deer is yelling back at me, while I am holding the door open, I start to kick at his head rack to set him free. Finally I kick him free and he bolts for the entrance however as soon as he exits the cage he turns around and looks at me crazy and wide eyed. My heart was pounding out my chest. I yell and he bolts. Long story short, ruined the hunt and I sat in the blind for hours steaming on how I was going to tear into my buddies for making a bone head decision like that.

Here are a few items:
1) Glassed up a mountain lion and cubs right before dark. Way too much imagination at play walking out in the dark.
2) Glassed up a woman giving the full treatment to a guy. She literally did every "job" with gusto.
3) Was predator hunting and got to my spot well before sunrise. Heard what sounded like an African lion roaring. Kept getting closer and louder. Wound up be a free-range bull who I call Mr. Ankle Banger. He's always in a nasty mood; I would too if my boys had cholla in them.

I woke myself snoring several times.....

Commas are so important. (Note them in red.) Otherwise, it reads like something was catching and killing a rabbit IN the deer stand with you, which, especially if you were only 12, would be exceptionally terrifying. And, the bowel movement inside the deer stand would have been completely understandable.

Funny this should come up....

I am sure my eyes were playing tricks on me, but just yesterday I saw something that puzzled me. Pulling into our land, it looked like a shaggy haired deer running away from me. Dark brown. Low set of antlers. From the back I swear it was musk ox like.

My sensible side thinks it must have been the rain and mud making a buck look odd.

One tripod stand I frequent has a hog trap about 10 yards away. It's always set but never catches anything.
I sneak in an hour before light, get comfortable half asleep waiting for light. Still pitch black out there is a terrible crash of the door closing, the hog bashing into a he cage and squealing.
Heck of a wake up call.
He calmed down, it got light enough to see he had no friends waiting and shot from the stand.

Muddy Angora billy?

First...sidewinder are relatively short...usually less than 3'

Second....they don't climb trees

and third....you most likely got really exercised over a harmless rat snake...

...but it did make for an interesting story.....where exactly did this snake attack take place.....

One time, I was watching this girl at Band camp....

I called it a sidewinder. It was a diamond back rattle snake. I'm a land surveyor trust me I've encountered plenty. This was in the evening and I'll be damned if I'm gonna spend the night in a metal tractor seat. I let all poisonous go except cotton mouths. Like I said this one was headed right to the base of my tree. All took place 5 miles south of Llano.

Wood knocks, and howling!

Maybe. The antlers/horns seemed a bit higher, but I’m not sure.

Cows walked up to the deer I shot last weekend and started licking the blood off his body. The following day the same cows walked back to where the deer was laying and started licking the ground. These cows went bat S crazy mooing, head butting each other and digging the ground with their hooves. I’ve seen them lick a hog i’ve shot before, but I’ve never seen them act this way.

Saw a wolf near Bowie.

My daughters first night hog hunting was the eeriest night I have ever hunted. We were in a ground blind that had loose rotted panel and holes in it, it was a full moon and a clear still night. As the moon got up a little and was casting shadows, we started hearing squealing and snorting from pigs in the woods, then coyotes started howling and barking all around us. We were seeing shadows darting across the sendero that we hunting. I have never seen/heard such a ruckus while hunting. We heard creatures rustling through the leaves next to the blind, but we couldn't identify anything. The running amuck continued for some time, my daughter was quite nervous and the continued action was giving me chills. As a dad I did my best to keep my composure, it was pretty dang noisy.
We finally identified what we thought were deer running across our sendero, and they were booking. There was no way that we were getting out of that blind and this was much too exciting to miss.
We finally had some pigs stop at corn about 30 yards out and my daughter dropped one right in the middle of the road. For the most part his put an end to the commotion. We got out and drug the pig into the woods and started our 1/4 mile hike back to the truck. Guns were loaded and heads were on swivel.
When we finally got to the safety of the truck my daughters face lit up, she thought that was so awesome and she wanted to do it again. I explained how that wasn't normal in any way.
I think we had pigs fighting/breeding, coyotes hunting, and who knows what else, things were moving way too fast and way to noisy.

