Dog Scaring

We have two watchdogs here on the farm. One is in a pen behind the house. The other is outside on a chain on a fence by the garden in front of the house. This way I know (theoretically) if anything comes around.

A few nights ago, the dogs were making one heck of a ruckus outside at about 3am. I couldn't see anything out the window to be alarmed at. It's very dark here, since we're off-grid and don't have outside lighting. So if I ever look out the window and see a light, I know it's someone up to no good. I certainly would not want to go poking around some hillbilly's shack in the middle of nowhere late at night with no light.

The dogs were going crazy and so I armed myself appropriately and slipped out the back into the treeline to see what was going on. Nothing was moving. No lights. After about ten minutes of observation, I determined that it wasn't a human out there and I flipped on my headlight.

Sam, the dog at the back of the house, was scared out of his ever-lovin' mind. He was hiding in the middle of his pen by a big oak tree there, his head down and whimpering. Normally when I'm investigating strange stuff at night, I flip open the gate so he can run out into the dark ahead of me. This time he wouldn't go. Unh uh, no way, boss.

So this left Fang. I slipped down to the garden to see if I could turn him loose so he could go out into the night to try and find whatever had been spooking them. Fang is chained up more in the open than Sam is, but he's a much bigger dog. He's part German Shepherd, part Lab, and part Rhino.

Fang wasn't where he was supposed to be. He'd climbed OVER the garden fence (6' high) and was now in the garden, on the opposite side of where he is normally chained. If his chain had been 2' shorter, he would have hanged himself when he went over that fence.

Whatever it was, it scared him so bad he climbed over that fence to get away from it.

Didn't find any tracks in the morning, nothing was missing or damaged, and none of the wild-roosting chickens had been taken. Still don't know what it was that came calling.