Screaming or howling in Grand Traverse County, Michigan

It was Aug or Sept of 2011. Warm night, around 3:30am. We were raising broiler chickens (meat birds) in chicken tractors (mobile chicken coops). Our bedroom window was open and I heard the sound of a squawking bird. I jumped out of bed, grabbed the rifle (.22) and a Mykyta flashlight and ran outside--thinking coyote. I shuffled down the slope behind our garage--toward the sound and toward the general area where the coops were--and paused at what I saw. 100 feet (I measured it the next day) ahead of me, and up the slope on the other side of this dip, was something--and I do not know what. I shined the light on something that had huge orange eyes and was staring right at me--and standing over one of our chicken tractors. I am guessing it was at least 6 to 6.5 feet tall, as I had my wife stand where it was the next day and she is about 5' 3" and it was way higher than that (maybe 7?). I just stood there and stared at it. I could not make out the rest of its body size or shape. We just stared at each other. Seconds passed and I thought about firing at it, but my one neighbor to the south's house was right in line with him/it, and him/it being uphill of me, I'd be firing up, into the air, and toward homes--so I did not. Also, my mind was swimming around trying to figure out what exactly I was looking at. We continued to stare at each other. I could see his eyes quite clearly, like detail of them. Or so it seemed. For whatever reason I decided to at least put the rifle in position to fire if need be. It had been resting over my forearm, while I aimed the flashlight at it. I took maybe 1 to 2 seconds, looking down at my hands as I positioned the rifle and flashlight together and lifted them--and he was gone. I looked around all freaked out, didn't see him, so ran up the hill, just running forward, flashing the rifle and flashlight in all directions--all the time running south. I quickly tuned into the sound of something crashing through the brush on my right. It sounded like something sprinting through the thick bramble and saplings and I could hear it breathing, exerting itself--and moving very, very fast, to the SW. I stopped and just listened to it until I couldn't hear it anymore. It was running very fast--covering ground quickly. Coming back to the chicken tractor, there was a pile of feathers sitting just outside the coop. The bird (only one in there at the time) was fine, but missing many feathers from her rear end. Usually, when a coyote gets them, or anything else, there will be digging of some kind. There was none. I went back inside and went to bed. This is the second odd encounter within maybe a 1-2 month window. It was again around 3:30-4:00am. I was sleeping and heard something screaming outside. At the time we had multiple chicken tractors set up in three different locations to the south of our house, plus a chicken coop in the barn. I assumed it was coyotes getting at the chickens and jumped out of bed, grabbed rifle and flashlight and this time ran out the front door--as it sounded like it might have been from the tractors best accessed that way. I sprinted out, over to the birds, and they were all sleeping. I then heard the screaming again and it was clearly coming from the west, over near the pig pens and barn. The sound continued as I ran past the pig pen (no action--all asleep) and past the barn (coop secured and closed). The screaming led off directly west. It sounded like it was just beyond the barn and moving west. Like, I ought to have seen it, but was running and unable to locate it with the flashlight. I paused at the corner near the pig pen and barn and shined the light up the two-track directly west and saw two large, orange eyes aimed right at me. I measured the distance the next day and it was almost 300 feet exactly (~290). The eyes stayed put, staring right at me. I felt no desire to shoot and based on my previous encounter felt like this might be a sasquatch and why shoot it? We stared at each other for maybe a minute? Then it calmly turned (to its left--my right) and disappeared. I had zero desire to go after it. I went back inside and went to bed. The sounds I had heard were like...screeching/howling/wailings. Loud! Ape-like. Like Animal Planet. Like jungle ape sounds. Third report within about a 1-2 month period. My family of four was out one evening doing animal chores (feeding, milking, watering). It was around 8-9pm. We'd gotten a late start on the chores. It was already dark. I was down near our pigs, my son was at the backdoor with the dogs, and my wife and daughter were in the barn milking and feeding goats. I was filling a waterer when all of a sudden a loud, freakish howl/scream/wail began right over in the woods to the west of our barn. I yelled out "what is that?" My son yelled back "I don't know!" It sounded like the wail from my previous sighting. I dropped the hose and ran for the backdoor where the flashlight was, telling my son to put our freaking out dogs in the house. I reached in, grabbed the flashlight and ran off into the woods. All this time it was still wailing, and as I ran past the barn and up into the woods it had stopped. I called my son to let the dogs out and they came out to me and tore into the woods. They were gone about 3-4 mins and came back all excited but otherwise fine. We all heard it, saw nothing, and wondered what it was.