Urban Bigfoot, Seriously?

[Lake County Bigfooot]

Perhaps antfoot, but we know that to bang a stick loudly against a tree does require a certain anatomy to hold the stick!

[Guest]

strong wind, gravity, jumping animals all good causes. another human being banging the wood together also comes to mind.

[Lake County Bigfooot]

Oddly enough, last nights recording captured 5 wood knocks, and I will concede that these are either human or primate to hold the stick, it is wood on wood, and has a bit of a pattern or rhythm to it, which also rules out natural causes.  I think the force and punctuation of the striking action is clear in the previous and current recording.  This was amidst almost no wind or other activity.  I hear some kind of guttural sounds in the first minute and then right at one minute the five knocks, three steady, then two steady.  I have absolutely no reason to suspect humans in the form of my few neighbors to be out at 12:30am knocking, but of course I cannot absolutely rule anything out having not seen the knocker.  Also I have been monitoring activity all summer into the fall and this is the first capture of anything suggesting activity, excepting one inspection of the recorder that was suspect.  All I am saying is this is the type of stuff I encountered last fall.  I know deer can rattle some wood as well, and there are small branches falling from a nearby poplar, all that I have taken into consideration, deer antlers do not strike wood as much as they rattle around, and the poplar branches sound more like small twigs dropping through the leaves then striking. 

Edited September 19, 2014 by Lake County Bigfooot

[Lake County Bigfooot]

Something also interesting is that in the first recording two knocks then two knock in a pattern, then three followed by two as in this recording above, then a lone knock after the coyotes stopped yelping.  I do not know if this is circumstantial but perhaps it suggests a pattern or code of sorts?  Does anyone else have experience of patterns with the wood knocks?  Am I remotely safe in suggesting this is possibly a pattern to be noticed.

Edited September 19, 2014 by Lake County Bigfooot

[LeafTalker]

Great recordings, LCB. I think the wood knocks always have meaning. My gut feeling is that there could certainly be patterns to them, but that those patterns may not be universal; that each BF (or BF group?) may use them in their own unique way.

 

Like some others here, I once had a wood-knocking conversation with a BF. I knocked first, three times, and they knocked back (but I think only once - I have to check my notes on that). I knocked three times again, and there was silence. I then realized I had probably overstepped and gotten a little too greedy, so I verbally thanked them and told them I would stop torturing them with my wood knocks -- and I got a final knock out of them!

 

I believe that final knock was meant to be an acknowledgment of my thanks, as well as an expression of appreciation that I had decided to cease and desist. 

 

IMO, there was no specific information in those particular knocks, beyond what I've just described. I think the BF was basically simply expressing a willingness to engage. The knocks meant mostly, "I hear you, and I understand what you're saying." But I think the knocks had such limited meaning in that context because they knew I wasn't capable of getting any additional meaning out of them. I think that, if they had been communicating with each other in that moment, instead of with me, the knocks would (perhaps) have carried a lot more meaning. 

 

This famous passage from "Through the Looking Glass" is about words and their flexibility, but maybe someday we'll find out that the same idea applies to wood knocks, too: 

 

"‘When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.'

‘The question is,' said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things."

‘The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master—that's all.'"

[Guest]

Wait, so you don't even really know if the was a BF at you place last year. You had some strange noises and a few knocking sounds. Someone threw an apple at you. Now you have theories about them batting geese out of the air? Absolutely no evidence mind you. Where do you come up with this stuff?

[Guest lightheart]

Actually LCB I think you caught speech in those first few seconds. Honestly it sounds similar to what I have heard as far as cadence and accent on the last syllable or word.

If someone with the software could isolate the first 10 second segment and then amplify it, I think it would be much more obvious that something is being said.

[LeafTalker]

Awesome catch, Lightheart! Woohoo!

[Guest lightheart]

LT were you able to hear what I am hearing?

What I hear is something like da da ee ta. The last syllable /word was carrying a strong accent. These are not the actual consonant vowel combinations just something I used to give a rough approximation of the cadence I am hearing. With the right software this section could possibly amplified enough to make out the actual syllables/words......possibly.

[coffee2go]

Oddly enough, last nights recording captured 5 wood knocks, and I will concede that these are either human or primate to hold the stick, it is wood on wood, and has a bit of a pattern or rhythm to it, which also rules out natural causes.  I think the force and punctuation of the striking action is clear in the previous and current recording.  This was amidst almost no wind or other activity.  I hear some kind of guttural sounds in the first minute and then right at one minute the five knocks, three steady, then two steady.  

 

I definitely heard the wood knocks and they do not sound like normal wind activity, but very purposeful.  I also heard some twigs breaking as if something/someone was walking.  This was right before the odd guttural sounds you mention.  I listened with sensitive headphones, but the background noise was too great to get a good idea of what the guttural sounds were.  

[Sunflower]

Cool!  I heard it too.  The traffic noise is so loud and if LCB could get a filter on the audio and just isolate, like you suggest, the first 10-12 seconds, we might be able to hear it more clearly.

 

It sounds like bee al ta dat............???

 

Cheers!

Edited September 20, 2014 by Sunflower

[Lake County Bigfooot]

Nope Nod4Eight I can't absolutely prove anything as of yet, and as you well know my approach is

not all that defined.  The geese theory is way out there by my own admission, but if you heard and

saw what I saw of massive amounts of geese carcasses strewn about, well the mind can play tricks

on you.  The only 100% thing I am sure of is that two primate creatures were communicating using whoops

in my backyard and all the other stuff subsequent to that is secondary.  I will never be able to explain

away what I heard that night, though I could explain away every other possibility.

Lightheart, Leaftalker, Sunfower, thanks for your input.  I too wondered if the sounds in the beginning

were language, or perhaps a cough.  Remember my aged neighbor is out in his chair at all hours of the

night coughing, but he never leaves the chair or makes other noticeable noises.  I will have to listen through

a filter in an attempt to isolate that portion.  I will let you know what I discover.  If anyone can help me

on that end it would be greatly welcomed!

Edited September 20, 2014 by Lake County Bigfooot

[JKH]

In the first few seconds, I heard twig snaps, then a human cough, then one, maybe two sounds like the others describe. Of course they're so faint, I could barely pick them up with headphones. To me they could be another cough or a lower pitched mimic even.

 

I've had success with Audacity, it has good tutorials that give directions for amplifying and eliminating background noise. I detect a high-pitched buzz that seems like the recorder, didn't notice it in your previous recording.

[Guest DWA]

Well, I am hearing clear sounds that only one thing in nature makes:  something with hands hitting one piece of wood with another.

 

Now the hands in question can't be positively identified.  But the sounds I hear don't sound like any time, ever, I've heard a human do it.

[LeafTalker]

Lightheart, no I didn't pick out any actual syllables. My hearing is not great, so I rarely notice sounds that others haven't (although it has happened from time to time); but I have heard them speak actual words (although not in a language I understood), so I know they CAN do it, so I'm very excited when other people report hearing such vocalizations, too. 

 

And DWA, I completely agree.