Something Was Walking Through an Arizona Ditch at 2:22 A.M.

At 2:22 in the morning, a trail camera near Fort Apache, Arizona, recorded something moving through a drainage ditch. The figure looked pale and strangely humanlike as it passed through the darkness, its appearance was unlike the wildlife usually caught on cameras in the area.

The camera belonged to Danny Pusher, who had installed it after hearing noises outside his home. When he reviewed the footage a couple of days later, he found a nighttime visitor he couldn’t explain.

The Howling Started Before Dawn

Pusher’s experience began around five in the morning when he heard an unusual sound coming from outside. He described it as a strange howling or crying noise, loud enough to catch his attention and make him wonder what was nearby.

He went looking for an explanation but couldn’t find the source. Rather than leave it alone, he decided to set up a trail camera and see whether anything returned.

The device was positioned to monitor a drainage channel near his property. Animals frequently use such routes to move through an area, making it a reasonable place to look for whatever had been making the noise.

A few days later, Pusher reviewed the recordings and discovered that something had passed through the camera’s view during the night. The shape was unusual enough that he decided to share the footage and ask other people what they thought.

On March 26, 2025, he posted the recording to Facebook, where he suggested several possibilities. Among them were Bigfoot, a skinwalker, or simply a person walking through the ditch at an unusual hour.

He wasn’t presenting the footage as proof of any particular creature. He was asking people to help him understand what his camera had caught.

The Pale Figure on the Screen

The recording showed a light-coloured shape moving upright through the drainage ditch. Its outline appeared thin and irregular, making it difficult to determine exactly what was passing in front of the camera.

Some viewers thought the figure had a distinctly human appearance. Others were drawn to its proportions and the pale, almost ghostly way it stood out against the darker surroundings.

The camera was recording at night, which limited the amount of detail available. There was no clear view of a face, and the footage offered little help in judging the figure’s height.

That didn’t stop people from examining its movement. The upright posture attracted attention because it resembled the way a person walks, rather than the movement normally associated with a four-legged animal.

Online reactions ranged from ordinary explanations to suggestions involving creatures from Arizona folklore. The clip began circulating beyond Pusher’s original Facebook post, eventually attracting attention from websites covering strange encounters and unidentified animals.

Arizona’s Other Upright Creature

Arizona has its own long-running tradition of mysterious creatures seen walking on two legs. The best-known is the Mogollon Monster, a large, hairy figure associated with the forests and mountains of the state’s high country.

Stories about the creature often describe enormous shoulders, a powerful build and a frightening appearance. Some witnesses have also spoken about strange screams coming from wooded areas, sometimes without getting a clear look at whatever made them.

One early account appeared in 1903, when I. W. Stevens described an encounter near the Grand Canyon. He claimed to have seen an unusual manlike creature with long white hair, a beard reaching toward its knees and fingers that resembled claws.

Stevens said the figure had been sitting on a rock before moving away through the rugged landscape. His account became part of Arizona’s collection of wilderness mysteries, long before Bigfoot stories spread across television and the internet.

Another well-known encounter involved Don Davis, who described seeing an enormous reddish-brown creature during a Boy Scout trip near Tonto Creek. He later recalled its broad shoulders, heavy arms and intimidating size.

The Mogollon Monster became a familiar name in Arizona newspapers during the 1960s. Its reputation grew through stories shared by campers, hunters and people who spent time in the state’s more remote regions.

Pusher’s recording came from a different part of Arizona, and the pale figure didn’t closely match every traditional description. Still, the state’s history of upright creature sightings gave viewers a familiar mystery to compare it with.