Strangest, weirdest, coolest thing seen in the woods?

Status
Not open for further replies.
Such a great thread, had to resurrect it.......

Most memorable time:

Dad and I were bowhunting javelina in S. Texas. Dad shot one, and we hung it in a tree and gut it (I'll never gut nor eat another javelina again, but that is another story). We were in deep in a brushy mesquite thicket. About halfway through the job, we hear teeth popping, and another herd of javelina moved in, not more than 20 yards away through the brush. A javelina was about 15 yds away facing me, just begging for a shot to the forehead. Which I gave him, dead center. I am here to tell you, a broadhead from a 65lb draw weight bow will not penetrate a javaleen's brain. Matter of fact, it really only pisses him off.

Javalina's scatter, teeth popping, running all around us; the "unicorn" javelina with the arrow sticking out of his head proceeds to charge us. He chased one or the other of us around for a good 30 seconds before veering off in the brush, never to be seen again. We blood trailed him for half a day through some of the thickest cactus/mesquite country you can imagine, and never found the arrow or the javelina.
 
Sitting at Camp Muir, about 10,000 foot level on Mount Rainier, watching the lights of trucks on 1-90 at Vantage, about 150 miles away. The next morning, was up before sunrise for the summit climb, and watched the glaciers turn a glowing gold as the sun came up. Amazing sight.
 
I was hunting down in S. Texas and this javelina came by with an arrow stuck in his forhead and boy did he look mad. Well any ways ....................................... :D

Ok, I'm just kidding. I don't even know what a javelina is? Time to google.

TerryBob
 
In Michigan's Upper Peninsula once, while driving down a dirt road, I saw hawk attacking a ruffed grouse. Both birds were on the ground. The hawk was small, about the same size as the grouse. I got out of the car, chased the hawk away and caught the grouse. We (my partners and I) ate it.

My friend from Wisconsin said "I like hunting grouse here. You don't have to shoot them, you just drive around and pick them."

I wonder if this was legal? Grouse season was open, I was hunting grouse, I had a valid license, I was wearing orange, and I left my vehicle to catch the bird.
 
I've already posted..

...but had something neat happen last year during dove season.

Had a dove fly by me not too far out one morning. I shot it and it fell. About 2 seconds after it hit the ground it pops up and flies off. So I shot it again and dropped it. Walked out and picked it up and put it in an empty shell box.

About 30 minutes later I'm sitting there on my stool and up out of that box that same dove pops and flies off AGAIN! So I stand up and shoot it again.

It was most certainly dead that last time. I don't know if I just knocked the wind out of it the first two times or what. We laughed about that for 30 minutes that morning.

In retrospect, I kind of wish I'd let him fly away the last time. He deserved it.
 
Once saw a unicorn picking apples with its horn.
We were in the woods hunting mushrooms at the time

I was halfway up the side of Mt. Madison in the White Mountains of New Hampshire one night and the thousands of ferns in the forest turned into Komodo Dragons.


As for more sober exploits . . . .

I was mountain biking once in the Tourne Park in Northern New Jersey and came around a bend face to face with a startled 4 foot tall Tom.

Most gorgeous thing I ever saw was a Mother Moose bathing her child in a beaver pond near camels hump in Vermont.

Dumbest thing I ever heard was the annual pilgrimage of weekend Mass-holes into the valley I used to live in, in Vermont, who would routinely see a deer and open up full bore with 4, 5 or 6 shots in a row. They never came out with anything, but always make a heck of a lot of noise. Never paid attention, but I wonder if any of these clueless clods was John Kerry. Ya know, he's a hunter and a vietnam vet:barf:
 
Last edited:
Your post about the tom jogged a memory...

Driving towards Back Bay Wildlife refuge to go fishing one morning, I saw a tom and his harem not 10 feet from the road. Granted this was rural southeastern VA, but still...

Found a 'coon with his gut ripped open one morning and a thin pine branch sticking out of him. Still don't know about that one.

Caught a flounder in a crab trap once.

Had a boat sink out from under me in the Dismal swamp canal, and later that same day another boat I was on started to split at the bow seam and was taking on water (crappy Owens boats, they were known to do that...)
 
"Caught a flounder in a crab trap once."

