Drawing by Valeria Dashieva
In the footsteps of Bigfoot and the Devil Woman
Since ancient times, the Sartuuls have been and continue to be engaged in hunting. The rocky mountains of the Dzhida region abound with wild animals, therefore, according to the proverb “A man’s happiness is in the mountains,” representatives of the stronger sex, returning from the taiga, say: “We had a good time, we rested.”
In the event of a large catch, a cheerful festival was held, at which a long bone was broken, the liver was fried, and stories were told, many of which later became hunting tales. Countrymen, knowing each other well, often embellished events and added from themselves. It is known that many do not believe the stories of hunters. However, in any place and at all times there were many who wanted to listen to hunting tales. Some of them were recorded by the Honored Worker of Culture of Buryatia and Russia, People's Poet of Buryatia Sandzhe-Surun (Galina) Radnaeva.
Dzhida Bigfoot
The son of Nimazhap Dymchikov, who then worked as the director of the state industrial enterprise, Bolot, while hunting, discovered traces of a strange creature. - Since I saw those tracks, various misfortunes have constantly happened to me. Either I’ll break my leg for no apparent reason, or something else... I can’t get into a normal groove,” he told me.
I, too, once while hunting in the easternmost part of Zangata before sunset, saw a small bear and began to chase it. Having walked 500 - 600 meters, I suddenly saw a creature stepping over dead wood and moving away. It snowed recently and I could clearly see the trail. I was wearing size 43 rubber boots. After comparing the tracks, I estimated that the track was approximately size 41. Suddenly I felt uneasy, I turned around and headed towards my winter hut. It always seemed to me that someone was walking behind me, or it seemed out of fear (although I’m not one of the timid ones)...
I tried to direct my white dog so that it was behind me, but I achieved nothing: the dog always ran ahead of me. So, shouting at the dog, I reached my lodgings for the night. I made soup, had dinner, and fed the dog. Suddenly the dog barked, releasing streams of urine out of fear. Surprised, I opened the door, and the dog ran inside out of fear, jumped over the fire and hit the wall so hard that it was stunned. I strengthened the door with whatever came to hand, loaded the gun (it wasn’t very important, really), moved the ax under my arm and sat down. Dawn is far away...
Suddenly an unpleasant sound was heard outside (no matter how much I wandered through the forest, I never heard such a sound). Whatever happens, I thought, I opened the door and started firing in the direction where the sound was coming from. The sound stopped, and the dog and I could barely wait for the morning, I didn’t go to bed. Early in the morning I caught the horse, took him by the reins and walked with the dog towards the house. We reached the Khundelen River, it is no more than a meter wide, and the horse suddenly fell into the water. Any creature that falls into the water raises its head up, but here the horse does not pull its head out of the water...
I pulled the horse's muzzle by the bridle, tied it to a tree and ran for help, forgetting even to remove the saddle from the horse. After running two or three kilometers, I found myself in a winter hut - the Ichetui hunt in the Khundelen area. There was one young guy there. We rode to that place on his horse, but my horse was already dying. The guy offered to kill the horse, but I was careful not to let the blood flow into the river. He took the bridle off the horse, and he immediately went under the water. He hid the saddle in the forest and went, then hung the gun on a tree in a secluded place, and walked to Gegetui.
About two days after that I became very ill.
A few years later, the famous hunter Garmaev Lubsan-Yeshi hunted in those places. Returning late to the parking lot, I had dinner and began to get ready for bed. Suddenly his dog Bars barked loudly. Lubsan-Yeshi took the gun, went out and headed in the direction where the dog was rushing - to the east.
And suddenly I saw a humanoid creature, all overgrown with hair (fur), with a pointed head. The hunter was scared; he didn’t remember how he ended up in the winter hut. There was no gun, no jacket, no hat or mittens.
For several days the hunter walked without blinking, with his hair sticking up - he was so scared. After that incident I became very ill. Now I think that the creature had strong hypnosis. Or was it Bigfoot?
Recorded from the words of Rinchin-Dorzhi Dorzhievich Chagdurov.
Translated from Buryat into Russian by S. Balsanov.
Devil woman in dark robes
When I was a young daughter-in-law, I loved listening to the conversations of older people - my husband’s grandfather Zhantsan and others. Their stories were like fairy tales, they were amazing and aroused interest
Here is one of the stories. In the past, there lived one very accurate hunter (he was a representative of the seventh generation of my husband). One day he was hunting Gunzane and heard a rustling sound behind him, as if something huge was rolling down a mountain; without looking, he shot back from his armpits. Hearing the sound of something big falling, he got very scared and, without turning around, ran away in the other direction.