The wife and I stay in a cabin on my brothers HF place. It is far away from the camp house and ranch house.
One night at about 2:30am we hear the Gator drive right by the front door of the cabin. It was plenty loud and woke me and the wife. I thought my brother was restless and out and about, and that seemed almost rude.
About thirty minutes later it drives by again. The wife is ready to strangle my brother.
It came by a third and I jumped out of bed to identify it, and I was too late, it was gone.
The next morning I asked my brother what he was up to, he had no idea what I was talking about. He said that he left the Gator parked in the barn the night before, we looked and it was right where he left it.
We have no idea who that was as there is only one unlocked entry to the ranch.

I was walking down a dirt road on my lease in Young County one evening after a deer hunt. It was dark so i could not see behind the trees on each side of the road. As I walked I thought I heard foot steps in the trees to my left. It sounded like leaves crunching from foot steps that were mimicking my steps. When I stopped the foot steps stopped. Then I decided to stop with a half step while my foot was still in the air. It worked because whatever was mimicking me finished it's step and crunched the leaves. I turned my flash light on and dropped it in my haste. I heard about 3 long steps as it took off running and that was it. I figured it was a mountain lion mimicking my steps, but i will never know for sure.

Walked up on a fellow lease mate yesterday toying with a snake. He invited me to come look at this Rattlesnake he found. I love snakes so I trotted on over. I looked at the snake, reached down & picked it up. Told him it was a run of the mill Rat Snake. He was speechless.

Not hunting, but while fishing with my Dad above Mother Neff, we watched a common water snake cross the Leon river to a dirt bluff. Now, this bluff was some 30' tall and straight up. We stopped fishing and watched that snake climb right up that dirt bluff and disappear over the top.

While fishing for steelhead in Idaho, I watched a bald eagle swoop down and snag a fish out of the river. Would have loved to have had a cell phone to take that video.

While varmint hunting one night with my cousin, we were sitting on a tank dam calling for coyotes/fox/bobcat when we heard a 'swish' and had a great horned owl land between us on the caller. Scared the bejeebers out of us both. I don't think my cousin has ever gone out varmint hunting since.

Was it running with a black panther by any chance?

We had a woman on our lease that was sitting with her husband in a tree stand.
She had her long hair braided and hanging out of the back of her ball cap.
Every time she moved her head the braided tail would move side to side.
A hawk caught sight of I guess what looked like food perched in the tree, and swooped down and tangled it's talons in her hair until her and her husband could fight it off.

While I was hunting in Menard County in the 80'S ..I was up in a tree bowhunting..something caught my eye..it was another hunter trespassing ..prolly 100..150 yds off...he didn't see me..so I got down to have a talk with him..he vanished...keep in mind this place was really thick..never saw him or heard him again..it was real spooky..

Another time on another ranch in Sutton County ..it was about 5:30 or so..I heard what I think was a Mt Lion ..Panther or sum sort of large Cat SCREAM out...scared the hell out of me..when I got back to camp..my buddy Doug says did you hear that scream?...Crazy..we never saw a large animal ..we were 90 miles or so from Mexico..where the road ended..Wild country for sure..

In college at LSU I got invited to go along with a buddy to his place in Louisiana. Got dropped off at a stand an hour before sunrise and close to sunrise I hear an elephant trumpet. Then I hear it again a few minutes later. Then it sounds like a dang elephant concert for the next few hours. Buddy came to pick me up and asked if I saw anything...he had a sheeteating grin on his face. The stand I was hunting borders a wild game park where tourist drive through and feed the animals and I was right next to where the elephants are pinned up each night. Apparently they do this to all the new guests who are clueless about the park. Was pretty funny.

Hog hunting last year I watched a big snake take a squirrel out of the tree across from the blind. He was in stuck to the side of the tree, right in a limb split with the top third of his body in an S shape. When the squirrel ran by, he struck and grabbed it. They both fell to the ground and the snake constricted the squirrel and ate it. Man, that squirrel screamed. I'm surprised a coyote or bobcat didn't come out. But it didn't. Really cool to see and it serves the little corn thief right!!

Thanks!!
Matt

Saw a Wolf in Pennington, Tx. I'm no seasoned woodsman. But, I know the difference between a Wolf vs Coyote when I see one.

Had an Owl fly up into my elevated stand window. He came low so I never saw him until he perched on the window ledge. I offered him some of my granola bar. He actually looked it over & then flew off.

Dad and I saw some funky lights outside of Ozona before thanksgiving this year. At first we thought they were vehicle lights (like headlights and tail lights) that stayed a constant distance between each other. The weird thing was that they started going left and right like someone was backing up and going forwards, but then would move up and down the side of the canyon wall in a forward and backwards motion, all while staying the same distance apart. The next morning is when we realized it was almost 2 miles away from where they were and we have no clue what the heck it was. The two lights were way too far apart for being so far away.

lol!

