This creepy clip from ‘In Search Of…’ (1978) is a good introduction to the ‘Sierra Sounds’:

Background of the ‘Sierra Sounds’

In 1971, Ron Morehead worked as a hospitality manager and church board administrator in Merced, CA. One fateful week, Ron learned that a family friend & fellow church board member was two days late returning from a high-Sierras hunting trip. The man’s wife explained to Ron that his hunting troupe encountered mysterious creatures that made “horrific, intimidating sounds and left five-toed prints around their camp.” One of the men even fled the site in terror.

A known explorer/adventurer and trusted friend, the man asked Ron to return with him to the area and collect evidence. Soon thereafter Ron trekked into the wilderness with a small group that included the hunter-friend and Sacramento journalist Alan Berry. The first trip yielded no results other than fragments of perceived toe prints in sand. The follow-up adventure was much more eventful.

On this trip, once they reached the remote deer-hunters camp, it didn’t take long for the mysterious beings to arrive from a nearby ridgetop.

Luckily, Ron & Alan brought ammo.

Well, tape recorders.

Though they evaded sight stealthily, the creatures whistled, screamed, and vocalized towards the men several times. After the invaders faded into the night, Berry and his companions found large bare-foot prints in the snow and pine.

For the next year or so, Ron, Alan, and friends returned to the site with microphones, tape cassette recorders, and plaster of Paris for foot-casts. It seems that, more often than not, the team encountered the supposed Bigfoot. Furthermore, they found the creatures to be incredibly stealthy. Camera traps were evaded easily and only brief glimpses were ever attained. Luckily, the phantoms overlooked the discreet microphones taped to bush branches and hanging from tree limbs. Over time, the team successfully collected high quality audio and footprint casts: a treasure trove of Bigfoot evidence.¹

Listen to the ‘Sierra Sounds’ Part 1:

Listen to the ‘Sierra Sounds’ Part 2:

About Alan Berry

I think it is important to note that, early on, Alan was very skeptical. Aside from being a former officer in the Vietnam War and holding a Master’s Degree in Science (if those accomplishments equal integrity for you) , Al was an investigative reporter for the Sacramento Bee. He cared very much about accuracy, and was described as a man of great character. He accompanied the men for a breakout story. Until his death in 2012, he always felt that “it would have made the story even more interesting if he could have discovered how anyone could have pulled this off.” His primary goal in the initial trips was to disprove the encounters. He was convinced of the hunter’s deception and even rummaged through their packs to find evidence of the fakery. He never found a shred of proof that he was being deceived.

Al Berry & Ron Morehead on their way to the ‘Sierra Sounds’ camp

Where is the Spot Exactly?

Ron and his group certainly found a super secret spot. According to a radio interview with BigfootEvidence.blogspot.com, the approximate area is inbetween Lake Tahoe and Yosemite National Park. Ron provides a nice rebuttle to skeptics on a hoax page of his website, providing some general geographical details:

• The Sierra camp is over eight miles, walking, from the closest road, any road.
• The trip is very exhausting. The men (about half way into the trip) would often leave the forest trail and proceed different ways to the camp, so as to not leave an obvious trail.
• The camp is over 8,000′ in elevation. In the fall it would snow and freeze.
• The men would always look for evidence of other people that may have been in the area. Rarely was any other humans within miles of the Sierra camp.

A shelter used by Ron Morehead and friends at the ‘Sierra Sounds’camp

How many recordings of the ‘Sierra Sounds’ were collected?

Several clips of the ‘Sierra Sounds’ can be found across the internet. I first heard this evidence on the In Search Of… clip where Al recreates an evidence collection session from 1972. There are staples, but I believe there’s still quite a bit of audio that’s not readily available, but can be purchased on Ron Morehead’s website. To date, Ron has released two collections (available on CD or digital download), and a book about his experiences (also available to download). Here are the descriptions for each:

Bigfoot Recordings Volume One: A True High Sierra Wilderness Story
Description: Produced in 1996 by Ron Morehead features very clear vocalizations captured in 1972, by Alan Berry, the investigative reporter brought into camp . Jonathan Frakes of Star Trek: The Next Generation, narrates. (40 minutes)

Bigfoot Recordings Volume Two: The Bigfoot Recordings
Description: Produced in 2003. Written, produced and narrated by Ron Morehead. It features rhythmic rapping-pounding sounds, and almost understandable phrases emanating from these creatures. (40 minutes)

Looks like about 80 minutes of high quality evidence. Hell yea.

Studies Supporting the ‘Sierra Sounds’

The ‘Sierra Sounds’ underwent a year-long evaluation at the University of Wyoming. The researchers determined the origin to be primate, and that one of the speakers possessed a vocal range and lung capacity much greater than the average human’s.

Additionally, they ruled out the presence of alteration. The tapes had not been sped up or slowed down or even re-recorded. They were organic pieces of evidence.

“The unusual growl-like sounds and whistles were studied by Dr. R. Lynn Kirlin, a professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of Wyoming. It was his opinion that the format frequencies found were clearly lower than for human data and their distribution does not indicate they were the product of human vocalizations and tape speed alteration.”

