"When the Ozark Howler cries under a full moon, even the hounds hush. Best not wander past the fence line — the Howler’s voice carries farther than you think.”

A Nighttime Encounter with Missouri’s Most Elusive Legend.

The moon was high, heavy with haze, casting a silver veil over the dense forests of Southern Missouri. The air, thick with cicada songs, fell abruptly silent. The only sound breaking the cool nighttime air was the sound of gravel crunching under a young boy's boots for the better part of a mile, but now the adventurous boots were off.

Barefoot and knee-deep in the chilly waters of the Current River, the freckle-faced, blondehaired boy stood with a gigging pole in hand. Just a simple Ozarks pastime beneath a blanket of stars—frog gigging by moonlight, a rite as old as the beloved river stone. One cast easily followed another as the rhythmic drip of water from the gig prongs mingled with the buzzing lullaby of summer insects.

This oasis of beauty was somewhere in Shannon County, near a bend known mostly to locals, a place not marked on any tourist map, and thank goodness for that. Cedar and sycamore trees lined the banks like sentinels, their gnarled roots gripping the earth. A sliver of a black snake could be seen twirling the grass by the reflective waters. Nearby, a newborn fawn slept in a warmth of speckled curl, calmly waiting for mama's steps to return. Overhead, the full moon cast everything in bluish silver—the trees, the river, and the young boy of perhaps thirteen 

He’d been gigging since just after dusk, lantern light low, listening to the world settle into nighttime rhythms. Owls hooted. Crickets chirped. Coyotes yipped from far ridges.

And then, as suddenly as a lamp's light flickered and frogs jumped into the pool of dark water—silence fell.

Every cricket, every owl, every sound in the forest held its breath. The precious fawn curled tighter with eyes wide open. The young boy readjusted his bib's and gazed into a nighttime of newfound suspicions. His blue eyes scanned the tree line. The lantern finally gave up and hissed quietly, the only sound left with its now darkness.

Then came the howl!

It didn’t echo like a coyote. It didn’t yip or yowl or growl. It came long and rising—from somewhere deep, like it had crawled out of the very soil, then howled at the hills and hollars in rage. It was the kind of sound that doesn't end so much as it leaves—rolling off into the woods like a fog of noise, soaking into the ground and ringing in your chest.

The young boy froze, now his face was blushing with fear. The tin bucket of so-lovingly-made oatmeal cookies fell into the water and disappeared while the gig was still dripping in his hand.

He'd grown up in the Ozarks. He knew bobcats, knew bears, knew when a fox was bluffing or when a screech owl screamed like a woman. But this… this was something else! Now glistening with fear, the young boy remembered what the old men at the local five and dime would quietly talk about while sitting outside on the wooden and weathered benches. It was something that they didn't talk about lightly and as sure as the world was turning, knew it was true.

The boy’s breath caught in his throat. Across the river, half-swallowed by the fog clinging to the banks, something shifted — something massive. At first, it looked like a sagging tree stump or a clump of wet brush, but then it rose.

Slowly. Deliberately.

It unfolded from the shadows, rising first on all fours — a hulking, fur-matted shape with shoulders that moved like grinding stone. Then it stood upright. Taller than any man. Taller than it should’ve been. Its outline was jagged with thick, dark fur, and its head tilted forward under the weight of twisted, antler-like horns that curled back like old roots.

Its eyes opened — two smoldering embers glowing through the mist — and its mouth peeled back into a wide, trembling grimace filled with long, uneven teeth. The sound it made wasn’t a howl, not quite. It was lower. Raw. Daring. A noise that didn’t belong to any animal the boy knew — as if something ancient had just cleared its throat for the first time in centuries.

And it looked right at him!

The gigging pole slipped from his fingers and splashed into the shallows. Nevermind the useless lantern, whose glow abandoned him seconds earlier. He forgot the bucket — the one his mother had filled with oatmeal cookies, now bobbing away on the current — and spun around, bare feet striking mud, then gravel, then the hard shoulder of the road. He ran. Tree limbs slapping him in the face, thorn bushes snagging his legs. The young boy ran as fast as he had ever in his young life. Fast enough that the rocks bruised the soles of his bare feet and the cold burned his lungs. But he didn’t care.

He never looked back. Soon the beacon of light curled around the corner and down the valley... home was near! For now, the Moon had went behind the clouds and the once twinkling sttars were now sleeping. Inside he went, turned around and locked the door! Always quiet and the small cabin, seemed like everyone had turned in for the night. Slowly making his way toward the comfort of the fire, the young boy drew to his knees and stared into the flames.

And with that, another chapter was added to the legend of the Ozark Howler.

The Ozark Howler – Beast or Bogeyman?

They call it many names: the Ozark Black Howler, the Hoo-Hoo, the Nightshade Bear, even the shadowy Booger Cat. Some say the name was born of fear; others say it was necessity. After all—when the dark woods scream back, you have to call it something.

What we now know as the Ozark Howler likely emerged from a blend of backwoods campfire tales and early 20th-century folkloric preservation. As these stories were handed down and eventually written, one feature stood out above all—the chilling, unforgettable cry that gave the creature its name.

Sightings most often come from the remote wilds of Southern Missouri and Northern Arkansas—especially deep within the Mark Twain National Forest, the Boston Mountains, and the lonely stretches along the Current and Eleven Point Rivers. And there may be more sightings than the record shows; some folks keep their encounters to themselves, afraid of being ridiculed or branded as just plain crazy.