Been there done that, this summer. Didn't even realize they were there. Bottom line: NRA4LIFE has lots of Flounder in the freezer now.

Also on one outing this year, we caught several gigantic sea stars in our traps. Very beatiful creatures, some as big as man hole covers.
 
I have also caught the occassional flounder in a crab trap (we always called'em pots).

It immediatley set me to thinking if you made a contraption similiar to a crab pot but with bigger funnels and baited it somehow with minnows etc it might make an excellent flounder trap.

Never tried it but I bet it would work.

S-
 
I have been hesitant about putting this in here but here is Strangest, weirdest, coolest thing seen in the woods?

When I was a teenager back in the seventies (this could posibly explain it.), three friends and I were out goofing off on a farm. Two of the guys challenged each other to stir up some bees in a dead tree and then run real fast out of danger. Timmy and I decided that we would just watch the fun from a far away bench that was next to a tractor shed. The braver of the two of us would sneak up to the tree, poke a stick into the hole, wiggle it and run like hell with bees hot on their trail.

On about their third time do this, the two idiots were running like mad, with the bees, I saw something out beyond them in the cow pasture, just over a slight ridge. To this day, I still doubt what I saw. It had off white hair covering it. It was running real fast on two legs and had a shoulder width that was about double mine and had a large head with no neck. It ran with a slight limp. I saw it from the waist up because it was on the other side of the ridge. I watched it until it was out of sight and then I turned my head to see Timmy sitting beside me eyes the size of silver dollars with his jaw hitting the ground. He looked as shocked as I felt.

The other two guys did not see it because they were running towards us with bees hot on their tail. Of course we had to tell them about it and of course they did not believe us. They ribbed us for a long time telling everyone that Timmy and I were thatched in the head.

Well, that's the Strangest, weirdest, coolest thing seen in the woods?

I dont expect anyone to believe me.

TerryBob
 
A few years back I was driving my survey party to a remote worksite near the Dead River in the U.P of Michigan. We came around a sharp curve in the road and I had to stop short for the ugliest darn horse I ever saw! It took a second to realize that I was looking at a moose, the first one I had encountered in the area. Later that week we had to run a line over a 400 foot ridge in the same area. We came to a cliff and looked down on two bald eagles flying below us, a whole new perspective.
 
Might as well keep this thread alive!

On Monday I was driving one of my daughter's friends home. About two blocks from her house we saw what looked like the fattest squirrel I have ever seen.

I stopped the car to look again and saw that it was a Siamese twin squirrel. I got out of the car and walked right up to it. It moved more slowly than a normal squirrel but got around OK. The main body was healthy and then it had a smaller body with short stubby limbs that was hanging down from its chin. It almost looked like it was carrying a young squirrel in its mouth, but the atrophied limbs could not belong to a young squirrel. There was no sign of another head, just another body hanging down from the chin.

I am going to try to take some pictures in the next few days if I can see it again. If I get some I will post them here.

As it is the only other witness is my daughter's 8 year old friend.
 
A couple of funny stories... My hunting buddy and I were walking through the woods... All was quiet as we came up on this old oil rig. We check it out cause it's out in the middle of nowhere and then turn our backs and walk away. We get about 10 feet from it and the thing STARTS UP! When you're in the woods, and everything is quiet, these things are LOUD! My legs almost gave as I thought it was blowing up or something... We laughed all the way back to the jeep and could hear it most of the way back... So it hadn't run for at least an hour as we approached it... What are the chances?! :D

The second story is me being goofy in the woods... There is this big pond where we hunt and we had just gotten our 2 way radios. I was in a tree just watching for deer, and so was my bud, but he was around 200 yards away. I get down, approach the pond and I see him walking on the other side... So I put my bow down and start doing the running man dance, in my full camo mind you, I'm sure it looked a bit funny... So anyway, he looks at me and keeps walking... Not getting the response I thought I'd get, I radio to him and say, "Dude, did you even see me?" He replies back with, "Huh? I'm still in my tree." LOL

Never found out who that was.... :D

J
 
Not wierd as much as funny

Actually didn't witness it, just saw film.
Turkey hunter had his decoys out, flock of turkeys slowly meandered up near the blind, a big longbeard started strutting his stuff, the hunter raised his gun, ---- Suddenly from off camera came a blur, and a coyote hurtled into view, and slammed into---a decoy. Momentum carried the coyote thru the decoy and into the front of the blind where he realized something was wrong. He beat a hasty retreat leaving the hunters laughing.
Still picture the coyote thinking, "what just happened?"
 