I was sitting on top of a hill early in this years deer season. It was before sunlight. Dark and cool outside. Many clouds overhead so I could barely see my hands. I like to get out 2 hours before sunrise so sometimes I doze off for a couple minutes. The fresh air and silence make for nice napping conditions.

I'm half awake when all of a sudden a strange noise starts up - literally like the UFO noise in classic TV shows. Sounded like "waaawaaawaaawaaa" but in a medium pitch. It was dead silent outside and it sounded like the noise was surrounding me. All my ears could focus on was this eerie noise.

I'm a couple hours away from Ft. Hood so I've seen some strange lights along with the occasional fighter jet pass by. This didn't sound like anything I've heard before. Made me extremely uncomfortable. Went on for an hour and stopped abruptly. Despite the noise, I saw a ton of deer in the food plot that morning.

Several weeks later, I was back out at the property. I had been thinking about the noise every other day since then. On the middle of a Saturday afternoon, I was about to hop on the tractor when I hear the noise again. This time it's much louder. I have my backpack so I pull out my binoculars. I scan the area and see an old pump house on the neighbors pond.

Seems the pump that moves the water from the neighbors pond to their fields was failing. Felt real silly thinking I encountered something paranormal.

One morning the landowner's wife climbed into a tower blind before daylight. This was in Leakey about 15 years ago. While she was sitting in the darkness with the windows open, she noticed a metallic smell. She looked outside and in the tree next to her blind there was a dead goat dripping blood. She quickly got out and we decided a mountain lion had killed it and drug it up there.

I was bow hunting one morning near Brownwood in a popup blind. While I was sitting in the stand before light I heard what sounded like some animal getting closer to the blind. A little while went by and all the sudden I could hear it was in the blind with me. I jumped up out of my chair and swooped down to grab my flashlight that was laying on the ground under my chair. When I turned the light on there was a four foot copperhead going under my chair. I watched it keep on going and out of the blind. Later as it started getting light a flock of turkeys came walking by and I shot one at about thirty yards. He flopped around far a little while and came to rest about fifty yards from me. All the sudden it looked like another turkey jumped on top of him. I figured what the heck and nocked another arrow and let it fly. When I shot the arrow flew over the bird and about that time the birds head did a 180 and I saw that it was a great horned owl that was trying to eat my turkey. Good thing I missed. That was quite a morning.

Last year in my blind on a dead still morning just before sunrise, someone in the closest house on a neighboring property decided it was time to practice their Cello. That house is 950 yards away. The way that sound travelled through the trees was right out of a movie. All three of us on that side of the lease started texted to see if anyone else could hear it. It was creepy for the first few seconds until I opened my door to get a better listen and identify what it was. Coolest thing I've seen was when I lived in Virginia, I was coming out of a ranch and right there on the road outside of the gate was a giant hawk and bald eagle. They were standing, facing each other, no more than 4 feet apart. It was like we had interrupted their conversation. They both turned in the opposite direction and took off, it was a majestic experience.

One that I heard, but soon learned the source - many years ago I hunted with an older gent who was an elder with an Indian tribe. While on an afternoon hunt, several of us started hearing a thud sound that was quite loud across the valley where the blinds were positioned. It went on for a very long time - boom, boom, boom with a definite pattern. Very eerie sound.

When we came in to camp which sat at top of a bluff, we found that the elder has brought one of his pow wow drums and had been playing/beating on it while we were hunting. It didn't seem to interrupt the hunting and we got a huge kick out of learning about the tradition.

Many years ago I was hunting Aquilla WMA (whatever it was called back then) and walking a old road/firebreak when I rounded a bend and came upon I think was a Golden Eagle standing over a rabbit. Thing was huge, probably 3 ft tall. I just gave way and kept moving. Pretty neat, got my heart thuming.

