| Minnesota Dogman In 2015 I was visiting some friends over the fourth of July holiday weekend up in an area of northern Minnesota which sits betwen the Chippewa national forest and the Superior national forest. The area where their farm sits is out by itself and I’m not sure if the forest behind their land is officially part of the Chippewa forest but if its not then its probably the only piece of land between their farm and the national forest. We didn’t shoot any fireworks and this was the night before the fourth, the night I had arrived. I got there probably about two and a half hours before dusk and we had time for them to feed me a late supper and settle down for some drinks and basically get caught up while shedding that feeling of having been in the car for an extended period of time. Sam and Bonnie had a great life for themselves. One that fit them well anyway. He drove a truck and was gone a good portion of the week but it allowed them to afford their dream home and sixty acres where he could hunt and fish without worry of being hassled by anybody. Bonnie had done many odd jobs, mostly part-time over the years which allowed her to have raised two boys who were going to be good young men. Carl was just about to enter high school and the younger one, Jess, was a couple years behind in middle school. On the northmost section of their land they had a lake that overspilled into a swampy area which was too wet to get out into for most of the year but the dry part of the summer that area got firm enough that the handful of cattle he was raising would sometimes wonder down into the area probably seeking grass which was still tender due to the moisture staying in that area the longest. The entire farm was wooded to some extent and it got thicker the further back you went until you reached where the lake sits and then down below the lake is the swampy area which has some scrubby looking trees which I’d bet have thorns, in any case that area does not look inviting at all. Sam’s farm isn’t all fenced. About a big third of it is and that is where he usually keeps the cattle. The fenced part is a rectangle shape which is longer than it is wide and it stretches down to where he has a little gravity fed watering spot which is the bottom half of some large sized barrel shaped container which he ran a hose to from the lake that sits slightly above that location and to the north. Anyway the water runs over when the container gets full and he just lets it run on down eventually ending up in the swamp. Where the water has run under the fence for the last ten or more years it has dug out enough soil that the cattle can get under the fence if they try hard enough and that’s when they make their way down towards the swamp. So when we first heard the cow crying out in distress Sam wasn’t too worried about it. He said something to the effect of damn cow must have got itself stuck in the mud again. Which I took to mean was going to be a nasty job getting it out based on the look on his face. Plus it was near dark now so we’d be dealing with that as well. Sam said I didn’t have to come but I wasn’t going to hang out with his wife so while he was getting together what he thought we’d need I slipped into the room they assigned me and put on some old clothes. They have some quad bikes they use to get around on the farm so the boys climbed on one and I climbed on the back behind Sam and off we went into the near dark to find a cow stuck in the mud. Sam and I led the way and instead of stopping and entering the fenced area we went past the gate and down along side the fence clear to the other end but stopped when we reached the other end of where it was fenced off. Sam had the boys going back to the house almost before they had come to a complete stop. We were close behind. I tried to piece together what i had just seen. At first glance there was a lot of blood. A cow or rather not really a full grown one, was bawling its head off and kind of standing but not standing because its back looked like it had been broken in two. Not broken like it can’t walk broken but broken in half to the point that its legs were still under t he front and back half of the poor thing but in between where there should have been a nice straight back instead was a v-shape and it had apparently torn apart the animal’s main artery that runs along the spine because it was covered in gushing blood. Quite possibly the most horrible thing I have ever seen or will live to see. I don’t think the boys had time to see what was really going on but they were visibly upset when we got back to the house. Sam ordered them into the house and followed behind them long enough to get a rifle and some shells. Then almost as an after thought he reached back into the gun closet and pulled out a pistol and handed it to me saying whatever did that to his cow was still out there and he had to go back and put the cow out of its misery. Would I cover his back? Of course I would. We got back on the quad and headed back out towards the cow. Oddly it had stopped crying and the thought crossed my mind that it had bled out because there was so very much blood when we were there. Probably fifteen minutes had passed since we left so there was a good chance the poor thing had already bled to death. We were coming from the south going north and the wind that night was blowing steadily out of the west but not so hard you had to hold onto your hat, but it had enough carry to it that we didn’t smell it until after we’d seen its backside. It was on the other side of the fences from where we were, and was scampering into the darkness and gone almost before i was sure I had seen it. The smell was another story. It was the smell of something that had been dead a long time. The odor is distinct and you would know if you had ever encountered it. Sam had raised his rifle in hopes of getting a shot at it but it was gone too quickly. Still I kept that pistol handy and allowed Sam to investigate what happened to his cow and I concentrated on the direction that I had last seen that creature go, and I also kept glancing to our flanks in case the thing was smart enough to try and sneak up on us. The night was quiet save for the whisper of the wind and I began to consider how alone the two of us were out there and that the creature was pretty damn fast. Sam