After some time, having calmed down, he returned to that place. I saw that there was a huge snake lying, whose head was the size of a foal. And all around the foliage of the trees turned yellow. There is a rule according to which the hunter must taste the meat of the killed animal. The hunter cut off a piece of meat from the killed snake and tasted it. “There is no tougher meat than the meat of a snake,” he later said.
Hearing conversations about this hunter, I remarked: “After all, this is a fairy tale, didn’t this really happen?” “No, no, it’s all true!” - the elderly said. They said that the hunter cut off his finger because in the autumn he rustled hay and straw and scared away the animals. When going hunting, he did not take any food with him, except for a container with melted butter.
One day a hunter was going to spend the night in the forest. I made a fire and boiled tea. Suddenly a woman in black clothes appeared and asked the hunter: “What is your name?” “My name is I myself,” answered the hunter. The hunter was a smart man and therefore suspected something was wrong (would a normal woman wander through the forest at night?), he ordered the woman to go get water. She took the birch bark vessel given to her and went to fetch water.
At this time, the hunter rolled up his degel so that they would mistake him for a sleeping man, and he hid behind a tree with his gun. The woman was gone for a long time. When she arrived, she covered her mouth with her sleeve and peered at the “sleeping man” for a long time. Then she turned into a bird with a long beak and was about to peck at the sleeping man. As soon as the bird raised its wings, the hunter shot in the chest. The bird fell screaming.
Various evil spirits (spirits, devils, etc.) came running to the cry and began to ask her: “Who did this?” “I myself! I myself!” - the bird called the hunter’s name. “Well, if you do it yourself, then what will we do?” - the creatures said and disappeared.
The hunter spent the night sitting by the fire. When it began to get light, I discovered a large, long, golden beak of a bird. The hunter took the beak, immediately returned home and went to the datsan. "This is very bad. Trouble is coming. This beak must be taken away and handed over to another datsan in the Zhuu area,” they told him.
It took the hunter three months to reach Zhuu. I handed over my beak to the datsan. The rector of that datsan knew who was heading towards them, and ordered: “A man with a golden beak is coming to us from distant places. We need to meet him, feed him, give him a rest.” The hunter changed horses along the way, which the Mongols gave him. When he got to Zhuu, he was met by people in the datsan. The doors of the datsan were open (and the hunter on the way was worried about how he would find and open the necessary doors).
The traveler was fed, allowed to rest, and then taken to the abbot of the datsan. He said: “You have defeated a very strong enemy. This strong sholmos (devil, devil) would bring considerable disaster to the people.” Then, as a gift, the hunter was given the book “Altan Gerel” (“Golden Light”), written in gold letters.
He was told that the book could not be held below waist level. On the way back, the hunter kept the book close to his chest the entire time. When his arms were tired (and he needed to sleep), he attached the book to his head, tying it with the reins. He rode for a very long time, and the reins rubbed his neck to the point of wounds and scars. Indeed, the book “Altan Gerel” was in this family when I came to them as a daughter-in-law.
Grandfather died at 87 years old. After him, the book was at the disposal of his wife. Someone asked to read this book, but never returned it. She must be in one of the Gegetui families.
The story is recorded from the words of Lyubov Damdinovna Badmazhapova.
Translated from Buryat into Russian by S. Balsanov.
One day, when I went on vacation, a friend invited me to go hunting. I agreed because... he loved to hunt and fish, because there was still a river there. We agreed to meet in the village at a friend’s mother’s place. I packed my things and came to the village (I have a motorcycle with a sidecar). I found my friend cleaning his gun. He sipped from a bottle of forty-proof and sang a simple tune. When he saw me, he waved his hand and said that he had met some old woman and advised him not to go hunting.
“No need, my dear,” he says, “you chose the wrong time.”
We laughed, got our gear and hit the road.
About five hours passed before we picked up the trail of a large deer. A friend (Sasha) rode his motorcycle in one direction, and I went in the other (we were surrounded). And after a while I lost sight of both my friend’s motorcycle and the pursued deer. I drove a little more, slowed down slightly and suddenly stalled. The headlight went out, only darkness remained. I listened. The roar of Ssani's engine was not heard. Crap!
I made at least fifteen attempts to start the equipment and all to no avail. Strange, the tank is full, no other damage was found. And then there was a groan, a creaking, aspirated groan. I raised my head. Nothing, just trees around. And it was still squelching underfoot: I drove to the edge of the swamp.