Went Worth College Professor and former U.S. Navy crypto-linguist Scott Nelson determined that the ‘Sierra Sounds’ feature an actual deliberate language. With over 35 years in the field and fluency in four languages (English, Russian, Spanish, and Persian) his expertise led to the realization of more than grunts and snarls. He believes there are clear distinctions tagged on to the words in the form of phonemes. Phonemes are sound unites that “distinguish one word from another in a particular language.” Phonemes directly cause accents, since foreign-language speakers apply one type of phoneme inventory (French, for example) to a language with a different one (English). Nelson even created a transcription of the recordings by slowing the ‘Sierra Sounds’ down considerably. Per his report:

“Sasquatch Language is spoken approximately twice as fast as any known language in most analyzed recordings, therefore it must be slowed down to be transcribed accurately.”

Nelson’s ‘Sasquatch Phonetic Alphabet (SPA)’ paper is truly amazing. Even if these theories never lead to a definitive conclusion, one can’t deny Nelsons work proves there’s much more to the ‘Sierra Sounds’ than just primal grunts.

“Because of what I did in the Navy, spending years and several thousand hours speeding the human voice up and slowing it down, I could just detect language in those vocalizations.”

Opposition

Like any piece of Sasquatch evidence, the ‘Sierra Sounds’ are highly debated.

Good.

We need to keep adding good, conscious evidence in bulk to the pot, but we ultimately need to strain out the flimsy bits. The ‘Sierra Sounds’ are held in high regard, but what do some skeptics say?

A Hard Skeptic: Karen Stollznow, ScientificAmerican.com

“The vocalizations are an amateur impression of how a proto-language might sound if it evolved from non-human primates. This “Bigfoot” is likely human, and the ‘Sierra Sounds’ a combination of hoax and misidentification, like all of the other evidence for Bigfoot.”

“Similar to the claims of the (so far mythical) Orang-Pendek, Bigfoot would probably communicate using vocalizations. However, non-human primates don’t have the physiology to produce a wide variety of speech sounds, so it is unlikely that Bigfoot would have developed language, or would be able to speak existing human languages.”

A Recreation

Youtube user Hippies WithGuNs recorded his own version of the ‘Sierra Sounds’ and I must admit, he does a good job. He certainly nails the “pig monkey” sound, as he puts it, but admits he needs to work on the whistling. Check out the video and let me know what you think.

¹ Natalina. “10 Extraordinary Questions With… Ron Morehead of ‘Bigfoot Sounds’.” Extraordinary Intelligence. N.p., 31 July 2013. .

The post The ‘Sierra Sounds’ : Our Most Impressive Evidence for Bigfoot? appeared first on Bigfoot Base.

‘Night Scream’ by Scott Davis

Note, it’s difficult to determine the authenticity of a true ‘Bigfoot Scream’, since there are an infinite amount of other animals out in the wilderness screeching, cawing, wailing, howling, and braying together in a moonlit chorus. The potential for hoaxing is also very high. Even though we have very compelling Bigfoot sound evidence, we can’t forget that technology allows us to blend, enhance, deepen, and overlay intricate audio collages. Even back in the mid-20th century sound recording technology was advanced enough to allow for granular manipulation. That being said, let’s have an honest listen to the best pieces of ‘screaming’ evidence.

Bigfoot Screams on the Umatilla Indian Reservation

In 2012, several residents of the Umatilla Indian Reservation near Pendelton Oregon (Washington/Oregon border) reported loud, bizarre screams and shrieks coming from a spread of dense swampland over the course of several nights. At times, the sounds were so unsettling and intense that residents woke up suddenly and couldn’t get back to sleep. Even their dogs refused to go outside. The sounds ranged from bass-heavy roars to blood-curdling shrieks.

A tribal housing authority employee, Colleen Change, recorded this intriguing audio:

The Umatilla Reservation spans 178,000 acres. The utter strangeness of the sounds made it all the more unsettling. Most of the 1,500 people on the reservation practically grew up in the wilderness. They experienced the full spectrum of animal sounds throughout their lives, but these screams, according to many, are sounds that have simply never been heard before. Some even heard the sounds bellow from two different directions, as if a conversation took place.

A History of Odd Activity

Could these truly be Sasquatch screams? The confederated tribes of the Umatilla Reservation— the Umatilla, Cayuse, and Walla Walla- all tell stories of a form of Sasquatch, or wild man of the woods. The region is rich in supposed Bigfoot activity. In 1976 18″ tracks were discovered by a Walla Walla man just north of the reservation in the Blue Hills. Oregon, generally is a hotspot for Bigfoot activity. The state reported at least 243 encounters decade after decade. Fifteen of these reports took place in Umatilla County, including a 1992 ‘Class A’ encounter, where two brothers observed a “large hairy man” watching them 100 yards away across a gorge. And in 2002, a man reported another ‘Class A’ encounter, claiming that a Sasquatch-like creature stared at him through a window of his rural home. The creature fled into the treeline when it was acknowledged by the man. He investigated the land immediately after, discovering 16″ long, 6/7″ wide footprints.

