DATE:  01/16/00

LOCATION:  NW Louisiana, Location withheld due to ongoing investigations by the GCBRO

TERRAIN:   Wooded, with Creek Bottoms .

OBSERVED:  One of several field reports from "THE BIG HUNT" hosted for GCBRO members beginning the week of January 15, 2000, and lasting until January 25,2000.

Day 1  I was very excited to get the hunt on when I arrived. After waking up and doing a short tour of the area ( IHOFA found a large male track), BF Bomber and I sighted in his big 338. After that I fixed one of the ailing mini-mics (damn things are a maintenance nightmare). Bobby now hates mini-mics and I don’t blame him for that. It was growing close to time. We hurried to finish and get to the hide site. Excitement filled the air. The hide site was in an excellent location. Seven years and countless hours of work had culminated to this point. I really believed history was riding on this night and this would be the best chance of obtaining a specimen. I made the mistake of not raking the leaves out prior to laying blankets. This, later, along with other things, proved to undermine our efforts. I felt hurried and rush. I knew better and had done these hundreds of times in the military. I should have calmed down and done what I knew was right. The basics. No talking, prep the site, and rehearse on site. We had not taken time to rehearse. A “NO-NO” according to military training. We did work out signals which later turned into whispering. As darkness approached the anticipation was driving me nuts. At dark crashing sounds could be heard for a brief second, across the creek from the front of BF Bomber’s position, then silence. A little later a few crashes where heard across the creek, further down, to my side. The sounds where too loud and heavy not to be the creatures. Then, from a little further down the creek, a "wale" call (a mournful, yearning sound) was heard. Then, at or near the creek even further down, another crashing/ walking sound. I stayed frozen on my weapon and signaled my partner with a foot tap. My heart was pounding as I waited. I heard a brief crunch very near the feeder site. I turned on my Night scope and began deep slow quiet breaths to calm down. Nothing. 20-30 minutes of nothing. Nothing but the sound of my partner sifting and me signaling him with foot taps so he wouldn’t move. You see, He had no idea that he was making noise because of his guilly suite hood and I only added to the dilemma by tapping him every time he moved. He would then push my foot to show me he knew. LOL! I should have removed the leaves and done an on-site rehearsal! Then I caught something tall, behind the feed area, passing from my right to left, in a quick brief flash blocking out the ambient light between the trees. Now I was really racing. It seemed like another 30 minutes before I could calm down but I knew it was only a few minutes. About the time I got calmed down I heard a "peacock" call from across the creek again. I continued to hold on the target area for about another 15 minutes. Finally I realized they weren’t coming out and probably heard me and my partner unwittingly crunching back and forth with our signals.
I couldn’t let it stop there so we stayed. Sometime later we heard the weird bird whistle. It got closer and closer as my partner and I continued to pass leave crunches back and forth. It stopped also about 20 yards out. There was no way to move my night scope over and I didn’t want to rise up to scan with the Cyclops. After about 30 minutes of no other sounds, I went ahead and raked leaves away and repositioned. My partner did the same. We stayed until the ambient light from the moon was low enough I that could no longer see the feed area with my GEN II scope. I figured they knew something was up from all our noises and had gone back across the creek to wait. After donating about a quart of blood for this evening and running off what I believed were our best chances of obtaining a specimen, I called it quits and had BF Bomber call in for "Exfiltration".

Night 2 This night I shuttled other hunters to various stands and did the midnight run. We heard all kinds of creature sounds from the shop. Later I replaced another hunter in the ground box stand. I had no activity to report.