The groan was repeated, now not far away, about thirty meters away. By definition, it couldn’t be a sleigh.
And then I saw a faintly glowing silhouette. Judging by the outline, it was a girl.
I was scared out of my mind. The silhouette was approaching. The ghost did not move his legs, he simply floated towards me through the air...
Gun…
Pulling the trigger...
It didn't work out...
Mmm, what's the matter?!
Forgot to cock!
Cocked...
I took aim...
By that time, the ghost had reduced the distance to 10 m...
Shot. Doublet.
The silhouette stopped and... Quickly went underground.
At that same second, the motorcycle roared with its engine and the blazing headlight took out a good half of the large swamp.
And I? I landed on my butt and the gun fell to my knees.
I sat like that for about ten minutes, maybe more. He stood up, picked up his gun, and reloaded. While I was reloading, the red cylinders of charges tried to fall out of my trembling hands. But it’s okay, I managed. I got on a motorcycle and went to look for Sanka. I searched until the morning. In the morning I arrived in the village, simultaneously managing to spank a small boar. In the village, Sanya was sleeping dead asleep in his motorcycle, a shot deer was lying in the stroller, and an unloaded gun was sticking out from there.
He made decisions when he was drunk. So I decided that I would get home on my own and there was no need to look for me.
I woke him up. Sanya looked at me blearily and said:
“You can’t imagine what I saw while hunting while drunk yesterday!”
- What?
- Think about it, I’m driving, I’m driving, I’m leading a deer. Well, he finished it, took aim, and shot it down. I stopped and started packing. And then some ghostly girl comes at me! Well, then I got scared and fired two guns at her! She disappeared.
“Hmm,” I said, lighting a cigarette. - Only you, dude, didn’t think so. I spanked such a girl too. Has your motor stalled?
- By the way, yes! Right before she showed up! And as soon as I fired, my Harley immediately turned on...
I found a grandmother who warned Sanya about this danger. She said that a lot of people died in that swamp, and it was on the day when they began to wander through the forest like ghosts that we started the hunt.
“You, my dear,” he says, “are terribly lucky, the ghosts could tear them apart!”
After that I stopped loving hunting, sold my gun and took up fishing...
The ancients made sacrifices to the spirits of the hunt so that this enterprise would be successful. Otherwise, the spirits will get angry and not send any prey, or else they will do something bad to a person...
Oddly enough, a similar custom has survived to this day, especially in the northern taiga regions. In Siberia, for example, there are special, “sacred” places where hunters, before setting out on their hunt, leave food for spirits or sprinkle vodka.
There are “untouchable” animals that should never be shot at. Siberian hunters call them “princelings.” You can recognize these animals by their unusual coloring or excessively large size.
“If you kill such a princeling, there will be no luck,” says Boris Ditsevich, a senior researcher at the Sibokhotnauka UMC.
Once, he says, one of his friends happened to meet a white musk deer in the forest. Usually the musk deer has a brown skin, but this was a real albino - snow-white skin, pink nose, reddish eyes...
The hunter could not resist and shot at the beast. After this, his hunting luck left him, and for a very long time he could not shoot any game...
Werewolf Hunt
Meetings with mystical creatures are also not uncommon for hunters. For example, in Siberia there are legends about werebears. In ancient times, one could hear characteristic stories of hunters there: “I’m walking through the taiga, and a bear meets me. Huge, scary... I, of course, immediately shot. Lo and behold, there’s no trace of the bear!”
A.M. Bronnikov from the village of Znamenka, Chita region, tells a story about his grandfather. He was brave, was not afraid of anyone, and went alone into the taiga to hunt a bear. But according to local belief, it was impossible to go hunting that day. Grandfather found a place, waited until nightfall, determined the time by the stars, and sat in ambush.
At exactly midnight there was a crackling sound in the bushes. The hunter raised his rifle. It began to be heard as if a bear was breaking, but no one was visible. The “steps” approached him, the grandfather wanted to shoot, but his hands seemed to be paralyzed. Then the invisible man laughed loudly, and a voice was heard: “What, you can’t shoot? You can’t kill me!” Wild laughter was heard again, and the bushes crackled again - the unknown creature was moving away. The man, neither alive nor dead, quickly let him go home...
Werewolves are found not only in Siberia. Many years ago, an amazing event occurred in the Poltava region, which was witnessed by a dozen people, including police officers.
