It was a dark and moonless night, with no wind. Just before midnight, I was awakened by a loud noise outside. I know that some animals (like rabbits) can make strange squeals if they are captured by a predator, and that was my first thought. I grabbed a video camera, turned on the porch floodlights, and looked out the window. Nothing visible. The sound didn’t change, so I stepped outside with a strong flashlight and went towards the sound. The sound didn’t seem to care about my presence.
I was able to trace the source from somewhere in the trees, perhaps 20 ft off the ground, but was unable to find anything visual, so the video shows nothing useful.
I kept the camera running for a few minutes, but the sound continued for at least 3 hours, diminishing, but never changing the apparent source direction.
So what is this sound? (The first 3 minutes are the best.) And why would it do this from midnight to 3AM, never moving?
The white noise you hear is from the Lake Michigan waves nearby, and the loud bangs are my screen door closing.
I have no real knowledge of bird calls and am just taking a stab. I’m going to say it’s a mom tree duck trying to call her ducklings out of the nest hole.
That was terrific! I managed to do something similar in a Petsmart with a bin full of screaming chimpanzee plushes–it was LOUD; it was LONG; it was funny; I ran for my life!
That second YT link sure sounds the same as my example; the first link, not so much. The second verifies the source of the sound (“Teddy Bear”), the first is only speculation.
Still, why for three hours? I rarely find pumpkins 20 ft up trees. We certainly have porky pines around here; that’s not in doubt. A porky up a tree should be quite visible in a spotlight, but the foliage might have been too thick. Porky pines visit my bird feeder near the ground frequently, also chew on my porch, but never make that sound.
