Strangest, weirdest, coolest thing seen in the woods?

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Saw a Bald Eagle fly to close to a Golden Eagles nest once. The Golden came at a fast swoop or dive at the Bald. Baldy turned to avoid but it was too late, at the last second as the Golden was upon him talons outstretched like he was about to catch something, the bald Eagle rolled over and the two of them grasp talons for the briefest of moments. What a sight. Golden then chased the bald back up the canyon for several hundred yards, before breaking off and heading back home.
 
I was eye level w/ a little finch on a tree branch about 6 feet away when I watched a hawk fly from about a hundred yards away (I thought it was comming straight for me at the time, I even ducked and everything) and land on/squish the finch right in front of me. It then flew back to it's perch with it's meal. It was real neat.
 
coolest:
I was jogging along a dirt road surrounded by wheat fields (post harvest time). It was about 20-30 minutes after sundown (dusk) with a full moon, when an owl decided to join me. We flew/ran together for about a half mile, very cool.

Most rewarding:
Found a wounded Kestrel with a compound wing fracture. I caught him, brought him home, fed him some hamburger (which he scarfed down) and turned him over to a bird rehabilitation specialist who, after time, was able to return him to the wild.
 
during the spring time at the deer camp. me and my girlfriend naked on a blanket that was thrown carelessly over a fire ant bed. that was not cool. but it was weird.
Sorry for that.
 
Not personal, but funny. My uncle told me a story of when he was a kid hunting with my other uncle, we'll name them Mike, and Mitch, as those are there names. They were walking on two seperate ridges with a small canyon seperating them, Mitch saw a very small forked horn running at full speed down the same ridge Mike was walking down, as it reaches Mike he pulls his rifle up and "boom" echoes accross the canyon, well Mitch is watching through his binoculars and this deer stumbles a little as it passes no more than 25 feet from Mike, still running as fast as it possibly can downhill too* well the deer stumbles and falls headfirst into a tree, when he shot he hit it in the front leg, which they say wasnt a lethal shot, but when it hit the tree at mach one it broke its neck and killed it. Also one of the small horns on its head, broke off and stuck in the tree.
Same mountain range, a few ridges over and about 25 years later, 3 years ago I was deer hunting, mind you this is about 2,000 verticle feet and about 5 miles from the closest 2 track, after glassing over this very large bowl for about 45 minutes, I grabbed my rifle and climbed back over this 4' ledge to stop and see 5 chukar not 10 feet from me just standing there looking at me. Neither of us moved for about 30 seconds, they then turned and walked away real slow, I think it was the first time they had ever seen a person before. I waited about a minute and continued upward, only to get about 10 steps and have the rest of the cuvy (oh about 70) ignite all around me. They're lucky I was only armed with a .300 weatherby mag.
 
Funniest and scariest for my son in the same story!

This past summer we were in Waterton Lakes, Alberta at the cabin. The cabin backs onto a green space that rises up to a mountain behind the cabin. Lots of bushes and trails. One Sunday afternoon we were all sitting on the back deck watching about 6 deer feeding on the berry bushes behind the cabin when all of a sudden a large cinnamon coloured bear came roaring down the hill towards the cabin (we thought) at the deer. The deer scattered a ways and then stopped to watch the bear who decided his cover was blown and then sat down to munch on berries for the next 30mins.

The following morning my son went out in the morning at about 7:30am to shoot his airsoft pistols at some cans we had set up on a box in front of some bushes in front of the hill behind the cabin. My son's first shot at a can missed and went into the bushes. Immediately the same large bear stuck his head up from behind the bush about 10feet from my son who was standing there surprised as heck. the bear took one look at him, let out a grunt, turned and ran up the hill as fast as he could.
 
All while scouting my favorite hunting area...

I've gotten close to some black bears, yellow-bellied marmots, beavers, moose, elk, and deer. Once stalked up on a muley buck and couldn't understand why he couldn't smell me 40 feet away and the wind was blowing straight from me to him. He actually craned his neck to look around me too.

I had a herd of elk run right past me within 30 feet. They were running from something and didn't see me and just past right beside me. The bull was bringing up the rear, and he was huffing and puffing out of breath. I can still hear him breathing hard. It wasn't hunting season yet.

I got between a black bear sow and one of her two cubs. I didn't have a gun, and I'll never hike ever again without a .357 in a holster because of that encounter.

I once came across a bull snake that had a fish head in it's mouth. Some fisherman must have cleaned a trout and tossed the head and this snake found it. The snake was swimming down the stream and came close enough for me to take a couple pictures.

I saw a cow moose that had two twin calves with her, not so unusual, except the calves were both blond in color. Don't think that is normal as all the other moose calves I've ever seen are always black.

