YEAR: 2026

SEASON: Spring

MONTH: May

DATE: May 10, 2026

STATE: Ohio

COUNTY: Jefferson County

LOCATION DETAILS: 40.50655
-80.85602

NEAREST TOWN: Bergholz, OH

NEAREST ROAD: County Rd 53

OBSERVED: My daughter and her family were sitting on the shore of a lake on our property. Their 15 yo daughter and 9 yo son were playing in the nearby woods. The boy was hitting an old tree with his hatchet while they explored. They were called back to sit with their parents before heading to the house.

While sitting there, the entire family heard crunching sounds of something large moving through the forest and then 3 very loud wood knocks coming from the same area where the kids had been playing. According to my son-in-law, the knocks were ‘clunk’… ‘clunk-clunk’ and very loud. From their seats, they were unable to see the area due to vegetation, topography, and distance – about 50 yards.

They could tell the sounds came from the same place/direction as the area the kids had been exploring just minutes before.
They determined to pack up and leave immediately.

My son-in-law is 6’4” and a big guy. He was definitely shaken by the noise – having never heard anything like that before. He was armed and stood watch while the others loaded up the chairs and got ready to leave. He said that it was something louder and more powerful than a tree branch or even a tree falling over. They live on the property and are used to the sounds made in the woods all hours of the day and night. Both have lived in the country their entire lives.

My husband and I went to the area to look for tracks and other signs. We found a few possible tracks, but no track line. Lots of deer prints. The ground is soft sand/soil mix and vegetation. We have occasional creek flooding covering the area. There are game trails through the area. It leads to a large, deep creek and into a much deeper wooded area.

No one lives in the immediate area. No homes or traffic. It is only accessible by a privately owned road with locked gates obstructing any trespassers. There was no one else around fishing or on kayaks/canoes in the creek. They all said it was not a beaver hitting the water with its tail, either.

There have been other incidents over the 20+ years we have lived here. Two other grandsons had small rocks and branches thrown at them when exploring in the woods above their home about 15 years ago, we have heard occasional, distant single wood knocks.

Animals in the area include deer, rabbits, bobcats, mountain lion, bear, beaver.

We live on 500 acres of mostly wooded land and are surrounded by more woods. approximately 15 miles from Toronto Ohio, on a large creek [Yellow Creek] which flows into the Ohio River.

There have been other incidents in the area told to us by neighbors and folks living along the creek, including a sighting of a large white/tan creature late last Summer.

ALSO NOTICED: They heard a something large moving through the woods. The birds did not become quiet and there was no odor.

Also - there have been large tracts of land clear-cut in our area recently.

OTHER WITNESSES: 2 adults, 1 teen, 1 school-aged. The kids had been playing in the woods, one of them hitting trees with a hatchet, making noise. At the time of the wood knocks, all were sitting lakeside about 50 yards away.

OTHER STORIES: We live about 15 miles NW of Toronto Ohio, where there have been recent howls and knocks. We have heard occasional tree knocks including one on the right side of a hill and a second answering at least 100 yards to the left. Nothing this close or loud.

TIME AND CONDITIONS: About 5:30 pm
Sunny, temp about 68 degrees F

ENVIRONMENT: Deciduous woods, bordered by large creek on West and an 8 acre lake on East. There are no homes in the immediate area.

Follow-up investigation report by BFRO Investigator James Thompson:

I contacted the witness and arranged to meet at their residence, which is on the outer edge of their family's 500 acre property and is adjacent to a 500 acre coal company property. The area was previously strip mined for coal during the last 70 years. As was most of the areas that were strip mined before the 1970's, it was not reclaimed, meaning it was not returned to it's original topography after stripping was complete. It was left scarred from the coal removal, the trees and vegatation grew back on their own along with the multi-floral rose and crown vetch the coal company planted to reduce soil errosion.

Yellow Creek flows through the property. The ground was not touched within 100 yards either side. Navigation through the property is by the old coal 'haul' roads, and a boat for the long narrow strip pit ponds, and an old hiking trail mostly on the south side of Yellow Creek. We traveled to the encounter location on one of the haul roads to an area that was about a 150 yard strip between Yellow Crèek and a narrow strip pit pond that was about a mile long paralleling Yellow Creek. The owners had made a camping/picnic area at that end of the pond.

The husband and wife had set up chairs in the picnic area and were watching their son and daughter explore the area between the creek and the pond. I ranged the area the kids were in at 90 yards from where their parents were. The son had a camping hatchet and he was going around chopping on different trees. The father called them back to the picnic area and shortly after they returned a loud crashing sound in the brush followed by a very loud tree knock, then two more knocks after a short pause from the first.

The father, who is an avid outdoorsman described the sounds as something he has never heard before and frightened him to the point of him rushing his family out of the area.

I first had the husband walk me through the area and point out and describe the events at the locations where it all happened while the family waited at the vehicles. Then moving back to the family, I asked them about the sounds they heard and the kids replied that they were very loud and scary. As a group we went back to the area and I had the son show me the trees he was chopping on and demonstrate it to me. The trees were mostly sycamores and tulip poplars but the last tree he chopped on was a dead ash that was broken off about 5 feet out of the ground. The sound his chopping made was loud and sharp compared to the dullness on the live trees. That was the tree he chopped on last before his parents called them back. The father could not pick out the exact tree the knock came from, only that it was the area where the kids were last at.

The family had to leave, but I stayed to search the surrounding area for any evidence. The area between the pond and creek contained numerous well traveled game trails. Although there was a short hard driving rain earlier that morning, I couldn't find any other type tracks other than wild game.

Yellow Creek in that area is about 25 feet wide with shallow areas and deep drop offs. In places there are wide rock and sand covered banks that didn't produced any evidence.

I found the witnesses to be genuinly scared at what they experienced that day. While talking with the wife's parents who are the owners of the property, there have been many experiences by both over the years that have left them questioning what is exactly out in their woods.

This location is within 10 to 14 miles from the previous reports of the last two months in Jefferson County and I look forward to continue investigating this area.

About BFRO Investigator James Thompson:

Jim served as a Marine Corps helicopter engine mechanic / air crewman for 24 years. He recently retired as a County Veterans Service Officer. He is a lifetime hunter and outdoorsman. Jim has attended expeditions in Ohio during 2019, 21,22,23,24,25 and in South Carolina in 2025.

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