I used to hear them at night frequently when I lived on a ridge top in Washougal, WA. I heard them a few times in FL when I lived next to the Brooker Creek Preserve in Oldsmar, FL. IMO they can do strange things so I now make it a point to avoid their areas if possible.
Around 2008 I encountered some human-like tracks inside the south end of the Brooker Creek Preserve. My house bordered the preserve. I had a second story bedroom facing the preserve and I’d heard noises at night over the past month so I wanted to investigate possible sources of the noises. I went to the general area I thought I’d heard the noises at night. That’s where I encountered the ‘foot’ tracks. The tracks were about a quarter mile in and a few hundred feet away from the main dirt road, nearby a side road. They were in the general area where I thought I’d heard unusual noises at night. It’d rained a few weeks back so the ground had been muddy. The tracks went into a water area that had dried up. In the dried mud there were impressions that looked like someone was down on all fours. The impressions were rounded, no sharp edges so I believe they were made in shallow water. There were impressions for toes, shins, knees then forearms further up. I had a good quality Cannon digital SLR with me and took a photo of the impressions from behind. On the way out, off to my right along the main dirt road and in some deep cover something growled at ground level as I approached. It was a deeper growl than a cougar’s. It could have been a bear I guess but this was at ground level and I’m not sure a bear would do that. It was quite deep and menacing and as the sun was setting I avoided the area.
When I reviewed the photos on my computer all the photos came out except the all-fours photo. It was present but it was all-white. The entire photo was simply bright white, no variation. The camera had never did that before or since. And there was no way was I going back to take another shot. In fact I never went back to that area again.
Spooky
We live out in the mountains and border a National Park and have similar things happen. I have one neighbor, my wife’s mom about 150 yards away and I can see her house clearly. You get rotting garbage smells from time to time. One night in the late spring about 15 yrs. ago my wife and I were sitting on our porch in the front of the house, it’s a wrap around porch and it was around 10:30pm, kids were small and asleep, no pets at that time and we hear and feel something beating either the backside of the wooden porch railing or the deck, wham-wham-wham! Probably a good 10-12 strikes which were loud. Right before it happened the entire woods went silent, no sound, not even bugs made a sound.
My wife said what was that? I said you tell me your family has lived on this land for 25+ yrs! No clue. I told her to grab my M1 carbine out of the front closet and I had a .357 magnum on me and walked to the corner of the porch and heard a commotion in the back yard and yelled out, you are about to get your ass shot off beating on my house! Nothing. I cranked off a single round into the dirt and more commotion. My wife then nudged me and handed me the carbine and I gave her the .357 and said go inside, when you hear me out back turn the porch lights on, lock the door behind you. I chambered a round, 110 grain hollow points. I walked to the back out of the light of the street light in the front yard into darkness and heard more movement in the yard, near the wood line. Again I yelled a warning you are about to get your brains blown out messing around my house in the middle of the night and in a sliver of light from the street light I put 5-6 rounds into the dirt ground. Then silence for a few seconds and then what sounded like a freight train tearing through the deeps woods, headed into the deep woods which made no sense for any sane human heading into copperhead and rattlesnake infested wilderness in the dark.
We have had a kitchen window knocked on about 1:00am. My son was playing xbox in the summer time with his cousins about midnight and heard some one rapping on the kitchen window and he blew out of the den and up the stairs into his bedroom. This window is easily 10-12 feet off the ground. We have had wood knocks, especially if my wife or daughter go outside walking around the property. Also a few strange yeps I guess you would call them, like a howl and growl together. I have heard about every animal in the area at some point in time: bear, bobcat, fox, coons fighting, coyotes, even a mountain lion wailing like a woman but these matched none of them.
I have no explanation for these strange things. We live way out away from people and it takes effort to get to our place.