YEAR: 2012

SEASON: Fall

STATE: Wisconsin

COUNTY: Iowa County

LOCATION DETAILS: Dry Dog Road, Avoca, WI

NEAREST TOWN: Avoca

NEAREST ROAD: Highway 80 and Dry Dog Road

OBSERVED: It was late in the evening. I just let the dog outside to do her thing before bed. She started barking constantly with alarm. I went outside and my horses were all lined up staring down the roadway. Then I heard this weird noise, very loud! Kind of cross between a scream and a growl. It did it several times. I went in the house to get my husband to come out and hear it. He came right now but the noise had stopped. He however did see how alert and nervous the horses were and how the dog was scared and barking. We stayed outside quite a while but heard nothing more. Several days later, also in the evening. I took the ATV to go close my gate at the end of my driveway about 3/4 mile away. As I went around the curve I seen a large, wide spread pair of eyes. I slowed but did not stop. I continued down the hill and I could feel the hair go up on the back of my neck. Of course I had to go back up. I seen nothing on the way up. I told my husband about it. The next day I went down to the spot where I had seen the eyes. I saw no tracks looking over the edge of the bank but figured whatever was there had to be about 8 feet tall to put the eyes at the height they were and be standing on the ground. There is a spring in the ditch line, the bank is very steep and I choose to not go down to investigate. I went to your website to check if there were any reports for Iowa County WI. A that time there was 1 near Dodgeville about 30 miles away years ago. I have thought of this several times in the past year. I've had 2 other people that have been on my farm--in the woods that have said they heard "something...like nothing they have ever heard before" out there. I did not share my story with either of them but I told them they weren't the only ones to hear something. Tonight I was watching the Bigfoot show and I thought I would get on your site and check things out again. Guess what? I know exactly where a witness lives and it's probably 5 miles away from me. I never heard anything about it until I read it on your site tonight. I probably won't call him but if I see him I'll have to share my experience with him.

ALSO NOTICED: For several years my farm animals tend to not want to go out to pasture. I have seen many animal in passing in this area such as bear, cougar, lynx, even some escaped elk have come through.

OTHER WITNESSES: My husband witnessed the farm animals' behavior that night but never heard anything himself. The other 2 guys weren't able to identify what made the noise they heard.

OTHER STORIES: Just what I read on your website tonight. Like I said earlier...a witness lives less than 5 miles away.

TIME AND CONDITIONS: It was late in the evening. Weather was clear.

ENVIRONMENT: Hills, valleys, woods, pasture, crops and a spring. Estimate of about 2000 acres with no full time residents but me.

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Robert Barhite:

I spoke with Joanie, who has lived on the acreage and around farm animals all her life. It was around 11 pm. when she heard her dog barking and she decided to go and investigate. Her horses were lined up next to each other and staring in the direction that her dog was barking. When she got closer to the horses, Joanie heard six or seven very loud crashing noises in the woods, like something extremely large was walking away. She urged her husband to come out to investigate, and they stayed outside for quite sometime hoping to hear it again, but it had moved off.

A few nights later Joanie was driving her ATV down their lane to close the gate for the night. Her horses again were lined up and spooked. They were staring down the road in the direction of whatever spooked them, and in the direction which Joanie was driving. As she rounded a curve the headlights from the ATV caught a very wide set apart pair of yellowish-white eyes in the tree line and about seven to eight feet off the ground. Joanie has been around both farm animals and wild creatures, and a few years back had a stare down with a cougar. This was the first time she truly felt fear. The eyes were significantly further apart than what they would be on a person. She accelerated, closed the gate, and raced back to the house.

The next day her and her husband went to the spot where she saw the eyes. There were no low hanging tree branches, which ruled out any squirrels or other creatures which could sit on or hang from a branch. And it was a spot which was nearly inaccessible which made it impossible for Joanie to look for tracks.

Family members who have hunted on her property over the years have reported hearing strange howls and screams which were unlike anything they've heard before, including big cats.

Please note that the location is less than five miles from the location of Report #38005 and occurred at roughly the same time of year.

About BFRO Investigator Robert Barhite:

A native of far northeast Iowa, Robert has always had an intense interest in Bigfoot and exploring the great outdoors.

His first expedition was the 2012 BFRO Iowa Hill Country Expedition He the 2013 Iowa Big River Expedition, 2013 Oregon Cascades Expedition, 2013 Michigan Upper Peninsula Expedition, 2014 and 2015 Wisconsin Expeditions, 2014 Iowa Expedition, and the 2015 Iowa Spring Expedition. Since 2012 Robert has participated in several private expeditions in Iowa and in Wisconsin. In addition to expeditions, he has conducted numerous solo research trips in Iowa and Wisconsin throughout 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, and 2016. And for the last two years has been a guest lecturer at the request of the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers. Robert led the 2016 Iowa Spring Expedition and is assisting with the 2016 Iowa Fall Expedition and is scouting locations across North America for 2017 expeditions, and continues to monitor activity in a long-term study location in the Midwest.

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