Night 3  I hunted from a tripod stand near the north east corner. Just as darkness came I heard all kinds of weird animal sounds. I thought to myself that this place has to be one of the weirdness places on earth. I had spent 6 years hunting the woods of SE Arkansas, not unlike here, and had not heard so many weird animal sounds. Then I heard leaves moving. My heart raced as I tried to discern what was making the sounds. When I finally realized it wasn’t large, a rabbit came out onto the firebreak from right under my stand. Sometime later I heard movement coming toward me. It came to within 20-30 yards, inside the thicket, behind my stand, and hung around occasionally moving for a little while. Needless to say, it kept me on edge. These sounds were much larger, not unlike a man moving around. I waited for it to come out. Then later I head either a large branch snap or a wood slap. It was one of those, my mind is on something to one side of me and I caught another sound as it was going away things. I shifted my weight and accidentally “dinged” the stand with my gun barrel. I thought I could get away with it, I didn’t. I soon heard the “bionic” bird call from behind me with an answering “bionic” birdcall from deep in the pine thicket toward the middle of the property. The wind was now heavy but the moon illumination had improved. Just as the wind died down I began to hear something occasionally moving in the pine thicket. Then nothing. The wind picked up again. I began scoping the food plot when I heard three distinct heavy steps, crunch…..crunch..crunch,  just inside the pine thicket not 10 yards from the firebreak, right next to and behind my stand. It startled me so much that I could not help myself. I had to turn and look. As soon as I looked I realized I had just been busted out by a BF. I held steady for about 10 minutes and then turned back to the food plot. Another 10 minutes passed and I heard the other one behind my stand sounding like it was edging closer. Now I was not liking any of this at all. Both made no more sounds for about another 10 minutes. Now this was driving me crazy. I called for a pick up when I realized neither one was going to come out and both were content to watch me from inside the thick cover. When the radio came on with its audible tones, I heard the one behind me take a step. I sat there motionless until the truck came. As the truck came neither one moved. I was relieved to be in the truck once I got down.

Night 4 This night I hunted from a box stand in a recent cutover. I walked from the main firebreak to the stand before dark. The stand belonged to the Bayou Cajun. It was noisy getting in it, noisy setting in it, and noisy hunting out of it. As darkness approached, I realized I was highly silhouetted from the large windows. I gave up on the chair squeaks and moved to the floor looking at the ravine through the door opening. Initially it was so dark that my GEN. II scope could not make out details in the ravine. As Illumination improved I moved to the chair again so that I could see further out. The only thing that happened that night was a Faun bleat from behind me. I could not find the source after scanning with my scope. I wish I had used my IR for an eye reflection but didn’t think to use it. High winds ruined hearing anything else and the vastness of the area proved too much to cover at night with a heavy rifle and GEN II scope.

Night 5 This day I hunted from a box stand on the ground next to the field. I had no activity except I thought I heard something moving in behind the stand. I discarded it until another hunter replaced me that evening and reported heavy movement behind him as soon as he was dropped off and in the stand. His quote was like “The SOB was already there when I got in”.

Night 6 This night I hunted from a tripod stand on the field. Opening darkness began with heavy foot traffic in the pine thicket next to the field, next to my stand. Some approximately fifteen minutes passed as something heavy continued to move around in the thicket. It stopped just as I heard two screams of a rabbit with the second scream cut short. I wasn’t to excited but ready for anything to step out. About 5-10 minutes later I heard a large animal whine as if to beg for more or after being slighted from a kill. The movement continued but this time it sounded closer and as if to come out into the open. Illumination was absolutely sucking this night. I waited for something to break out. I got a little excited. It got really close to the main fore-break but brought off and moved away. I little while later I herd heavy foot steps, in the woodline, on my side, then nothing. A “bionic” birdcall came from the woods behind me, from the directions of the ground box stand with a reply farely deep in the woods on my side. I decided that I needed to turn and look for a possible firebreak movement coming form behind me, going to where the other large animal had crossed. After having turned, my stand made a low noise from my boots on the metal grating. I didn’t think much of it at the time. Finally I gave up on waiting for the thing to break out. I turned to face the pine thicket and waited. While waiting I all of a sudden heard heavy, large footsteps behind me, in the field. I froze with heart throbbing. It was only a few steps, very close. Right after the steps stopped I felt my stand shake one time. My mouth went dry, a lump formed in my throat and my heart was now pounding hard enough that it was the only thing I felt I could hear. This has only happened to me two other times. Once in Somalia when rebels ran our aircraft off out in the middle of nowhere leaving us stranded and the other time when the ground war started in the Gulf War with enemy artillery and heavy machine guns. After what seemed like 10 minutes but in reality was only about 15-20 seconds I heard the footsteps move away. I still didn’t turn. I waited for an additional couple of minutes. I turned and scoped the area but did find anything. Latter I heard crashing in the woods on my side and more “bionic” birdcalls. I was happy the truck stopped when I flashed my light at it! I told myself I would never hunt the ground again, no more tripod stands, and I would have to be thirty feet in the air. The very next morning I recanted and no longer had the BF obsession but now had the disease.