I live in the woods these days, though most of the strange things I've seen involve my roommate :D One funny incident took place the week before last, when Willow was hit with a very long and soggy rain storm. It rained for many cold days and nights, and the ground was about overflowing. I had a pup with me in my shack, a six month old GSD female. I let her out about two AM after she starts jumping around. About ten minutes later I hear her barking and running back and forth in front of the shack. I open the door and see her dodging and weaving around. I realize she's fighting with *something* in the dark. Whatever it is, it's PO'd big time and up on its hind legs. Looks like a little beaver. I dispatch it with my CZ and bring the flashlight out to look. It's a huge muskrat! Must have been flooded out of its usual swampy home and tried to make a new one under my shack. The pup hadn't done much damage to it as far as I could see.
 
Back in May I was down in the flood plain of Terlingua Creek. I was sitting in a chair on top of the deck on Art's 4runner. Had a disemboweled rabbit wired to a barbwire fence that we had been baiting for several days. The raked ground underneath the wire had tracks earlier in the day. Either a big bobcat or a small mountain lion. I was hoping for a mountain lion. I saw nada. After dark, I drive back up the mountain to Art's house. He's grinning at me. Seems a big bobcat had walked up on his front porch and rubbed up against his coffee table.

Had a great horned owl perch on a limb within touching distance of me one morning. He looked around in the predawn light and after a few minutes you could see his attention suddenly snap into a laser intensity. He fell off the branch as he snapped his wings open. The last I saw of him, he was soaring through the tree trunks with only the occasional beat of his wings. My buddy was in a tree stand about 150 yards away watching a gray squirrel hopping around on the ground when here came the owl. Last he saw the squirrel was in the talons of the owl...still chittering.

In the same swamp, I was walking on the only dry trail in the place. I came around a bend and was face to face with a possum. That sucker bowed up at me and hissed! Like he wanted to contest who was going to walk in the mud here.
 
Watching two bucks butt heads for about 45 minutes. I'd never seen that before and it was amazing to watch.
 
Our church had a Youth Pastor who had decided to take a group of Jr. High boys on a camping trip. They arrived at the desired site late in the afternoon and set up camp. They were getting their tents up when a skunk wanders through the middle of their site. Our pastor tells all the boys to be quiet but sees one, out of the corner of his eye, pick up a rock. The boy takes aim, and just as the pastor yells, Don't!", the boy lets the rock fly and hits the skunk right in the head. The startled skunk begins running around in circles and spraying the tents and everything left laying around. The pastor and kids just pulled up the tents, repacked the cars and began the long, smelly ride home.

This same man told a great story (though not out in the woods at the time) about driving on the highway here in Kansas City. He was in the left lane and wanted to move to the right lane. He looked over his right shoulder, saw the lane was clear, and began to change lanes. When he looked forward again, there was another car in the right lane heading straight for him. He quickly swerved to the right shoulder and glanced backwards to see if the car had hit any of the other drivers on the road. The other car was nowhere to be seen. He eased back onto the highway and saw out in front of him a pickup truck someone was using to haul their belongings, and tied to the back-end of the truck was a large mirror.
 
Bump for an ancient but worthwhile thread.

Anyone have anything cool, weird, strange, or funny happen in the woods this year?

pax
 
Not this year, but when I was a LOT younger, I was walking the fields of a local ranch late at night. Warm night, full moon, fog settled in the valleys... beautiful! I was near a treeline when something screamed like a stabbed woman, almost at my feet. Can we say heart failure here? Found out later that I'd gotten too close to a fox den, and that was her way of telling me to "get lost" .