Could the local fauna be to blame for the Umatilla screams? One local wildlife manager on the reservation explained that when cougars breed, the sounds they make are “absolutely hair-raising.” And the neighboring swampland is “a perfect place to have an echoing call sound eerie.” Additionally, wolves, coyote, and fox (listen to examples below) can produce wailing bellows and the same type of maniacal cackle the residents heard. The swamp may have enhanced the eerie nature of these already strange animal calls.¹

The Bigfoot Scream You Have Probably Heard

“The sound you hear is what some experts claim to be a Bigfoot scream. Recorded in the state of Washington by a group of campers in 1971. It is regarded as the highest quality audio of the creature ever captured.” -Leonard Nimoy, Ancient Mysteries (1992)

This is probably the most well known of all Bigfoot screams. I first heard this clip featured in Ancient Mysteries: Bigfoot (1994) back in the day. I assumed it was authentic, no doubt thanks to Leonard Nimoy’s wise timbre. Unfortunately, about a year ago I watched Sasquatch: The Legend of Bigfoot (1976) and was upset to hear that this very scream was used prominently in the film! The sense of awe and terrified wonderment I always had for the hauntingly beautiful audio was lost.

At that point when I watched the movie, I accepted that the audio was made for the project and year after year the origin became hazier and hazier into oblivion. The film is 40-odd years old and highly obscure. I assumed the producers of Ancient Mysteries and these other Sasquatch documentaries of recent years completely overlooked the source or chose to move forward with the segment believing no one would notice.

Unfortunately, It’s Probably Fake

As I continued research, I stumbled into ParaBreakdown’s corner of Youtube, and he provided evidence that this scream was utilized in an EARLIER Bigfoot movie, called Big Foot: Man or Beast (1972). In this pseudo-documentary, a couple from British Columbia were interviewed about an anguished ‘screaming cry’ heard in the swamps behind their home at dusk. The film then provides an “approximation” of the recorded sound, which of course turns out to be the Bigfoot scream in question. This form of it, though, is much clearer and even seems to have some echo and reverberation, somewhat indicating recording-studio acoustics. No!!!!

And if this is the original version… then the Ancient Mysteries: Bigfoot clip just completely made up the 1971 Washington Campers story. Why wouldn’t they have played this original audio then, you know?

I am holding out. I like this audio too much. It’s real damnit! It has to be!

So I’ve decided to subject myself to the suggestive powers of unsourced Wikipedia pages and down-the-rabbit-hole Youtube Comments. The Sasquatch: The Legend of Bigfoot Wikipedia page says the audio is authentic and recorded before the film. As I waded deeper into the shitty blackness of the Youtube comment feed I found a handful of users defending the source, claiming it was truly legitimate:

“There’s not a bit of actual proof that this is a construct. In fact, though he doesn’t take credit for it, it’s most likely a capture made by the same gentleman who’s responsible for the “Sierra sounds” recordings.” – Youtube user ‘Pattysreal’

You read that right. I’m sourcing Youtube comments and unverified Wikipedia text. I consciously elect to put my head in the sand. Roar on, lonely Sasquatch.

More Notable Sasquatch Screams

Even though the Ancient Mysteries wail is likely fabricated, there are plenty of compelling Sasquatch scream recorded throughout the years. Many possess that same kind of anguished, exasperated cry. Others, on the other hand, feel malevolent and sound just plain terrifying.

The Puyallup Screamer

In the spring of 1973 a young boy and girl were riding their bikes on an old pipeline road outside of Puyallup Washington. As they rode near a large gravel pit, a hulking, bipedal ‘thing’ walked across the road, approximately 150 yards in front of them. It paused halfway, looked at them, and continued its stride into the dense bush. The kids pedaled home frantically. No one believed their story even though something strange had been haunting the town of Pullyup for weeks: horrible screaming in the night.²

The children had experienced it, and many of the townsfolk felt the terror. The screams continued after the children’s encounter. And finally on May 12, 1973 a man named Marlin Ayers collected proof. One night he recorded this frightening audio of the chilling screamer:

The Clipper Mills Screams

In the Summer of 2012, a couple traveling with their two dogs through the Sierras near Clipper Mills CA pulled off-road to fix transmission issues in their truck. The vehicle was beyond repair that night, and they decided it was best to wait until morning to seek help. At approximately 10:00 pm, a chorus of powerful, distant howls began. The unsettling cries lasted exactly twenty minutes before fading away. Per the video uploader, “This is as it happened, it changed us, we will never forget that night as long as we live. I am so glad I caught this to prove our sanity and to remind us that this actually happened.”

¹ The Oregonian, Richard Cockle. “Bigfoot or Animals? Strange Sounds Coming from Swamp on Umatilla Indian Reservation (listen).” OregonLive.com. N.p., 20 Jan. 2013.

² Bigfoot Field Researchers Organization. “BFRO Reports by State: Pierce County, WA.” BFRO.net

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