Night 7 This night I hunted from a portable stand on the fire lane near the field. A wiser head than my own, easily done concerning BF, determined that the BF’s are crossing the main firebreak further down. A portable stand was erected about 10-12 feet off the ground with good coverage of the crossing point but in view of the opposite woods. Again more movement in the pine thicket but this time two rabbit kills over the course of about an hour. I just knew this would be the one night to get a BF. Everything was perfect except for my butt in pain and my legs falling to sleep. The movement was getting closer. I figured it was far enough away that I could move the blanket I was trying to sit on that I would not disturb the current progress. As I stood, “creeeeeek” echoed out from the little stand as it resettled against the tree. I sat back down very quickly. The movement of the animal continued. My butt continued hurting and my legs fell back to sleep. I waited for the damn thing to cross but it stopped at the edge of the road, out of sight, turned and went up the road, away from me, toward a dark shaded spot that crossed then road. I scoped the road but it was too far for me to see with the GEN II and in the shaded area. I heard movement into the woods on my side. Then I knew I had missed the crossing. I sat waiting for maybe another animal to come by. Still in continued pain, I heard something right next to my stand, moving very quietly. I didn’t care because the pain was so bad. Then a low deep guttural growl came from the woods. Still I didn’t care. I thought to myself, “lets do it now or go away because I’m in too much pain to play”. Nothing. I barely heard the thing move away. Within seconds the camp truck went by to pick up another hunter. As the truck passed by and was probably 75 yards away I heard what sounded like a pig grunt about 30 yards away on my side of the woods. The only problem with this is that there are no pigs on the property. When the truck came back by I signaled for pick up. It was an early night for all.

Night 8 This night I hunted from a tripod stand over looking the bottoms on the edge of the cut over. The Bayou Cajun took the hide site in the bottoms. Right after dark I heard leaves crunching on the ground. It sounded small. I thought it was a deer at first but I hadn’t seen one the whole time. Latter I realized it was too small. A raccoon come out of the woods and went up the road. A little while latter I saw the Bayou Cajun come out of the bottoms shining his light everywhere. I thought, “why doesn’t he just call for pick up”? The Cajun continued slowly up the cut over road in front of my stand. When he was about ¼ the way up the road I heard brush breaking behind me getting closer. The animal came out of the bottoms, crossed the firebreak, into the woods, and away toward the field (this, I realized later, was toward a point ahead of the Cajun as if to cut him off). The animal did all of this out of my sight. I scoped and IR’d the whole time but never saw eyes or anything. Then I heard a large branch break out in the cut over. I turned and saw The Cajun half way up the road. The Cajun continued until he was out of sight and either in or near the field. I turned my attention back to the bottoms. While watching the main firebreak along the bottoms, I saw a large dark form dart across and back into the bottoms from the cut over. Soon I heard the other animal return from behind me, coming back the way it had gone. Again I scoped and IR’d with no results. It too crossed over and back into the bottoms. No sooner than the animal had return that the whole bottoms came alive with chimp sounds, calls, hoots, and whistles. I turned to scope and IR the bottoms. As I turned I “RANG” the stand with my barrel. I froze and remained still. Within one minute I heard heavy footsteps coming from the bottoms which stopped right across from my stand. It was right there. It is very unnerving to have them watch you. You can feel these creatures watching you. As one member puts it, “it makes the hackles stand on the back of your neck”. I remained frozen for about 5 minutes and then I just had to scope and IR the area. Nothing! I remained for some time but ever since I “rang” the stand the animal noises had stopped. I left knowing I had busted myself out once again.

Night 9  I hunted from a portable stand near the field nothing to report, low duration hunt. Illumination into the thick brush was terrible and worsened as the night went on.

Night 10   I hunted from a tree house stand near camp site II. One raccoon reported for duties.

Summary. I have had BFs extremely close on several occasions. None of this would have been possible without the dedication and commitment of Monster Hunter, Bigfoot Hunter and supporting members. I was privileged to work and hunt with a fine bunch of men, all of which impressed me greatly. I could have spent 10 years, some where else or with a different organization, and not have even had one nights worth of the activity that I had in NWLA. I am fortunate and know it. We learned a great deal on BF behavior, activity, and intelligence. We are decades closer to, and I would venture to say closer than, any research organization or individual has ever been to solving the mystery.