I now will think of recumbent riders whenever I see a Javelina, which is fairly often.

While doing a solo canoe trip down a somewhat narrow Southern Missouri river, out of no where a cattle herd appeared and crossed about 50 yards in front of me. Gave a whole new meaning to backpaddling.

Almost hit a rabbit today, it just bounded out in front of me, a young one. Not sure if I would want to see a wild boar run out in front of me, that would be spooky, those suckers are mean.

Out here we have to contend with herds of kangaroos, as well as snakes.

Last week in an MTB race I had at least 3 near misses, one with a roo mad that he couldn't get over the fence.

I'm glad our smaller wildlife tends to be nocturnal.

Ran over a NH snake once. It was a big one, maybe 10 inches long!

Tonight on the local Rail Trail a black bear came up on the trail about 20-30 feet in front of me and Mrs. PB. I slammed on the brakes, Mrs. PB screamed, and grabbed Biscuit our Corgi, which was in the basket mounted to her bars. The bear turned and took a good long look at us, and then dashed into the woods.

Do these herds of Roos chase you? Or do they stay away from people?

Makes me glad we only have deer and kamikaze squirrels here.... I'd much rather go head to head with them than humans in Escalades. Almost got taken out twice yesterday, including a bunnyhop over the curb to avoid a football dad (kind of impressed that I did it without bumping the back tire on the curb- guess that cx clinic helped). Just like the mayhem commercial, he was checking out the hot babe's awesome headband while turning in front of me.

The Hereford bull is the most dangerous mammal in North America, statistically speaking. And if I lived in the mountain West I would really be leery of mountain lions. But this is the upper Midwest, so we get deer and turkey on the trails instead of cougars.

Around these parts you can spot the cougars pretty easily, they tend to hang around sports bars and chainsmoke.

The mental picture on that one is brilliant!

A bunch of us were riding a century this past July. We were all riding close together and passed really close by a dead squirrel. But it turned out not to be dead, as it gave its last twitch, just as we passed it. We all let out grossed-out groans!

haha

We get those around here too, in the same natural habitats. Usually the cougars are pretty friendly, sometimes too friendly, but they are known to be feisty at certain times as well.

Just be careful about how much u drink though, you may believe that ur going home with a cougar, but she might have turned out to be something else

I'd still be careful.

Mountain Lion Found in CT.



Possible Mountain Lion in NH

The end of August, a mountain lion was spotted about 1/2 mile from my church. I know the family which saw the animal in daylight and watched it for 10 minutes with binoculars. I would not doubt them.

I firmly believe there are mountain lions here in the Catskills as well. For years, I have heard stories and rumors that are incredibly believable.

I spotted this guy a few weeks back. It's a Timber Rattlesnake, pretty typical of the Gunks in the New Paltz/Ellenville area:

I had mountain lions where I lived in Bakersfield CA, but I never saw one in the 7 years I lived and rode in the mountains around there. Most sightings of cats were by MTB'rs who were on trails which I did very little of.

On my Sunday rides I dodge 5-10 squirrels. My bike is very quiet and by the time they see me they panic and run in every direction. Most of the time in front of my bike.

I kind of like snakes too but have never come across one on the road on a bike. I did find one laying in the middle of the floor in my bedroom a couple years ago. Being from the west I had no idea what it was, but it turned out to be nothing scary. Just creepy. Gridplan's post has be wincing, though. I did an "end-O" over the bars years ago a went through the busted clavicle thing. Ugh. Hope you're recovering well.

That's an incredibly sad picture. Hate to see any big cat killed though I do understand the cats are becoming increasingly brave in sub-urban environments.

Roos just blindly bound across the landscape. If you are in their path thay just belt into you. One rider was knocked down this year. Same race last year a girl was hospitalised.

Roos are fairly timid when grazing, and will tend to hop away, but when they're going somewhere you have no chance. If they arc up and attack, then yes they can be quite vicious. Long claws, and an even longer reach with the hind legs.

good grief man, they sound like the bullies of wild life!

I too had a good size deer come out of a corn field around 9:30pm a couple of weeks ago, my light spotted him, he ran across the bike path about 6 or 7 yards in front of me to get to a tree line where a river was; what's amazing that for an animal this size to be running and all I heard was a twig snap! he may have froze in place once he hit the tree line knowing I was there but I couldn't see him nor was I looking for him.

All of the foregoing posts actually make me feel glad that I live in England - bizarre!

Our ancestors had the foresight to hunt pretty much all of our indigenous wildlife to total extinction centuries ago. No more bears, wild boar, native deer or wolves here thanks.

The modern peril is the feral fox. In recent years much of the farm land and open spaces previously inhabited by foxes has been built on. Added to this, the previous Government's total ban on fox hunting with dogs has left an over population and with no natural habitat. Hungry and emboldened they have moved into towns and cities and occasionally a sleeping baby or small child is mauled inside a house by an intrusive fox. If you cycle in the early morning you see plenty but so far they seem wary of bicycles and confused by the sound of a bicycle bell.

Do you live in England? In America they reintroduced wolves back into parts of the midwest, and we now have had sightings of them in Ohio and Indiana. Farmers don't like the idea of wolves reestablishing themselves due to livestock, but the government said that other wild life was getting out of hand due to no natural predator. Maybe England might one day follow suit?

But smells like fish.

the world needs more fox hunts. See brideshead revisited. No one ever looked that sharp as Sebastian in the mock hunting outfit.

You might not have seen the mountain lions but they saw you!

I lived in the mtns outside of Boulder for 15 years and didn't see any lions until the last 2 years. Then I saw one dart behind a tree while I drove past. I pulled over to check him out and could just barely see his head as he peered around the tree trunk. The other one was on my porch trying to kill our geriatric dog. My wife screamed, the lion dropped the dog and we hauled her back inside. While I looked for a camera the lion just sat on the porch like it was waiting for the dog to come back.

One of our neighbors had one stalk her for about 1/2 mile while she was walking along the road below our house. Yikes! Now, they are seen often enough in town that it doesn't even make the papers anymore. It seems like a lot of time people see them as they run across the road in front of their car or bike. They are very hard to spot but they are certainly out there.

I can't deny that, it could be very well possible one or more had spied on me, but I'm too thin so they waited for an overweight cyclist to come by!!

I lived in the foothills of Pasadena growing up, our property butted up against the easement. had to watch out for coyotes, rattlers, mountain lions, and ... Peacocks! I made a few bucks as a kid roaming the foothills for peacock feathers.