Little Tupper Lake - odd reverberating sounds

[RichieC]

That Damn farmer can't start his tractor! IT is a very low frequency, difficult to get a direction on it... and the sound carries. I have heard bitterns too, that is a cool sound, but it does not escalate and is not a pressure sort of thing!

Thing is, it is so quiet in the Adirondacks, you hear more, and the effect is more pronounced. So they do sound different up there than down where I live.

For those not familiar.

Bittern:

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/459205791#_ga=2.253217289.14447685.1655731873-1179116664.1655731873

Ruffed Grouse

https://macaulaylibrary.org/asset/459043471#_ga=2.243723525.14447685.1655731873-1179116664.1655731873

https://www.audubon.org/news/see-and-hear-ruffed-grouses-haunting-air-drumming

Owls can't hear this frequency or they too can't figure out where it is coming
from:

https://www.nps.gov/articles/netn-species-spotlight-ruffed-grouse.htm

"
Out-wising the Owl

Besides ruffing it out, another part of the elaborate mating ritual male Grouse perform is to bang out a drumming solo from an old rotting log in the forest. These prime drumming locations are highly sought after by males. Ideally, they?re about 15 inches off the ground, 20 to 40 feet long, and sitting under branches to foil would-be winged predators. Once they find a keeper, male Grouse will likely spend the remainder of their lives no farther than a 200 to 300 yard radius from that log.
It is a sound of such low frequency, it is almost felt more than heard. To the uninitiated, a male drumming routine can often be confused for a pesky chainsaw or lawn mower that just won?t start-up in the spring. The deep base notes start slowly, build to a crescendo, and slow down again towards the end. All this is done without banging on the log at all however. The entire routine is achieved by rapidly rotating his wings back-and-forth so that they create a series of miniature sonic booms that can travel a quarter mile or more. Not bad for a bird that barely tips the scales at a pound.
This routine might seem like ringing the dinner bell for owls, but this surprisingly isn?t the case. Owls hear best in the high frequency range (think the squeaking of a mouse), and much less acutely at lower ranges. Grouse drumming is either so low that owls can?t hear it or the low-frequency long-wavelengths are too difficult for them to pinpoint."

Note the description from above : "Felt rather than heard"

[Little Canoe]

Probably a Ruffed grouse.

[Justin]

…Every so often you'd get a similar feeling to when your heart beats super-fast to the point you feel it in your head. Only it certainly wasn't that - it was something causing a reverberating sensation that would start slowly before becoming more rapid and then dying off, all in a matter of maybe 3-5 seconds.

I vote for ruffed grouse also, and I agree it happens more often in Spring but have also heard it during the early Fall before too. And yes, you kinda “feel it” in your chest more so than “hearing it”. An odd sensation for sure. Here’s a video, which doesn’t really do the ‘drumming’ sensation any justice as opposed to out in the wild where it seems a little more powerful…and if you read some of the comments, one person even describes it as similar to someone trying to start a Harley…

https://youtu.be/MVfiIp3QGs4

[montcalm]

It's not a bird. Unlikely you and some other random people camping on the same lake would feel/hear the same bird(s).

[Viking]

Well, Chick and I spent the last 3 days at LTL and we didn't know what the hell it was.

Not putting it in the drumbeat grouse column - we have come across grouse many times in the woods.

This was weird.

[Zach]

I've only heard the bittern a few times to know what it was, but it's a really fun sound.

10 or 15 years ago we had a visit from a lady who was about 90 at the time and somewhat hard of hearing. During the day she would wear hearing aids, but at night she took them out. One morning at breakfast she asked if we had bears around here, because she thought she had heard a deep snuffling sound when heading for the bathroom in the farmhouse around 5 AM (in May). We had a grouse drumming a lot that year, and when she heard it with her hearing aids in she thought that was probably what she had heard early in the morning.

[Wldrns]

I often heard the bittern when growing up as a kid next to the wetland flats farm country of the Black River. My father likened the unmistakable clunking sound to the sound made by someone in the distance pounding a fence stake in the ground with a sledge hammer.

This and the drumbeat of a grouse should also be very familiar to anyone who has spent any time in the wild.

[Simuliumvenustum]

The sound was most likely being made by an American Bittern. American Bittern produces a sound much like that described by the original poster, though it is most prominent during their spring mating season. It is an eerie and fascinating sound. I have heard them on Little Tupper in the vicinity of site 10 in May. Wetlands in that vicinity are their preferred habitat.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAxAEoAVmuc

[montcalm]

I've definitely heard grouse before but I never thought it felt it like you guys describe it.

[mike7575]

Back in the 70s, 4 of us went camping in Canada. The third day one of the guys mentions the weird sound of the Grouse. Two of us were surprised it was a bird making that noise. The fourth said " You guys hear that too, I thought it was in my chest and I might be having a heart attack. When we stopped laughing, we said what a trooper, having a heart attack but didn't want to ruin the trip.

[Little Canoe]

It's a ruffed grouse

The sound you are hearing is the bird, a ruffed grouse. They make the exact sound you are describing. Look it up online or in a bird book.

[chief900]

appreciate the comments - certainly never thought of wildlife potentially being the culprit but I will say the cadence of the grouse drumming is pretty much spot on with what we experienced. That being said I don't recall hearing anything - really just something we felt. Next time it happens I'll be on the look-out!

[St.Regis]

I've heard ruffed grouse drum a lot in the fall. I suspect it's probably not so much a mating call, but more of a territorial thing. I've watched turkeys gobble and strut many times in the fall too. Ever have them so close you can feel the "Thummmm" when the go into a full strut and drag their wing tips on the ground? When you hear that sound and feel the vibe, they're really close. That's good stuff!!

[Zach]

I've heard them in late summer/fall too, though not as often. Someone told me once that it's the young birds practicing so they'll be good at it in the spring, but that may not be true. I've heard young turkeys learning to gobble around this time of year too, a few times.

[Wldrns]

Sure does sound like partridge, but the season is wrong. Usually heard just during mating season in the spring.