Posts tagged animals
How safe is sleeping in bear country? I, too, like to sleep in a bivy sack under the stars. And while during the summer I am not too concerned about wolves (in spite of locals reporting attack...
A baby black bird fell in my baby's pool and I think he was there about 30 min. I took him from the pool and put him under the sun for 3-4 min to dry and then left him under the tree where there is...
There's a huge list of things to start duck hunting. Dogs, decoys, blinds, etc, and it's a chicken/egg problem. How could I possibly know how to buy and train a dog, which decoys to buy, etc., wi...
I've noticed a lot of bats around my house recently. I'd love to know what type of bat they are but all I see is a silhouetted glimpse as they dart past. Is there anyway to identify what types of b...
Usually when I'm at the beach, especially at low tide, there are many pieces of open or broken shells of mollusks, including clams. They can't survive without their shells, so those broken pieces a...
Someone was telling me that elk were solely plains animals before they were driven to the Rocky Mountains. They mentioned the account of Lewis and Clark and that they said there were no elk in the ...
Right now the irrigation ditches and ponds have lots and lots of mallard ducklings, sometimes multiple families to a single pond. The way to tell is that there will be too many ducklings for one fa...
I found this guy right under my window, huddled in a corner and bleeding a lot (for a crow) from his leg. You can see that the leg is sort of twisted backwards on these two pics, and you can see wh...
There are pictures of bobcats climbing on top of really tall cacti, the one story I read says that the reason the bobcat climbed the tree was to get away from a mountian lion who was trying give it...
Assume that the victim is a healthy rational adult. I've chanced on snakes while trekking in nature. So I was stunned to read about this tragedy where: Not realising she had been attacked, th...
I was out hunting last weekend (end of October) near Yellow Pine, Idaho. While walking up a hill during the late morning with moderate timber coverage (thin enough to ski comfortably but thick enou...
Just recently, a photographer was watching some foxes hunt rabbits. One of the foxes caught a rabbit when a bald eagle swooped down grabbed the rabbit and pulled both rabbit and fox into the air. T...
I found the remains a of a porcupine in the woods, with nothing left but quills and hair. As porcupines are pretty well protected by their quills, what types of animals would be capable of killi...
More than once, I have come across a porcupine in the woods sleeping on the ground during the daytime instead of in a tree. They keep their nose tucked down and their long hairs provide some degree...
We have a wild Red Eared turtle laying eggs in our yard. What can we do to keep animals from getting to their eggs? We had a turtle to lay eggs about two weeks ago and the next morning, something ...
I made plans to do some hiking in the mountains of Nevada this weekend. I'll have someone there nearby and a hospital is an hour drive away. We thought it would be fun to uncover rocks and even dig...
I have seen some barn cats that were claimed to be the offspring of female barn cats and a male bobcat (they had bobbed tails). Wikipedia says that there is circumstantial and anecdotal evidence f...
How many hours a day do Canada Geese typically sleep in a 24 hour period?
A buzzard seen nearby has been continuously attacking people for over a year now. As far as I know this isn't normal behaviour, especially not outside breeding season. Please correct me if I'm wron...
Last night, I had to climb a tower at work. When I reached the top platform (about 40 feet up), and turned my back to close the swinging gate behind me, I was whacked on the back of the head. Fort...
Which dog breeds are best for backpacking? I know malamutes do well in the cold and on mountains, but what if I'm backpacking in the summer? Which dog breeds are good for daily trail runs? I wo...
I was camping at around 1500m in the Italian Alps, and around midnight I heard howling that sounded very much like a wolf. I know there are wolves in the area (a friend of mine was lucky enough to...
There are plenty of bird identification app or books or websites, is there anything similar for dinosaur tracks? I get that identifying dinosaur tracks is hard, if I remember correctly there are o...
If one were to come across mountain lion tracks, how would one estimate the size of the lion making the tracks? Also, is it possible to tell the gender of the mountain lion(s)?