In September 2001, a wolf unexpectedly attacked a cow herd and dragged away a young bull. There have been no wolves in those parts for about forty years, and at first the local residents decided that it was one of the feral dogs who had caused the mischief. But forester V. Andrienko, looking at the tracks left by the animal on the ground, immediately realized that they belonged to a wolf.
This case was the first, but by no means the only one. In two months, the bloodthirsty wolf killed more than 20 pigs. He came to farms at night when people were sleeping. The yard dogs, instead of driving away the uninvited guest, whined cowardly when he appeared and, with their tails between their legs, hid somewhere away.
Traps and traps did not help: the animal seemed to guess in advance where they were set and avoided them. The forest rangers just shrugged their shoulders - where is the animal hiding, because the forest around is small and sparse, they combed it a hundred times, but they never found the robber...
Only one early winter morning a silhouette flashed before the hunters, looking less like a wolf and more like a monster covered with thick fur. It quickly darted away from people somewhere to the side, and - lo and behold! - standing on his hind legs. And disappeared into the fog...
And then people started disappearing. Of course, everyone decided that they had become the prey of a wolf. A terrible panic began in the area; residents stopped sleeping peacefully at night and did not turn off the lights until the morning. Parents did not let their children go outside and even forbade them to go to school...
The villagers organized voluntary self-defense units that patrolled the surrounding area. Eventually the police were brought into the matter. It turned out that all the incidents took place within one zone - near an old abandoned farm nicknamed Kabany. A group of eleven people - policemen and forestry workers - went there to hunt.
In a dilapidated wooden house, a hole was dug in the earthen floor - a glacier. There they discovered an empty wolf's den. Next to the pit lay a stack of clothes and a pair of Salamandra shoes. Everything is almost new. Who could these things belong to? - those who came were perplexed.
They set up an ambush in the hope that the wolf would come to his “home.” He came only at dawn, when people had already lost hope. As the hunters watched, the animal ran across the field. It was huge, with shaggy fur of a reddish hue. It moved somehow strangely, as if dancing.
Before reaching the farm, the animal somersaulted over its head - and suddenly everyone saw in its place a completely naked man!
"Werewolf!" - one of the men shouted and fired - obviously his nerves lost. The bullet hit the stranger in the side. He fell to the ground and... turned into a wolf again!
The beast hobbled away and was soon out of sight. The confused people did not catch up with him. When they came to their senses and rushed to the place where the shot overtook this creature, they saw blood stains and traces of bare feet in the snow. They suddenly broke off, and beyond were the prints of wolf paws...
Uninvited guests
Hunting bases and winter huts are often located on the site of abandoned villages. These are, as a rule, places with special energy that influences people.
Here is the story that happened to the Siberian Fedor T. Returning from hunting, he decided to spend the night in a forest winter hut. At night I heard someone driving past, playing an accordion... Passers-by dismounted at the winter hut, the door opened - and two people about 30 centimeters tall entered the hut. Fyodor jumped up from his bunk in fright and started to run. So he ran without looking back all the way to the house. His wife said that he imagined...
In the Krasnoyarsk Territory, five military men went hunting and disappeared without a trace. They had to make a halt in a forest hut, which for some reason was considered “bad”. The search engines decided to go there. The door turned out to be locked from the inside, it was broken into... All five people were sitting at the table, the remains of food lay in front of them. They were dead, their faces distorted with horror. Death occurred from sudden cardiac arrest...
And in a long-forgotten village in the Olkhon region, everyone who stayed there was visited by “They”. This is what hunters called a man with a white beard and a woman with long white hair, dressed in white clothes. “They” appeared both at night and during the day, and those who saw them later described their state as semi-conscious.
Usually “They” asked: “What are you doing here?” Having heard the answer - “We’re hunting!”, they said: “You can’t hunt here!”
These ghosts appeared not only in the hut, but also outside it. Once upon a time, a hunter was tracking game in the forest in winter. Suddenly he saw two people in white in front of him... The man lost consciousness and woke up only a few hours later. Mysteriously, he did not get frostbite - probably the guests in white decided to simply warn him, and not harm him...
After this incident, local hunters called a shaman from the nearby village of Kurtun to come into contact with the ghosts and find out what they needed. The shaman took four bottles of vodka and began to spray the corners of the winter hut with alcohol.
After a ritual that lasted more than two hours, he said that the mysterious “They” were former residents of the village where the winter hut stood. Once upon a time, a man and a woman died a violent death, and now their souls cannot leave these lands... Magic helped. The spirits didn't bother anyone anymore.
