YEAR: 2025

SEASON: Winter

MONTH: February

DATE: 19

STATE: Pennsylvania

COUNTY: Centre County

LOCATION DETAILS: This incident occurred at the west end of Gamelands 333 on Spring Creek. I had parked along Rock Rd which runs under I-99, and crossed the creek to get up into the woods.

NEAREST TOWN: Bellefonte

NEAREST ROAD: Rock Rd and I-99

OBSERVED: I had an encounter where I heard a wood knock, caught a glimpse of one moving between trees, and finally caught one dead in my spotlight before it hid behind a tree.

ALSO NOTICED: I have experienced other incidents in this area. I had a rock thrown at me, feelings of existential dread, and saw a ball of blue light moving through the woods

OTHER WITNESSES: I was the only person in the area.

OTHER STORIES: Bad Eagle State Park, only a ten minute drive away, had a sighting in 2020.

TIME AND CONDITIONS: 6:30ish

ENVIRONMENT: I was walking west along Spring Creek to return to my car when I heard the wood knock, and began to be followed. The area I was in specifically was covered by thick healthy tall pines, causing complete pitch darkness while I was there.

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator Benjamin C.:

I spoke with the witness at length about his sighting and experiences there in State Game Lands 333. A young man attending Penn State, I found him to be earnest and very credible. Due to privacy concerns, the witness requested not to be named in the report. His initials are M.K.

The area of the incidents is along Spring Creek in the Pennsylvania State Game Lands 333, located just north of State College and southeast of the town of Bellefonte.

It consists of over 1200 acres of rolling and forested terrain, interspersed with fields to aid pheasant hunting. The primary game species here are deer, turkey, squirrel, and grouse, with introductions of pheasant and extant small fur bearing animals. The author of this report (me) lived in the area for two years and explored the exact area of the sighting in question several times and can vouch for the witness’ descriptions of the environs and the capacity of the environs to conceal and sustain a bigfoot.

MK had been going to the game land since January to scout out locations for raccoon hunting. After receiving his permit he began to hunt the area in earnest in early February.

Nothing out of the ordinary occurred until the beginning of February. The witness had come to the area on Feb 1st at approximately 6:45PM to raccoon hunt. (Sunset occurred at 5:29PM, with civil twilight ending at 5:58PM.)

He parked his truck at the trailhead of Spring Creek Canyon Trail and then hiked northeast along the trail. He walked around the first curve where the trail turns to the east. At this point, the witness described a “dreadful feeling” as if something bad was going to happen. He looked around the area, shining his spotlight around, and said that he felt like he was being watched. His back was to the creek, and he was looking north up the slope into the forest.

Despite feeling deep unease, the MK carried through with his initial plan of raccoon hunting. He set up his Predator Hunter FoxPro Patriot to call blast racoon fight sounds and baby racoon sounds to attract raccoons to his location.

The call had a timer on it that was set for four minutes. MK described a feeling like he was being watched the entire time. Visibility was extremely low, as Spring Creek is in a semi-canyon blocking out most light, leaving only a limited amount of open space for star or moonlight to be seen. It was nearly “pitch black” although what ambient light there was did allow for some discernment about where the creek was due to the ripples catching the dim light.

While he was using Predator Call, approximately every 30 seconds MK heard a “plap, plap, plap” sound near the creek, as if something was hitting the water. The water was moving and gurgling as creeks do, but this sound was distinctly different and apparently caused by an external force. MK looked in that direction but did not see anything moving.

After the predator call finished after the four minutes MK decided to leave the area. He was feeling a bit “freaked out.” He gathered up his Remington 870 12 gauge shotgun, spotlight, and predator call, and walked back up the trail towards his vehicle at the trailhead. He stopped and turned and looked towards the creek and shined his spotlight. That's when MK saw a black silhouette on the opposite side of the creek disappear into the brush.

He continued to shine his light but did not see anything else, and then he turned back down the trail and continued walking until he reached his truck at the trailhead. He took off his vest and placed his gear into his trunk and drove away, thinking to himself that maybe he was simply imagining things and overreacting to the conditions.

A short distance down the road he realized that his phone was in the back of his vest pocket so pulled in at the entrance to the fish hatchery on Shiloh Road. The witness exited his truck to grab his phone in the back.

Almost as soon as he secured his phone, a small stone came out of the dark, hit the ground near his feet, and skittered with forward trajectory across the ground underneath the truck. At this point MK says he dove into the front seat of his vehicle and peeled out of the area.


MK’s most recent encounter occurred on Wednesday February 19th, but on the southwestern side of the game lands.


He took Rock Road to access the game lands and parked his truck at a pull off on the side of the road. The current time was approximately 5:20 PM. The weather conditions were mid to low 20s, overcast, no wind. Wearing chest-high fishing waders, the witness crossed the foot deep Spring Creek and entered the thick forest on the opposite shore. Walking inwards approximately 70 yards into the woods.

He started broadcasting predator calls at approximately 5:30 PM, running the calls for ten minutes at a time. With no animal activity observed, he decided to walk back to the creek. Along the way he found a small animal trail which he decided to follow. The trail roughly paralleled the creek and headed east. There is a small bridge that crosses the creek at this point that allows limited access from a parking area on the north side of the creek to the land on the opposite shore on which there is a unique exposed rock face. He reached this location at about 6:10 PM.