One of the genera of dinosaurs is the Tyrannosaurus, which includes the famous T-Rex. What do the tracks of this type of dinosaur look like?
I was reading this question about how to identify mountain lion tracks just now, and noticed the remark at the end of the accepted answer about the lack of claw marks. I am a cat owner, so the lack...
What does moose scat/poop look like and how can one distinguish it from the other similar scats namely deer and elk?
I have a friend who lives in Orlando, Florida. She and her husband are avid sailors and travelers. They also hunt lighthouses, and have seen over 100 different ones. They're currently on a trip fro...
Of the dinosaur tracks that people find in the outdoors, there are two main types, true tracks and natural casts (there are also undertracks and infills but these are harder to see). What exactly...
With some friends, I saw some dinosaur tracks in Wyoming that looked like this, Can anyone identify what type of dinosaur made these tracks?
What should I do if an elephant is annoyed by my presence and if I can't outrun it?
Mountain lions are rarely seen by humans, but their tracks can be much easier to find. How would one find and identify mountain lion tracks?
DEET is very toxic to dogs. How can I use DEET-based sprays and not poison my dogs? (my dogs often lick me, and they can get poisoned)
Inspired by this question, how dangerous are alligators to people out canoeing in say the Everglades in Florida? I am sure there is some danger because from time time you here about people winning...
I just passed the pond where the geese in this question are, and it turns out that while some of the geese are sleeping ontop of the ice, there is a section right there, about 20ft by 80 that is op...
This weekend, I was hiking in the Spanish Sierra de Guadarrama. On a small trail north of Navacerrada (used by only a handful of people each day at the moment), at 1905m height, I encountered the p...
I was having a nice evening walk near one of the nature reservations in Andover MA, close to Tewksbury, when I've found such a footprint. I'm really sorry for image quality, though. So it's a wet, ...
And what situations should I try and avoid in regards to wildlife and areas prone to hazards in the UK? Edited my question to cover the other answers more as they were very good additions to the w...
I found some scats that looked a lot like those of a pine marten or otter at 600-700m in the Lake District, UK. The scat was full of white claw-shaped items, possibly bone, and was 10-15cm long an...
This question comes from a circle of thought processes, so bear with me a moment... The skunks are waking up from hibernation, and after smelling so many sprays, one can't help but wonder (theoret...
I often see Mangrove and Cypress swamps on T.V. and I think it might be fun to explore one in a canoe. My wife thinks we might get eaten by Alligators if we try it. I have no knowledge about alliga...
There are times when I just barely miss getting sprayed by a skunk (there are a lot of them in my area). I haven't actually gotten directly sprayed, but I would like to be ready in case that happen...
I've heard that running in a zig-zag pattern makes it more difficult for the alligator to keep up with you. Is that true?
In September of 2017, for nearly two weeks, the Kenow Wildfire raged through a swath of Canada. Its largest impact was on the Waterton Lakes National Park in Alberta. More than 38,000 hectares, (94...
What is the possiblity of getting rabies bitten by a street dog in Berlin. By street dog I mean the dog of a homeless person. Is there a high chance of rabies from that. I must say that I didn't pr...
I live with my parents. I love bird watching, and would love a bird feeder, but my mother does not want to keep one fearing it will attract rodents which may carry lyme disease. We've had bad exper...
I get to travel a lot in the richly biodiverse western ghats of India. While hiking, one of the most difficult tasks I face is to identify birds that I come across. I'm not a professional or even a...
I use a backpack to commute on foot. It has one vent channel on the back to cool the back, but the problem I think is my shell. Heat builds up on my back and I get sweaty. As a cyclist, I have a n...
I just went outside (11:30pm) and could hear seagulls screaming/cawing overhead. I looked in the direction of where the sound was coming from and could see a couple hundred of them being illuminate...
In my garden pond I saw a bundle of frogs seemingly smothering one reddish coloured frog. Being British and always favouring the underfrog I sprayed the "attackers" with the hose until they all wen...