In another winter hut, hunters were strangled at night by some black men with unkempt beards. In addition, everyone who spent the night here began to have a severe headache. According to Boris Ditsevich, the culprit was the stones interspersed with copper, from which the stove was laid.
When heated, they released poisonous gases, and people began to hallucinate... It’s just not clear why everyone saw the same images in their delirium. No, it's not that simple!
Mystical warning
Sometimes the “evil spirits,” on the contrary, help the hunters. One such episode happened in the summer of 1952 with the future famous director Andrei Tarkovsky. While on a geological expedition in the Yenisei region, Tarkovsky stopped to spend the night in an empty forest lodge. Suddenly he heard someone's voice: “Get out of here!” There was no one around.
The young man thought that he had imagined it. But the voice came again. When the warning sounded for the third time, Tarkovsky, despite the late hour, still decided to leave the hut.
He had barely ridden his horse a hundred meters when, due to a strong gust of wind, a huge pine tree broke and crashed onto the roof of the house. If Tarkovsky had been inside, he would have inevitably died or been seriously injured...
So it’s better to try not to anger the spirits and live in harmony with nature, without invading someone else’s territory. This is the “law of the taiga”!
edited news OzzyFan - 17-03-2013, 10:34
Fatal parting words
Back in elementary school I had a bosom friend, Vovka. He lived with his mother and stepfather, as well as brothers and sisters, in a large apartment, in the same house as our family. I didn’t learn about the tragic incident that happened to his father, a hunter, right away, but about four years after we met. My dad, also a hunter, although not such an avid one, told me the details...
In the first years after the wedding, Vovka’s mother was quite tolerant of her husband’s weekly hunting trips with his friends. In addition, he always returned laden with booty. Meat and poultry were not allowed in the house. But when the family grew to three children, the wife began to hint more and more often that it would be nice to spend weekends at home with the younger generation instead of wandering through the forests, and even drinking vodka. For educational purposes, so to speak. And my wife needs help with housework.
But is it really that easy to discourage an avid hunter from his favorite hobby? By hook or by crook, whether in summer or winter, Vovka’s father, picking up a gun with a bandoleer, would certainly rush into the treasured forests on weekends. And then, on one of these Friday gatherings, the wife could not stand it and gave the hunter a devastating scandal as she said goodbye. Even though the woman was very quiet and calm, here it was as if she had broken free.
Having shouted, she shouted out in her hearts after her leaving hubby: “Well, stay there in your forest, since neither I nor the children interest you!”
The woman burst out in the heat of the moment and immediately regretted it. But the word is not a sparrow - it flew out, you won’t catch it. With such parting words the man went duck hunting.
It was in the middle of autumn somewhere. The seventies of the last century. There was still plenty of game. So by Sunday the men had shot a whole tent of ducks. When we were returning from the last swim on rubber boats from the reed thickets to get ready for the return journey home, the unexpected happened.
Vovka’s father, crawling ashore, suddenly saw how his gun, which remained in the boat, began to slide to the bottom. And there the water splashes. The man leaned forward, grabbed the trunk with his hand and pulled it towards him. And something like this happened, the trigger caught on some rope in the boat. And the gun turned out to be loaded...
A point-blank shot tore apart the hunter's entire chest. Died on the spot. So my future friend Vovka was left without a father at the age of five.
And his father’s best friend, the hunter, later became his stepfather...
Lady Luck
The next incident happened to one of my friends, Vadik, much later, in the early 1990s.
Vadik is an avid hunter. No matter how much his wife fed him, the wolf kept looking into the forest. Their daughter was about seven years old. Before each outing, Dad always promised to bring her a bunny, a hazel grouse, or a duck. And, of course, he made sure to keep his promises and never return empty-handed. And the daughter always happily saw off her father and looked forward to him from his campaigns with booty.
But one day, out of the blue, he suddenly declares:
- Daddy, you no longer need to go hunting to kill birds and animals!
And he looks very alarmed at the folder.
- What happened, daughter? Why not walk? In the forest, you know how cool and interesting it is! When you grow up a little, let’s go together and see everything for yourself!
But my daughter is in tears - don’t go, that’s all! My mother and I barely calmed her down and put her to bed.
And early in the morning, at about four o’clock, the hunter dad got ready quietly, so as not to accidentally wake up his daughter. From the threshold, the door has already opened, he hears bare feet knocking on the floor - the daughter is running at full speed. She jumped up to the equipped father, grabbed him with her arms, pressed herself, squealed, and burst into tears:
- Dad, don’t go hunting!!! Dad, don't go!!!..
