Do you have any unusual wildlife stories?
We have a female Northern Bobwhite Quail that’s taken up residence at our house. She showed up this fall and has never left. She sometimes sleeps in a planter on the porch or hangs out at the end of the house. She was in the planter last night and she let my girl set a cup of bird seed in the planter without her ever moving. When we get home most nights she’s sleeping in the planter and coos to us as we unlock the door and head in. Just strikes me as unusual because we don’t see any other quail around.
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That’s cool!
I have a pair of mourning doves that nest in a hanging planter on my porch.They have done this for the past three years.I am also able to get chickadees to take seed from my hand when I go out for my walks.They are really cute!
I was at the zoo a few years ago and happened to have a stuffed otter toy that I pressed up against the glass at the otter house.There was no one in there at the time so I started running back and forth with this toy and the little otter was swimming along playing and having fun.When I turned around,there was a crowd behind me.Oops
I won’t even go into the Highland cow that wants to kill me XD
One time when I was backpacking, we had a deer that kept about 50 yards away from our campsite. She circled us for hours. She never looked towards us, she just kept walking around our site. She was there all afternoon and evening, and she left sometime after we went to sleep that night.
If you haven’t read That Quail Robert, you might want to find a copy. It’s a true story about a family adopted by a bobwhite.
Dad was walking through the woods and came across a dead blue jay and a wounded cardinal. He brought the wounded bird home to see if it could be nursed back to health. A friend loaned us a birdcage. Since one wing was damaged, as well as one leg, gauze was wrapped around his body, and we strung him from the top of the cage. Eventually, the wing healed, but the shriveled claw had to be clipped off. The day came where we let him go, and he flew off.
Maybe some of you have read my old question about my strange encounters with animals…
but I’m not gonna repeat them here. This one happened a couple of years ago….
I left home after dinner for a walk,it was dark by then.My neighborhood had a lot of cats around and suddenly I was surrounded by loads and I mean loads of cats,, miaowing and rubbing themselves against me.I’d say there were at least 15 of them. They walked with me till the end of the street,by the time which I was becoming sort of freaked out…..so I decided to go back home.Still,they followed me back.They even wanted to come inside the house…I had to pick a few kitties up and put them outside again. I’m still puzzled to this day as to why they were following me around like that. : /
When I used to live at home with my parents, I would sit on the back steps and read a book while I smoked a cigarette. One morning, a raccoon approached me boldly and just sat there, watching me intently. It was really weird, because I was used to seeing raccoons at night, but not wandering around the patio in broad daylight. I stared right at it, but it didn’t become frightened, or agressive either.
I wondered if maybe he was hungry, so I put my cigarette out, stood up slowly and walked into the house and grabbed a pack of lunchmeat from the fridge. I looked out the door and he was still there, so I walked back outside to sit down on the steps again. I figured all the movement would frighten him off, but he sat perfectly still, just watching me. I tossed a couple slices of meat to him (he was only about 3 feet away from me) and watched him eat.
For whatever reason, I’ve never been afraid of wild animals (my mother thought I was insane when I told her), but I decided to see how much the raccoon would trust me. I held a piece of meat out with my hand, and just sat there, not moving. He actually walked over to me and delicately took the lunchmeat from my hand, then sat back on his haunches and ate it, kind of like an overgrown squirrel. I fed him the rest of the package and just watched him the whole time. I think I was outside with him for about an hour before he finally wandered off.
It was a really neat experience!
Let’s see here…
I’ve been chased by a turkey vulture, attacked by a crazed chicken, attacked by a rabid coyote, surrounded by coyotes who just howled at me, approached to within 2 feet by a doe, and I was mocked by a giant raccoon that was literally the size of a child when it stood on its hind legs in defiance of me trying to defend my best friend’s cat.
I love the outdoors.
@Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard I wish I was you!
By far (unless I think of something else) the baby owls that showed up to play in our back yard last summer. Here is a link to the Q I asked, complete with you-tube vid and pictures!
I had a wild duck take up residence in my back yard for a year. I looked out the window one morning and there she was, a duck sitting at the end of my swimming pool. I thought she might be injured, but she apparently just liked the location.
Anyway, she stayed for a year using our pool as her own private pond (and my porch as her own private toilet). So… shortly after my first son was born my wife and I decided that “Francine” the duck (along with her poor hygiene habits) had to go. So, I located a school that would take her as one of their several class pets. The odd thing is that the very day that I went out to relocate her to a new home she had flown away never to be seen again.
