Fun with Wildlife

rfryer wrote:
In 50 years of tramping the mountains I’ve had many “close encounters” with wildlife. Some of them hunting, but some were working and some camping. More with rattlesnakes when working than anything else.

Back in the 60’s my job was to develop maps in remote areas and that involved surveying the country first. That was the era of transits and chains and you pushed through whatever brush and obstacles you needed to in order to maintain a straight line. That practice will put you in conflict with a LOT of rattlesnakes, and it did. I don’t know how many I shot, 20 is probably conservative. And that doesn’t include the ones that were far enough away I didn’t think they were a threat. And a point to remember, they do not always buzz, sometimes they just strike.

I had three incidents hunting that I recall. Once I was on a small rise in a bunch of saplings and a big bull elk stepped out onto a 4WD road about 70 yards away. I hit him square in the chest and he came barreling up the hill right at me. I don’t remember being scared, but after the 3rd solid hit that had no effect on him I knew things were getting dicey. At the 4th round he stopped about 10 yards in front of me, then turned and ran back down the hill and I dropped him on the road with my last round. I often wondered if he was going to teach me an object lesson or somehow didn’t see me. It’s immaterial, though, it doesn’t matter if you’re skewered accidentally or deliberately.

Another occasion I was deer hunting and met a rancher in a jeep back in the hills. While we were talking a lion screamed very near us. The rancher said that’s a lion, do you want a ride out with me. I said no, I’m going on hunting. Translated meaning I’m too macho to let you think I’m some city boy scared of a lion.:) Oddly enough that lion tracked along with me in the brush for quite a distance, occasionally screaming. To say my senses were at max alert would be an understatement, I’m more wary of lion than bear. With a bear what you see is what you get; a lion can be on you before you even know he’s there. And there are a lot of lion in AZ.

My teenage son had a tenser experience deer hunting with me. He was sitting on a rock on the side of a ridge when he heard a young deer bleat. Then it ran right past him and a few seconds later a big lion landed right in front of him close enough to slap. He was trying to very slowly inch his rifle barrel around when the deer bleated again and the lion was gone. All he remembers is it was big and rippling muscles.

Once I was still hunting turkey and as I came around a bend in a trail I was about 6’ from the rear end of a young buck deer. My first thought was to reach out and poke him with my rifle barrel, and then I thought that probably wasn’t a good idea. So I said “Hello deer” and he leaped 3’ straight up in the air and was gone.

Camping, we were in Yellowstone and people were gathered near a big bull elk grazing along the road so we stopped. The people kept getting closer and closer to the elk and I could see he was getting irritated and I thought pretty quickly someone’s going to get a harsh lesson. Sure enough he spun around and stated tossing his head and pawing the ground and the people scattered like a covey of quail. What’s my DW who takes such good care of me do but think he might charge and get her new car so she gets in and backs away, leaving me standing alone with nothing between me and one po’d bull elk but air. But I guess he was satisfied with scattering everyone and he went on his way.

We were camped in Tuolumne Meadows in Yosemite many years ago in a PU. It was about 8:00 and our young son was asleep in the PU and we were standing out near the campfire. The DW said she was going to the bathroom up the hill and left. A few seconds later she was back wide eyed and said there’s something out there. A moment later a huge bear lumbered through our camp right between us and the campfire. I know my hair stood straight up and I remember thinking he looked like a Volkswagen with muscles and there isn’t a gun made that’s not on wheels that could put him down at this range. He came through our camp every night for three or four nights after that and we began looking forward to his trips and joked that he was going up the hill to the bathroom.

I apologize for the length of this post, but after all, you did ask if we had any close encounters with wildlife.:B