He described the terrain in this area as being a stand of pine trees. The ground cover is open and not too thick, but the canopy is extremely dense and blocks out much of the ambient light, leaving the forest floor beneath the trees very dark. At this point, there was almost no twilight left (the sun went down at 5:51PM and civil twilight ended at 6:19PM on this date and location) and the encroaching darkness was making him very nervous. Standing next to the rock face, MK turned west and headed back along the creek.

After he passed the rock face, he heard a single solid knock off to his 8 o’clock, or southwest of his position. He described the knock as “if you took a bat and gave a tree a nice firm tap.” This sound unnerved him. He continued walking, trying to keep himself calm. (He has had prior experience in encountering bears while hunting and knew that running could trigger the chase response from a predator.)

At this point MK had his spotlight out and was scanning the forest back and forth with the light. He could hear movement of something “slowly and surely” paralleling him. He heard ice and twigs crunching beneath what sounded like footsteps that were proceeding from the location of the wood knock.

As he moved forward he kept turning back to look behind him. Turning with his spotlight, he caught a glimpse of some movement. Something large and upright disappeared behind a tree.

MK took out his cellphone and calls a close friend (ROTC student at Penn State) and pleaded with him to “get his AR (AR-15) and get out here!” further telling his friend that he was stuck in the woods and something big was following him. MK said that his ROTC friend laughed at first, only to shortly realize that the witness was serious and something potentially dangerous was actually going on.

At this point, MK estimates he was about 100 yards east south-east of the right angle bend in the creek. The thorn bushes along the bank of the river at this location formed a choke point and if he had to push forward the brush would act as a turning obstacle and force him to go deeper into the forest into to keep going. He did not want to turn back in the direction of the noise of whatever was following him.

He was facing south,with his shotgun in one hand, spotlight in the other, and cellphone in his vest pocket set to speakerphone. He was still talking to his friend at this point and scanned the forest again with his spotlight. Turning partially to his left, his light caught the creature “dead in the face”. It was roughly 40 yards away.

MK described the face as looking roughly like the face of King Kong in the most recent 2024 movie, with some differences. "The nose was sharper. It was not super wide or flared.” The skin color of the face appeared to be a medium gray, surrounded by wispy, lighter gray hair. It had a pronounced brow ridge and sunken eyes. The mouth was “thin-lipped” and closed. The jaw appeared “not sharp like a human’s, more a rounded, blocky chin.”

MK did not see any ears. He did not see any major eyeshine but thought could see a glimmer of reflection of his spotlight in its eyes. The top of the head was not cone shaped, but rather sloped back and rounded, similar to a human. The creature had a tuft of hair on the top of the head and the hint of a receding hairline. He could not describe the hair on the body of the creature other than “dark”, and could not tell how long the hair was either.

MK estimates it was over seven feet tall. He could not fully see the body as it was partially hidden behind a pine tree. It was holding onto the tree with its left arm with its right arm pulled back and holding onto the back of its upper leg, seemingly trying to minimize its profile.

He described the bulk as massive: “Take the biggest body builder you have known in your life, and double it.” The upper arm and shoulder were “massive”. The trapezius muscles were huge, seemingly coming up to just under the ears and having no observable neck. The creature was “absolutely jacked.” The witness was able to view the creature for only about 2 seconds before it pulled back behind the tree.

At this point, MK was freaking out, telling his friend on speakerphone that he saw something move behind a tree. MK was now terriefied so he pressed his back against the thorn bushes and forced himself backwards through the entangling brush to get to the creek. He was relived that he “didn’t get torn up too bad.” He hopped into the shallow creek and crossed to the other side, crawled up the embankment to Rock Road, and then quickly walked back to his vehicle.

____________________________________________________


My own prior familiarity with this specific hunting area leads me to believe that in wintertime, the local bigfoot population will leave the more secluded, secure, forested ridges and valleys of the region and move to the lowlands where the weather is less inclement, and more importantly, where there are readily available sources of food, shelter, and water. State Game Land 333 has all three of those in abundance.

During MK’s scouting of the area prior to his encounter he came across a group of ten pheasant hunters running a pack of three dogs a few days after the area was stocked with 400 pheasants. The hunters said how despite their efforts they could not find a single bird in the entire area. It is easy to hide in there because parts of the forest are so dense.

State Gamelands 333 sits in the Northern Limestone/Dolomite Valley eco-region that makes up a substantial portion of the Ridge and Valley region of the Appalachians. The forests here are primarily oak-hickory forest, which include red and white oak mixed with tuliptree, red maple, and hickories among others. White pine, beech, birch, sugar maple, and Canadian hemlock can also be found as well but in lesser numbers as they are more common at higher altitudes and latitudes. Animals in the region include white tail deer, black bear, coyote, red fox, and a plethora of smaller animals. Two fish hatcheries a

re also located within and adjacent to the game lands, Benner Spring State Fish Hatchery and Bellefonte State Fish Hatchery, as are food plots planted for local game species. Just a few miles to the north of the game lands lie Bald Eagle State Park, State Game Lands 92, State Game Lands 103, and Black Moshannon State Park, and beyond that the vast Sproul, Susquahannock, and Elk State Forests

About BFRO Investigator Benjamin C.:

B. has attended multiple BFRO expeditions: North Georgia 2018 Fall, North Georgia 2019 Spring, Tennessee 2020 Fall, South Carolina 2021 Spring, and Pennsylvania 2021 Fall, Pennsylvania 2022 Fall, New Jersey 2022 Spring and Fall.

He has also conducted private expeditions in New Jersey, Alaska, Arizona, North Carolina, and southern Georgia. His area of responsibility as a BFRO investigator is central Pennsylvania.

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