In response to all the entreaties of his parents, he screams more than ever, clinging to his father.
That one to her:
- Yes, I’ll shoot you such a deer today - you’ll fall in love! Then we'll hang the horns on the wall!
And the girl went completely hysterical:
- No need to shoot a deer!!! Don't go into the forest, dad!!!..
And at the entrance, my fellow workers in the industry are already waiting in the car.
Vadik barely escaped from his daughter’s grasping hands and with a heavy heart left the house.
As we had planned, we went on a deer hunt. But they were just unlucky from the very beginning. The forest has died out. There are plenty of tracks, piles of deer balls everywhere, but no animal in sight. And the dog will not raise anyone. On the second day of empty wanderings, they were about to give up on everything, but then suddenly they heard a characteristic dog barking in the distance. The race has begun. There were three hunters. They hurried to the husky's call.
It so happened that Vadka pulled ahead of the others and was the first to approach the hunted prey. In the middle of a small forest patch stood a trio of deer: a female with a six-month-old fawn and an adult antlered male, who was pointing his menacing spreading antlers at a dog circling around. Usually a male deer courtes several females, but here there was only one. The rest managed to run away, perhaps. But for some reason the male did not abandon this one and, flaring his nostrils, with his horned head bowed, made sharp lunges towards the galloping husky.
Vadik, without leaving the bushes, raised his gun and began to aim at the head of the male deer so as not to damage the skin... A shot rang out.
A minute later, the partners who ran up were presented with a terrible picture: Vadka’s body lying in the blood-splattered grass with his head half blown off, and a gun with a broken bolt. The deer ran away, judging by the dog's barking, quite far. But there’s no time for hunting anymore!
The man simply had no chance to survive. I don’t know exactly why the cartridge shot backwards. This happens extremely rarely. But it still happens, as it turns out.
One of the two heads of families (human and animal) was supposed to die that day. And, despite the undeniable advantage of man, Lady Luck still smiled on the beast.
In Altai
The third, rather strange incident occurred in Altai in 2000. A cop operative who was serving in Biysk at that time told me about him.
Then they urgently created a group and threw them into one of the remote settlements of the region due to a very complicated incident. A man was shot and killed while hunting. As expected, by accident. But this had to be dealt with, so he and his partner were sent to the scene to help the district police officer.
An interrogation of the participants in the tragic episode and an inspection of the murder scene revealed a rather strange picture.
From the words of the random killer (let's call him Sergeyich), who fired the fatal shot, the following came out. He stood in ambush, like three other hunters, waiting for the dogs to drive the raised herd of wild boars to shoot. Everything happened early in the morning, at dusk, and even in the fog. Suddenly, a heartbreaking scream was heard and, taken aback by surprise, Sergeich saw his partner running quickly. Moreover, without a gun. A second later, after him, a huge shaggy figure jumped out of the fog, moving in huge leaps. The thought flashed - a bear! Your partner is in mortal danger! Sergeich raised his double-barreled shotgun and, without hesitation, hit the furry moving carcass, saving his friend from certain death. The carcass roared in pain. Got it! But it was too late, in the last jump the animal overtook its fleeing partner and, grabbing it with its long front paws, lifted it above its head. The man squealed like a cut-up rabbit, kicked his legs, but could not do anything, squeezed in a deadly vice. The monster stood on its hind legs, holding its victim high above itself. And then Sergeich realized that it was not a bear.
The creature looked more like a huge gorilla, with short legs and long arms. Only the head, or rather the cephalothorax, was not elongated, like a gorilla’s, but round. And the growth is simply gigantic. In horror, Sergeich pulled the trigger again.
At the same moment, the monster threw the limp body of the unfortunate hunter to the ground and disappeared into the fog.
The rest of the men ran up to the noise. When they turned the victim lying motionless in the grass on his back, they realized that nothing could be done to help him. Instead of one eye, there was a hole in the face from a jacket.
They didn’t believe Sergeich’s story about an incomprehensible huge creature. But...
An inspection of the scene of the incident did not bring clarity, but only added questions. A round zhakan bullet, which went right through the head, was picked out from the tree trunk opposite the body. At a height of more than four meters. It turned out that at the moment of the tragic shot, the unfortunate man was exactly at this distance from the ground. The bullet couldn’t ricochet like that – it didn’t follow the trajectory. In addition, abundant traces of blood were found in the surrounding area. Obviously not a dead hunter, but someone else. And upon examination of the corpse, wide bruises were revealed on both forearms. So Sergeich didn’t lie after all?