In Yellowstone Park, I saw an eagle swoop down and grab something off the ground, but I couldn't see what it was. It had a heck of a time trying to fly off with whatever it had caught.
 
Enjoyable moment was watching Mama Mulie watch my fly fish silver creek (Idaho) under some low hanging brush while bedded down.

Eeriest, have a feeling something is watching you while out for a leak at night then seeing cougar tracks along the river (Big Wood in Idaho) the next day. :what:

Oh Crap moment, waking up nearly nose to nose with a skunk while under a lean 2 as a kid back home in Indiana.
 
Herd of cows watched me climb up a tree stand and they all(300 of'em) came over and looked up at me. One started to pee and the whole herd then fallowed.
Click to expand...

I would have laughed myself right out of the tree stand! That's too funny!

Once when I was a kid vacationing in northern VA I was riding my bike on a trail and suddenly 3 large deer burst through the brush and ran down the trail in front of me. That was neat!

There's an unusual place in the woods near my parents house. All the woods there are pine and gum. There's reeds covering most of the floor because it's so wet out there. When I was young I followed an old ditch a lot further back than I usually ventured. I came to an area that had about 3 large pools in the dirt that were probably 6' across and 4' deep. There was crystal clear water in them, no real vegetation or algae, and the bottoms had some type of clams. I've never been back, but I still wonder what those pools might have been.
 
One hot, dry, still August afternoon I was squirrel hunting in mixed hardwoods of hickory and pecan - great squirrel habitat. But, I wasn't having any luck; nothing was moving; it was too hot. I was walking down a trail not even trying to be stealthy; for some reason I looked up directly into the sun and saw the sunlight shining through a squirrel's tail. He was laying on an overhanging Oak limb with his legs hanging over both sides and was not the least bit interested in me or moving. He was good.
 
Looking into the "ornamental pond" "expansion pond" or as I prefer to call it, the stock tank, from my office window and see a local Seaeagle take a fish, just like in the movies.

Geoff
Who is getting too old and fat for the wet wild woods.
 
I have an uncle who is into photography big time. He was taking (video) of some local wild flowers in hopes of getting some footage of some humingbirds working them. He did-a pure white, albino one-for about 2-3 minutes of film.
 
I'd say the nastiest thing that ever happened while hunting was when I hopped off a stone wall into a bunch of high brush and landed on about 15 vultures feeding on a dead calf. Half of them flew right into me and I ended up practically taking a bath in a freezing lake.
 
Coolest: a black bear cub, and a full size black bear a couple hours later. I was solo backpacking at the time. Very cool.

Weirdest: a very small snake attempting to eat a very large frog. That was just freaking bizarre. Second place for weirdest: a giant bug. Thing was eight inches at least. Maybe more. Utterly freaking bizarre. Thought they only have bugs like that in the Amazon. I was with a much older, more experienced friend, and he'd also never seen anything like it.
 
coolest: watching the sunrise from the tooth of time. Come home, get pictures developed. Mom surprised says,"when did you go to the ocean?" Those are clouds momma.

Strangest: One night there was a screaming. My uncle says it's either a woman or a baby terrified. After a couple of hours all the local services are out including the rescue squad (granddad was in r.s.), cause you know, it is a baby out there in the cold for goodness sake. Well they narrow it down to my uncles trailer and he starts lookin nervous, cause you know, how do you explain a baby under your trailer. Well the local big britches hero sidles up and says he is going to be the one to go under there and get it out (picture in the paper time).

A few seconds later a brown and white blur comes flashin out of there at the speed of light and a screaming, bloody faced hero follows. Seems that a bobcat doesn't like to be rescued from under a trailer.
 
I took my brother in law deer/hog hunting a long time ago. He was standing on his dog box with his shotgun bbl. resting on it. For reasons unbeknown to me he pulled the trigger. It's a good thing the dog box was empty. He got in my truck one day with a single bbl. 12ga. I noticed that the hammer was cocked. I asked him if it was loaded and he just shrugged his shoulders. I reached over and lowered the hammer and ejected an unfired 3" mag. buckshot. I took a quarter and took the foream off, broke the gun down and threw it behind my seat where it stayed the rest of the day.
 
Non-Hunting:

Group of campers on heavily wooded private property one mid-evening near a river, standing in the dirt road/trail in a circle with no fire, chatting when someone hears a low 'thump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump' of a large SOMETHING running our way.... We just move off the road into the treeline when a (guesstimated) 1,000 pound steer RUNS THROUGH THE MIDDLE OF CAMP just where we had all been standing... We all laughed, slapped each other on the back in the middle of the road and giggled - Right up until the time HE CAME RUNNING BACK THE OTHER WAY! :eek: THAT was funny, because it was so unexpected. The closest ranch/farm was over 3 miles away... He was named 'Ferdinand' and stayed around until someone finally came and picked him up.