I was a back country ranger at Grand Canyon in the 70's, and we were patrolling the Tuweep area of the Canyon. We opted to camp outside the park, at an area called Mt. Trumbull, at around 8000 feet. Much cooler, and no damned bugs. Now we heard coyotes singing every night; no big deal. But about 1 AM, we woke up to something much deeper and richer. Mournful and drawn out. I've heard coyotes by the hundreds, and wolves by the dozens, and I'd swear these were wolves,... and CLOSE! I've studied wolves and I know that they don't generally pose a threat, but that sound definitely puts the hair up on the back of your neck. Next day we checked in with Park Ranger John Riffy (a literal legend in AZ, RIP John), & he suggested that we might have heard Mexican Wolves. Interesting, especially since they've been deemed extinct since the early part of the 1900's, but then, that's mighty remote country. The reason it came back to memory is that, only a few years ago, the presence of Mexican Wolves was confirmed in AZ. John knew that all along.

The funniest had to be my cousin and wife, and the "great bear caper". Cuz and his wife are tenderfeet... city folk. We all went to Cook Forest, PA for a couple of days, and their version of camping is a cabin on the river. The whole trip they had been bugging me about wanting to see a bear. We hiked the Longfellow Trail, and I pointed out bear scrapes and scat, and they kept saying I was BSing them. That evening, and after one two many beers, I decided to call it a night. I was just about to doze off when cuz and wife came RUNNING back into the cabin, slamming and locking doors and windows. They looked like they'd seen a ghost, and when I asked what all the fuss was about, all cuz could manage was "B-B-B-BEAR!!" :rolleyes: . I looked outside, and lo and behold, a medium sized black bear was helping himself to the munchies on the picnic table thoughfully provided by cuz. I turned back to them and said "I thought you wanted to see a bear?" . Geeze, city slickers! :D
 
Earlier this summer, I was hiking NE of Granite Falls, along the Mountain Loop Highway (in Washington state), when I came along someone's meth manufacturing setup. And the most interesting thing was the distillation vessel was still warm, indicating that someone has only minutes ago turned off the propane burner underneath it. I carefully did a 360 look, checking for whom was watching me from the woods, did not see anyone, and promptly retraced my steps down the trail.

The most frightening thing was when I was hiking in National Forest land down by Mt. Rainier. I passed a sandwich board (of all things) at the trailhead saying 'military training in progress'. There were about four Humvees and 2 two ton trucks at the trailhead. I thought nothing of it, insofar as in certain areas of the state, you often encounter Army troops from Ft. Lewis doing training, climbing or routefinding exercises. About an hour later, I walked right into a simulated ambush set up by a platoon of British Army Gurkhas that were there doing some training with the Rangers from Ft. Lewis. I did not notice a thing until a whistle blew and suddenly 12 Gurkhas arose from the brush in front of and to the side of me. I almost crapped my pants, insofar as they all had SA-80's and a light machine gun, which they all very kindly were not pointing at me. We all had a good laugh, and I continued up the trail. I never did see any of the Rangers. That was the second time that I had ever seen Gurkhas in the flesh. They really do carry those kukri knives.

Another interesting thing when I was hiking along a ridgeline in the Cascades, and a flight of four A-6 intruders from Whidbey flew about 50 feet over my head on their way to the Yakima Firing Range. They were practicing terrain-following maneuvers, and I watched them until they went out of visual range. Amazing how closely they were able to hug the nap of the earth.

No interesting hunting stories involving animals, though.
 
About two months ago I was driving south on Route 10 from Northhampton to Easthampton MA. This road goes through business and light wooded areas. As I got to one patch of woods, about 75 yards ahead of me a large dark animal burst out of the woods to my right and began to run across the road. At first I thought it was a large dog but as it passed in front of me I saw that it was a black bear, maybe 150-175 pounds just running for all it was worth.

About two miles down the road I stopped at a sporting goods store I know and mentioned it to the owner and a city cop who happened to be there. The cop just laughed and said that last year they had about 175 bear calls but this year the bears were so numerous that people just stopped calling.
 
The weirdest thing that has happened to me was last year during hunting season. I was in my tree stand and a sparrow flew into my leg. I decided right then that my camo actually did work.
 
Ditto on finding and following cougar tracks. Found mine on Crooked Island, Florida (it's not really an island, but a peninsula). They're as big as an ashtray!

Other cool thing I saw was a Sandhill Crane catching and eating a chipmunk. I figured the cranes were carnivorous, as I've seen them fishing, but I was probably as surprised as the chipmunk was.

I've also seen artic owls twice while deer hunting in Michigan.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top