Maybe he wasn't lying. But there was no other evidence of the presence of someone else, and even of such a strange appearance. And the unwitting killer, as it turned out, already had a criminal record under a rather serious crime.
Therefore, they did not go deeper into the investigations and delay the investigative actions. Guilty - answer. They imprisoned a man. Moreover, there is a reason for it. Still, his bullet put an end to human life.
But the question - was there a Yeti (or who else was there?) remained unanswered.
We continue to receive stories of unusual phenomena from our readers. You can also submit your story via and it will be published on the website.
This happened in 1993. I then lived in the Primorsky Territory in the city of Artyom. I often went hunting with my friend in the village of Yasnoye (Primorye residents know him well).
I'll call my friend Alexander. His work was connected with the forest, so in the forest he is not an uninvited guest, but a welcome friend. It happened in Pashkeevskaya pad. These places are quite familiar to me.
When I came to visit Alexander, I didn’t find him, but there was a note “Come in winter.” The winter hut was built by Alexander on the bank of a stream. If you walk nearby, you won’t see it. This was done because there are still crappy people among the hunters. They’ll come, get drunk, break everything, or even burn down the hut. So we have to hide the winter huts so that they are not noticeable to prying eyes.
This is the introduction. Now the story itself.
The time was about 2 pm, maybe more. The road is familiar. I read the note, I threw on my backpack and went. I had a dog with me at the time. A wonderful male, he had a lot of diplomas in wild boar, deer, and bear. A beastly dog in general. He didn't pay any attention to the fur. Yes, I didn’t need it anyway.
All hunters, let's face it, are a bit of a poacher. The state helps us with this. But there is a difference between poacher and poacher. If you shoot a roe deer or a wild boar and leave with it, that’s normal, but when they take one license and shoot several dozen, taking advantage of the weakness of the rangers’ work or their blessing, this is not uncommon), these are poachers.
In general, I moved to the winter quarters. I don’t know how it happened, but the road, which I had walked dozens of times, took me for a spin. It was evening on the way. I didn’t bother looking for a way out at dusk, but decided to spend the night by the fire. In September it is still warm in Primorye even at night.
I collected dead wood and lit a fire. I chose a place near a littered cedar tree. And what? The twist is powerful and the back is covered, and there is a fire in front. There is a dog and a gun nearby. What kind of crazy animal will come in? And the dog will warn you in advance. I warmed some tea in a pot, fortunately there was a stream nearby. Sliced bread and sausage. I had a snack. I think I need to sleep.
Only at night in the forest, what good is sleep? Yes, visibility. Maybe these professional hunters will laugh. But when there are 2-3 people, your sleep is serene and sound. But when you’re alone, even though you have a dog and a gun, you won’t get much sleep. So, dozing off and falling asleep. You listen involuntarily to every rustle of the night forest.
In general, the dog and I had dinner. He curled up on my right side, and I began to doze off. Suddenly I hear the foliage rustling, not like an animal walking, but like a man walking. Hunters know that the steps are very visible. And then the grandfather comes out to the fire. Tall, black or dark green cloak almost down to his toes (didn't look closely). He was struck by his beard, even in the light of the fire it was clear that it was white as snow and long, almost shoulder-length hair. He didn't have a hat on.
Any person is welcome in the forest at night, and I was happy, but I didn’t think about how there was a person here at night, but without a gun. But he stood up and invited him to the fire. There was still half of the tea in the pot. There was sausage and bread. In the backpack there is a spare plastic mug and a spoon (I always carry it with me just in case. It’s not heavy, but it will always come in handy). Sit down, I say, grandfather. Have some tea. Sausages, bread.
Grandfather sat down on a small fallen tree that was to my left. She fell along with the cedar. Or rather, falling, he also tore out its roots. Thank you, he says. I just can’t stand your food, but I’ll drink the tea and thank you for the bread. I poured him some more hot tea (the pot was standing near the fire and had not cooled down). He gave me bread and sugar. Grandfather did not put sugar in the mug, he ate it as a bite, noisily sipping his tea and biting off pieces of bread from a slice.
I ask him: Why are you wandering around at night? He: Yes, I live here not far away and I’ve noticed you and your friend here more than once. You’re a visitor, and he’s a frequent guest of mine. This whole conversation didn’t alarm me at all. Neither his manner of speaking, nor the fact that he knows us and lives somewhere nearby. Then I realized that my dog was sleeping and wasn’t moving his ears. Just like there is no one.