Hunting:


1. Deer hunting in AR, wearing my electronic ear muffs... Hear something 'moving' in short steps to my left - look - nothing! It's an open area, just 12-inch and shorter scrub under the trees, but the NOISE is there! I just can't SEE anything, but man is 'it' moving.... FINALLY I spot one little quail, standing in the trail, then I look more closely now that I 'see' it - and there is a freaking MIGRATION of over 40 quail I count after I finally see them... They cross the trail, and make a swishing sound as they cross the leaves in the forest in front of me - then some flush! And I can hear a heavier movement through the brush in front. The sound circles from left to right, and just as it breaks brush on the right, it clears the creek and a fox pops up! First one I see while hunting, but I have terminate orders on fox and coyotes (chicken farms all around), so the .308 gets the nod. It's downwind and sniffing, I cluck at it a bit - it raises up to see better - One dead fox.

2. Large group (13 hunters) just limiting out on Goose while hunting North of Lubbock. We had policed up all the birds from a pond we were hunting near, and noticed a VERY LARGE group of geese wanted to land on the pond... I mean VERY LARGE GROUP of geese. The pond was about 200 yards in diameter - the geese landed nearest to us (in the decoys) in rapid succession - and filled the pond. Just at the last / rearmost geese landed, the first geese lifted off. Seems like Nature was telling us that we only scratched the scratch on the goose population that day. :) That day was a fantastic sight, with the sky almost dark with Canada Geese, Snow Geese and various Ducks flying together and stacking up to get to the decoys and water... looked like a WWII bomber formation with fighter escorts...

The best part of that hunt was my 11-y/o daughter saying 'That's cool!' on her first hunt with Dad. Made everything come together, that did. :)


3. Had a Deer hunt in Michigan ruined by the gray squirrel from h*ll barking at me from 3-foot away. He didn't know what I was, he just knew I was in his turf. He made sure everything else in the forest knew he was pissed. And the red mist I would have created and covered ME with was the only consideration given for his survival. The Pest. :)


4. Sitting in a climbing Deer stand in AR, the tree started to shake. Sounded like someone was beating on the tree, then something hit me in the head - looked up - A squirrel was jumping up and down on limbs above me, pelting me with acorns on their way down. He didn't bark, so the camo was working, but the acorns were a little annoying... :) I shot a doe about and hour later, and about 15 seconds after that, an 8-point buck that was chasing the doe... I call him, 'Hero'.

This story took place 2 days after a doe ran INTO the passenger side window of my car moving at 20 mph at 9pm the night before opening day - Something had my attention in the yard of a house on the road, and as I looked back to the front - I saw a deer face in the passenger front window *just as it impacted*... left a nose-print on the glass, fur in the window trim and dent in the right rear roof pillar where her hind legs wrapped around as she piled up on the side of my car. Thankfully, the window was up, or she might have 'come on in'... I scrempt like a little girl! :D We vowed to kill her, her friends, and anyone that knew them... Did my part after the squirrel pelting... :D I think Nature was getting 'it's turn' that year...


>>>


I have lots of little observances like these hunting stories. For me, it's just being a 'part-of' that makes it worthwhile for me.

Like the other hunters have said, when you're camoed enough to be a part of the environment, it's beautiful to watch the animals' reactions.
 