must have been thinking the same thing or perhaps was just not wanting to get his guest hurt or killed. Whatever his reasoning he put a bullet in the cow’s head just to be sure and we loaded up and left there with me watching our backside the whole way back to the house. The next day was the fourth so getting someone to come out to look at what had happened was a tall order apparently but somebody did show up about an hour before lunchtime. It was a county sherriff and though he found our story to be in his words … facinating, it was clear he had the fourth of july on his mind more than he did our problem. Still to his credit, he dutifully examined the scene of the crime, took pictures of the cow which I noticed had been largely eaten by the time we got back. I can’t guess as to whether it was the creature we saw that ate the poor cow, but it stood to reason that it did. Sam mentioned that to the sheriff and he didn’t disagree but in the end what could he really do? Saturday night the darkness was complete early on and the moon didn’t come out until probably midnight. The farm is located far enough out in the middle of no where that there isn’t even a hint of the sound of fireworks though you can see them light up the horizon in spots you can’t really make out what is happening. Still we sat outside with the porchlights out and gazed in the direction of where the horizon was lighting up. It was a clear night or Sam said we’d not have seen as much as was allowed. Just before we went inside there was a howl that was really long and I could tell from Sam’s face that it was not something they heard on a regular basis. However it was just the one time. We had been standing on our way inside the house when it stopped everyone in their tracks. The kids were inside watching fireworks on the television and it had been just us three adults outside. The boys heard it all the same and came to the door blocking Bonnie’s way from getting inside. She had been turned the direction towards the howl and was in the process of turning back to go inside when she ran into Carl which scared her and brought everyone’s attention back to where we were and what we were doing and not on that howl that had come from the north. As mentioned the howl was a one time thing and when Bonnie had recovered from her initial being scared from running into Carl; everyone had a nervous laugh at our own fear of the unknown and Carl backed up and let Bonnie and the rest of us enter the house. Sam decided about fifteen minutes after we had come back into the house that he wanted to take a ride down to the fenced in area and just look the cows over. I said okay that I would go with him and he grabbed his pistol just in case and we went out and took one of the quads down to where the cattle were kept. We didn’t have to go far because all the cattle were up at the end of the fenced area that was closest to the house. Plus they were huddled and I could hear them not exactly crying but you could tell they were uneasy. I think if it had been a big heard of cattle that there would have been a stampede but instead they had settled for huddling into the corner of the property closest to where the house was located. Earlier that day Sam had taken what was left of the cow that had been killed and he’d dragged it to the far corner of the fenced in area and left what was remaining of the carcass there for the coyotes to eat. Plus he said if whatever did do the killing came back maybe it would settle for what was left of its kill from the night before. That made sense to me. Anyways we drove past the gate into the fenced in area and drove back down to the far end of the fenced area but there was nothing going on. I thought I heard something down in the swamp area but by the time we got the quad’s headlight positioned so we could see down that way there was nothing to see. Between where we were located the fenced area came to a ninety degree angle which actually put two fences between us and the swampy area of his property. We were basically in the same spot we had been the night before when he had the chance to shoot the creature. Admittedly a very brief opportunity. We could have driven on up and went around the corner of the fenced area but instead Sam chose to just turn the quad back for home and we patrolled past the nervous cows again and then when he went on up to the house and stopped he turned off the quad killing the lights, but didn’t get off the bike. Instead he said hang on a few seconds. We listened to the cows which were still uneasy and noisy. After doing this for about a minute or two he started the quad up again and we took off back towards the cattle but this time with the lights out. If it wasn’t so big we probably would not have seen it but it towered over the cattle by a good three or more feet when it was standing on two legs. The thing was black as the night and it had yellow eyes that glared back at the headlight when Sam flicked it on. We were probably about thirty yards from where it was with the handful of cattle between us and it. The thing snarled, it had a dog looking face with a short snout that wrinkled when it snarled at us. It let out a growl and disappeared below our line of sight hidden by the bodies of the cattle. Sam raced the quad over to that side of the fenced area and came to a stop where his property line is and aimed the quad’s light down the length of the fence. We both had flashlights but they were no match for the light on the quad and there was nothing to see. None of us slept much that night and about three in the morning I heard another of those howls. However the next morning all the cattle were still alive but the carcass of that dead cow had been picked over. Whether by coyotes or the creature was anybody’s guess. I went home that next day but I stayed in touch with Sam for the next couple of weeks. He had chosen to stay home so he took some vacation time and watched over the farm that coming weeks. There was no further incidents not even any howling up to the end of the two weeks that Sam stayed home. Even after that there were no more howls or incidents with the cattle. Sam came to believe that whatever it was that we saw, was something that must migrate or perhaps was just in transit to another location but he doesn’t think it lives there in that area. The End |   |