Was moose hunting one year with my brother and we had a bull responding to our call, but he hung up further up a ridge and a bit on the other side from where we were hunting, so we decided to see if we could sneak up on him and get a shot. We moved along the ridge on the opposite side from where we thought the moose was and then slowly came up over the top. On the other side was a huge 60" bull, two smaller satellite bulls, and 5 cows. We sat there for a while watching the show and deciding who was going to get to shoot the big guy and which one of the other two we were going to take. The big boy would sway his antlers back and forth and fake rush the smaller bulls away from his cows, and the two smaller bulls would do the same to each other and kind of square off. At one point the big bull peed on the ground and then flopped over on his back and rolled in the muddy piss like a dog on a road kill. Was hilarious watching this huge bull with all four legs in the air rolling around. We finally had watch for at least an hour and then he took the big bull and I took one of the two smaller ones. While we were getting them opened up and waiting for the rest of our group to come up to help butcher, the bull and the cows just stood around watching us for a long while, then he left with all the cows in tow. Was certainly one of those Mutual of Omaha moments I will never forget.

-TJ

called in an owl on an archery hunt... it landed in tree next ta me... we chatted for several minutes...

That would be really kool to see.....

I was doing a drawn hunt in Huntsville State Park. They had me set up in one of the blinds you walk to yourself. I hunted in the blind the previous day and was positive I could get to it in the dark, no problem. The next morning, I was going to the blind in the dark without my headlamp on because the moon was bright and the leaves and pine needles were wet and quiet. It sure seemed like a longer walk than I remembered from the previous day. I finally found the blind, went around back to get in, and heard this blood curdling scream from the blind. It was a young girl and her father and I was crawling up into the wrong blind in the dark. I'm dang lucky that little girl didn't shoot me.

Two bobcats fighting and screaming. I was hunting hogs at night by myself in my tree stand at about 13 years old. It was probably about 830 at night and then I hear something right behind me where it’s really thick and it sounded like 2 little girls screaming on top of their lungs. It scared the crap out of me.

I was hunting out of a tower blind in LaSalle Co a few years back and noticed a bunch of cottontails in the food plot next to me. All of a sudden, an owl swooped down and pounced on one of the rabbits. It then proceeded to rip the rabbit to shreds with its talons while sitting on the ground. There was screaming and pieces of fur and flesh flying in all directions. Poor rabbit!

I was out bow hunting on an old two track road that went through the center of the woods that the muzzleloading club that I belonged to owned. I had my climber stand higher than I normally would go because I was on the side of a hill and needed to see over the top of the hill. A truck comes down the two track and stops about 30 yards down the hill from me. A man and woman get out of the truck and get undressed and climb into the back of the truck and get to going at it. When they get done and climb out of the truck the man make eye contact with me. I knew him and his wife quite well. It was not his wife! He never said one word to me about it.

I thought 2 foot was about as big as these got, maybe 28 inches ...

Well, I didn't ask it to hold still while I get my tape measure out to make sure my story is exact. I did manage to keep my cool and stay in the pop up without disturbing the woods. Wiki says the largest is 4'6" so who knows?

Some good stories here.

Thats a good one. You should have walked up to the tailgate and said "excuse me, is this where the line starts?"

Was she hot?

If you had a camera with ya that picture could have been worth a thousand words dollars......

Way hotter than his wife! No camera sorry to say.

Sitting in a tower stand, about 30 minutes before dawn, and just about asleep. A voice said, “Dave, are you up there?” It was the GW who had slipped in and wanted to use it for surveillance on adjoining property that had poaching problems. I had 2 chairs so told him to come on up. Dang sure woke me up.

I've seen a 4ft copperhead at Cedar creek lake. It was near 'Star harbor' and came out of the sawgrass near the dam, charged our boat in 4 feet of water and tried over and over to get in our low slung bass boat. Whacked him a couple of times with the paddle and he finally retreated. Although uncommon they can get to 4ft.

A copperhead or a cottonmouth?

A couple of years ago I was out hog hunting one night about 9PM and I saw several strange lights falling down from the shy several miles away. A few minutes later I saw the same thing happen in a another location. You could hear distant jet engines, It took a minute or two but I figured out it was the military training with flares. They do a lot of training east of Breckenridge. Pretty neat sight and the only time I ever saw that.

Wolves have not lived in Texas for a very, very long time. If you think you see a wolf in Texas it is most likely a wild/feral dog that has a similar build to a wolf. (german shepherd, collie mix, or many other large breeds of dogs that have wolves as great great, great ancestors).

I was fishing in Packery Channel in my boat near the 361 bridge watching the pelicans diving for mullet. As I watched one over head he folded his wings and dove strait into the concrete embankment on the side of the bridge. He wasn't even close to the water. He made a load splat and never moved again. I was shocked !!!!! He either committed suicide or had a vision problem in either case it was something really strange.