Wow- great stories!
My best friend and I lived in the woods as kids. This was central CT, and evidence of long habitation was everywhere. He grew up in a house built in 1750, across from a very old barn-they found a flintlock rifle in it and played with it for a while, till it got dropped in the quarry. Now New England is a lushly wooded place, but also lacks the dense under brush that locks in places like western Washington, you can see under the canopy and thru the woods. One day we were walking and I spotted an unusual squarish stone, with another one on top- you folk know what I mean-when something is just not quite "natural?" We walked over and there was an old well, with a capstone of solid granite with a two foot diameter hole cut in it , and a flat lid of granite-beautiful work. In Canterbury, CT, there is a complete abandoned town, one can see the ols wagon roads four feet below the stone fences, worn by the years and with large pines growing in the former pastures. The foundation ruins are laid along a stream-course down a hill, where waterpower would turn the mills. It is in the woods, miles from anywhere. (or was, 30 years ago)
My father grew up in Northern New England, and every summer we would take a trip up to Baxter park in Maine and camp and fish- We would take my fatherless cousin with us. I can still recall with a bittersweet flavor my cousin and my father and self ,wading a creek for trout, and getting chin deep in a beaver pond before breaking out into virgin unfished territory and pulling out huge eastern brook trout. Some years later my cousin took his life, I will always remember the happy kid he was.
The West End of Washington state was sort of wild in the '70's, what with logging and commercial fishing going full tilt. Art"s Place tavern in Forks was a local watering hole, with a nightly round of fisticuffs for any willing to partake.(and gunfire, the Barkeep killed a ruffian who opened up on him with a rifle after closing one night, apparently the perp had been ejected for drunkeness-must have been some drunk!)
Had a job buying fish in La Push, on the coast. Being young and adventurous, we would sometimes take the company skiff and play in the ocean- a favorite pastime being to find an opening in the surf, run into shore, and then blast out through the breakers. Once while engaged in this, I nearly hit a giant old fir tree ,covered with barnacles and rolling in the surf. Must have been ten feet or so away when it spouted! Yikes!
Never have I seen a whale so close!
James Is, off La Push, is a horseshoe shape, if the swell is running right you can slip a small boat on the crest into a lovely little cove on the ocean side- sand beach with a sheer 100ft cliff rising all around.
Some other things I have seen- while hiking down the Alatna river , south out of the Brooks Range, I came across two caribou skulls and antlers locked together and bleaching on the ground. They must have been fighting and gotten stuck. And on a float trip on the John river watched a wolverine as it kept pace with the raft, then swam across the river and ran off.
Sorry if this is sort of rambling, it's funny how a bunch of stories picks up the memory rug and shakes it!
And for funny- I must have been 10 or so-we were in Baxter Park, and watching the bears at the dump. Some tourist in the typical city garb was creeping up on a bear and cubs to take photos. Those old camera's have viewfinder's that made everything seem far away-he got about 20 foot from the mama, and she charged-I have never ever seen someone run backwards so fast-his arms sprung straight out in front, shirt-tails streaming as he took amazing strides in reverse- fortunately it was a bluff charge!
Keep them coming folks, these are a window on our heritage.
 
There's alot of great stuff here.

My cool event began with me deer hunting with my father near Bly, Oregon (south eastern part of Oregon).

It was about mid-day and we had seen alot of Does but no Bucks. We were near the top of Gerhardt Mountain when we heard a roar above us. When I looked up I saw a large plane flanked by 5 fighter jets. I assumed the fighters were there to protect the President. Not a nature story but cool and totally unexpected while hunting.
 
Here is a nature story for ya. I am not sure when it happened but I got bit by a tick. I guess it was bad luck for me. I got Lyme from it. I am here to tell ya that it is NOT fun. I am hopeing that the Doctors found it in time to get rid of it. However, I have to go back and get more meds for it. I was on one perscription of antibiotics for 28 days. I got better till about 3 wks after I finished that Rx. Then the symptoms have started coming back. I am a very active person and this has really put a dent in my activity. It has attacked my muscles and joints to the point that some days I can hardly walk. My grip is sometimes half as strong as it was before. I will be 31 in 3 wks.
My advise is do everything can to prevent tick bites and if you have any unexplained symptoms (even if your Dr doesnt think it could be Lyme) insist on getting checked. If you are diagnosed with anything simular to arthritis, get checked. Go ahead and take the time to Google LYME but know that the symptoms are not limited to what you find on most of the sites.
There is thread currently goin on here about tick bites and Lyme. check it out.

http://thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=318042

I feel this is on topic because it has to do with being in the woods.

I am not looking for pitty. I just want ppl to be aware that this IS out there.
 
One year, me and my dad took a canoe down a stretch of the Shenandoah River about 10 or 12 miles. Caught a few nice smallmouth and saw 5 bald eagles. A couple of them were juvies but the rest were adults. Awesome birds for sure.

Watched a pair of red-tailed hawks perched side by side on a fence line on my property with their 3 juvies walking around on top of a run in shed not 10 yards away. All the juvies were old enough to fly. The hawks have a nest near the barn, so I see them often.

Running around the farm on the tractor, a cardinal fly flew about 10 feet in front of me with one of the red-tailed hawks in hot pursuit. Weaved in and out of a few spruce trees. As far as I know, the hawk didnt catch him.

Fishing on a beach in Florida couple summers ago. Was out for anything I could get, but mainly shark. Schools of mullet were crusing up and down the shoreline. Few hours after being on the beach a school of 100+ pound tarpon crash a school of mullet. Many were clearing the water while pursuing the mullet. Was really cool to watch. I ended up pulling a 5 1/2 foot blacktip out of that mess with a live mullet i snagged on a lure.
 
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