Grandfather drank some tea and said: Well, I’ll go. I told him: It’s dark, stay by the fire, and when it dawns you’ll go. He: You have to wait for dawn, but I know every bush here. All paths are well-trodden. That's what you are, a guy. Go to sleep. Gain strength, but tomorrow morning you will go out onto the path and quickly arrive at the hut. Go into the hollow from the honeydew to the left, your friend knows it. You go upstairs, and he’ll rustle through the bushes from below, so you’ll shoot a couple of roe deer. After all, you don't need much. You don't seem to be greedy.
He got up and went. I don't remember how I fell asleep. Yes, I fell asleep as if at home in a bed behind brick walls. I woke up in the morning. Cheerful, well-rested. The dog wags its tail. The only thing that struck me was that the mug my grandfather drank with was standing on a dead tree and covered with a piece of birch bark. And the tea in it is hot and next to it on another strip of bark lies a crust of bread. Not my city one, white, but from a black loaf and sprinkled with salt.
The main thing is that the tea could not be hot, the fire was small. It burned out until the morning. Yes, and there’s tea in the pot at the bottom and it’s cooled down. For some reason, I started to analyze all this later, and then I drank tea, ate bread, and the dog and I went, and immediately hit the trail. It looks like we spent the night near it.
Came to the winter quarters. At first, right from the door, I didn’t talk about my grandfather. I do not know why. Alexandru immediately said: Let's go get the roe deer. Near here. Him: Where do they come from here? They were never here. Well, I persuaded him. And it was not he, but I, who led him to the hollow, as if I myself knew this place very well.
Come over. As my grandfather said, I told Alexander. Come on, I’ll get up here (why from this particular place, I don’t know), in about 20 minutes you go diagonally. Hunters know that the animal always runs uphill. And so they did. I got up. I hear hoofbeats. 3 roe deer jump out. Male and 2 females. So I took the male, and a couple of minutes later I heard Alexander’s shot.
He soon came up to me and said: Well? I told him: There’s a stag lying there. Him: And I took one, the rest ran away. In general, we skinned the animals. The meat was chopped. They were taken to the winter quarters. Alexander put it in an earthen niche he dug (it’s like a glacier there all summer). We decided to get home in the morning, otherwise the meat would be lost. Of course, we cooked a pot full of fresh meat in the evening.
So after dinner I told him about that night. Alexander laughed at first: You dreamed. I may have dreamed it, but I don’t suffer from sleepwalking so I can look for dry wood at night and heat tea until the morning. And there were no traces of birches near the place where I slept. Then Alexander began to interrogate me in detail. Where he slept, how and what happened. He asked me in detail about the place where the roe deer was caught. But he doesn’t remember where the cedar tree littered near the path lies. No, he says, there is a fallen cedar there.
I tell him: I’ll show him tomorrow. Pathfinder. You don't know your places. In the morning we woke up, packed and went. We walked along the path, but there really was no cedar. And I can’t find that place. In general, we had to walk along the path here and there, there was no place to spend the night and that’s all. Obsession.
So we came to the village. Alexander put the meat in the glacier and said: You sit down, I’ll go see one person here now. Let's talk if he's at home. I sat down, lit a cigarette, stretched out my legs - after all, it was a day before. Alexander is coming, and with him an old man with such a homeless appearance is spanking. They came up, the old man begged me for a cigarette and began asking me what, how and when I saw and heard.
I repeated to him everything I told Alexandru yesterday. The old man says: You're lucky. You met an old forest man. I told him: What’s the luck? He: So not everyone comes out of the forest after such meetings, and even with loot. Apparently he liked you. He is a stern old forest man. It won't help everyone. Sometimes it will lead into such wilds that either a person has disappeared altogether or will emerge from God knows where. You will meet him again. Exactly.
We chatted about nothing else. Alexander brought the hind leg of a roe deer to the old man, wrapped in plastic, and with that the old man left.
I say to Alexander: What kind of homeless person? Him: Be careful. Don't look at people based on their appearance. This is our local hunter. He's lucky on the hunt. They say he also caught tigers with his team. And in general he deals with herbs. Everyone goes to him for advice. Well, he drinks, but not to the point of stupor. Yes, for the company. Never loses his mind.
This is the story that happened to me in one of the corners of Southern Primorye. But believe me or not, it’s your right. I do not insist. He told me what and how it happened to me. I still don’t know when will I meet the old forester again? And I’m not specifically looking for a meeting with him. As it turns out.