In retrospect, I have always wondered if “Francine” wasn’t in fact the reincarnated spirit of my Mother (who died the previous year) who had come to oversee the birth of her first grandchild.
@Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard -I know someone who was chased by a turkey vulture too! He was riding his bike and it was flying right behind his head!
He told me it smelled pretty bad…I bet it did!
What happened with the coyotes??
I was up to a nature center in the Spring, and the Canadian Geese were setting up nesting sites. One geese took a disliking to the guy just ahead of me and chased him up the trail, hissing like crazy. The guy ran as fast as he could with the geese just behind him until they were out of sight.
@lucillelucillelucille, I was chased on foot! And I do remember the smell. It was horrible. Those bastards are mean and tough.
@lucillelucillelucille, I had to shoot the rabid one. The ones that surrounded me.. that was a different story. I was out camping with two of my best friends, as well as a city boy friend of mine who has barely ever been outside. Around 3 in the morning, we suddenly heard a chorus of howls coming from all around our camp. Our fire just so happened to be dying about then too. We stood back to back beside our fire and I electrical-taped a flashlight to my rifle while we just stood there scanning the woods. We never saw them, but all of them couldn’t be more than 20 feet outside of our camp (which was surrounded on all sides by thick brush and mountains).
@Adirondackwannabe, as one who has been attacked by a goose, I can say from experience that being on the business end of the wrath of a pissed off goose is one place that most people would definitely rather not be.
@YoBob I concur. Those things are mean and fearless.
Hmm…vultures. My hometown in Virginia is currently inundated with them and has received permission from the federal govt. (the birds are protected) to cull down their number from the current 500. The last time I was there, I pulled the car over in front of a house to watch and listen to the activity of a flock of them roosting in a 3–4 story tree behind it. It was creepy.
The owner of the house came out, a woman who had recently been ill but still has a wry sense of humor, and I explained that I was just observing them. She glanced back at the tree and said, “Oh, they’re just waiting for me to kick the bucket.”
Those suckers are huge. @Fiddle_Playing_Creole_Bastard , being chased by one must have scared the daylights out of you.
I was sitting in my chair under a midnight sky alone in just my boxers and I felt this hot air on the back of my neck….I jumped up and hit my head on the chin of what I assumed was a very large deer. I screamed…it screamed and we both went tearing off in opposite directions. I ran screaming in the pitch dark all the way down the hill to the cabin. I was never so surprised in my life and as I was running away I heard the gallop of what sounded like a small herd of deer. Deer scream like little girls and so did I! LOL!
HAHA…you reminded me of my brother…..he screams like a girl too : )
But don’t worry @Cruiser ....your secret’s safe with us : D
Random dog + me=rabies vaccinations
Okay…one more story. While strolling around a lake in Minneapolis, my friend and I noticed a disturbance in the water. A female duck with a large group of ducklings behind her was attacking something in the water. On closer inspection, she was jumping on a duckling that appeared to have a broken neck. We came to the conclusion that it was one of her brood, and it must have been wounded somehow. Her actions must have been to put it out of its misery. This was over 20 years ago, but the vision is still vivid.
I once came face to face with a mountain lion while hiking home at dusk. scariest thing that ever happened to me.
CRUISER SCREAMS LIKE A GUUUUREELLLL! CRUISER SCREAMS LIKE A GUUUUREELLLL!!! (I never said your secret was safe with ME! MUHAAAAAAA!!!)
@Adirondackwannabe I hope you know I’m not going to be abe to sleep tonight. Thanks.
What did the mountain lion do @FluffyChicken?
—@Dutchess_III For the record when I was screaming…it was very much like what I thought a little girl screams like….but when I heard the deer I must say I scream more like a 12 point Buck!—XD
OK @Cruiser! Your manhood has been restored. I shall withdraw the ads from the paper—but it may take a couple of days….
At a sheep farm in Pennsylvania, I saw sheep that were protected by geese. You could not get close to the sheep because those geese were bad ass!
Please don’t ask why I wanted to get close to the sheep.
@herculies Of course, now we have to know why you wanted to get close to the sheep.
Oh dear!
Well, since this came up…when I move into this house 15 years ago, it came with some sort of wire pen in the back yard, in one corner, about 6’ by 10’. Dunno if they kept chickens or dogs or what in there. I just use it basically for Stuff I pick or rake up out of the yard that I don’t want throw away. Well, the dogs have been on point for 2 days at that pen. There must be some critter in there. Dunno what it is, but I’ll have Rick check it out and get back to you.
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