Considering An Alternate Explanation for Wood Knocks

Posted by Steph at SKOOKUM QWEST - 9 months ago

Recently while hiking in a hidden meadow (swampy area) between ridges in a valley I encountered a very fresh Cougar Scat. This type of find puts me on a higher alertness, especially when in an area where the grass and brush obscures vision.

In this meadow there is a wide meandering shallow creek (which makes it swampy) and I enjoy going to some of the muddy areas to look for tracks.

After taking note of the scat and continuing forward on my way, I was alerted several minutes later to a very loud sound of wood on wood "Thwack".

I stopped to listen as I interpreted the sound as humans in the area, waiting for chainsaw start up, people talking, an axe hitting wood etc. I sat on a large old cedar stump and waited for approximately 20 minutes for any other sound. Nothing.

When this wood on wood sound happened, my dog alerted to it and also began to go in the specific direction (in the treeline) to check it out and turned back half way there.

I began to think on that distinct sound, it was a beautiful full wood on wood solid "Thwack". I had noted in my many hikes with my dog the sound he makes when walking along downfall and jumping to the ground, on occasion, the wood would lift and settle back creating a wood on wood thwack. I too create this phenomena when changing from walking on downfall trees to the ground.

I got to thinking about the Cougar, the one who left fresh scat, it was marking it's territory and presence in the area as a warning - that much was clear.

The fact that me and the dog continued to work our way into the meadow and the high possibility the Cougar was sitting on an elevated vantage point to see us (from the tree line) could have caused that Cat to jump from it's perch releasing pressure on the wood that it was more than likely sitting on (no rocks or outcroppings) as we approached closer to where it was hiding.

If you have ever watched a house cat or even lucky enough to watch a Cougar in the wild, you will note they kick off with their rear legs when jumping down.

Noting the sounds me and the dog make out there in areas where we have plenty of ground debris as well as lots of downfall laying over each other and partially against standing timber, gives a great deal of pause for thought when considering the sounds of wood on wood while in "The Woods".

There is a much higher probability of a Cougar jumping from a vantage point making the sound we heard over the probability that a Bigfoot was sounding a warning of our presence. The Scat helped shape the theory, the knowledge that our hikes have created similar sounds when the pressure of our weight is removed from an unstable wood object tends to sway me towards common animals including humans making the sounds attributed to Bigfoot.