Your best 'recent' wildlife experience?

[y2blade]

C3BER said:

Here goes: short version.

After two days roaming the countryside in WW1 battledress and stinking no longer of me I found myself sleeping under a bush. During the night I thought I was dreaming that my dog was curled up against the back of my leg. It's one of those what the "f" moments when you realise your not at home and what you thought was your dog was as you carefully look was in fact a badger. It's head was resting in the crook of my knee and I honestly i had no idea what to do. Sometime later I moved my leg slowly and it woke up and moved away.

It really is one of life's amazing true stories and one that Im so very lucky to have.

wow
I didn't realise we had WW1 veterans on PH


joking aside,...how cool is that story? "VERY"....btw what is the background to your dress? are you part of a re-enact group or something?

Edited by y2blade on Tuesday 29th November 15:23

[bluntededdie]

Not so recent but spent a few days fishing on a big highland loch in the spring and I watched a big osprey empty the bay of eels over a four day period.They say the osprey only catch a fish once for every four dives they make,well this one was making a mockery of that by getting a feed just about every time it hit the water.Fantastic to watch over and over again in a stunning location with some great weather for the time of year

[Lefty]

Saturday night, I was the designated driver and we were coming home from the pub at about 11pm. There has been a dead badger by the side of athe road for a few days and as we approached I could see something sitting on it.

It was a buzzard. He looked up as we drove (very slowly) past but didn't get off his dinner. We must have passed 4 or 5 feet from him, absolutely beautiful bird.

[Piersman2]

I was out digging over a bit of my garden a couple of summers back.

Something made me pause and look slightly behind me, just out of my normal line of sight.

There was stood a fox staring back at me... with a foot long Koi carp in it's mouth.

We both froze as we looked at each other for a few seconds. I uttered the phrase "What the fk???", and at that he just turned away and carried off into the hedges with his catch.

All quite sureal.

[y2blade]

Lefty said:

Saturday night, I was the designated driver and we were coming home from the pub at about 11pm. There has been a dead badger by the side of athe road for a few days and as we approached I could see something sitting on it.

It was a buzzard. He looked up as we drove (very slowly) past but didn't get off his dinner. We must have passed 4 or 5 feet from him, absolutely beautiful bird.

Birds of prey are truly stunning, I could watch them all day.

[Hugo a Gogo]

not particularly exotic:

the other morning I saw two red squirrels chasing each other round and round in circles as I was driving up in my car, as I got alongside them they suddenly seemed to realise I was there, both stopped and looked at me as if to say "oh bks! act natural!" then ran up a tree

telling my 5 yr old daughter about the two running round in circles she said, in a patronising tone "Daddy, there was probably only one, but going really fast"

y2blade said:

....btw what is the background to your dress? are you part of a re-enact group or something?

he might be one of THEM

I saw it in Ross Kemp's true to life Super Army Soldiers series

Edited by Hugo a Gogo on Tuesday 29th November 15:45

[Tacagni]

We have had a lot of wildlife in the garden over the years badgers (lots) red kites, sparrow hawks, barn owls, have at the moment 7 wild ducks eating our geese feed, but the best one must be from a few months ago in one of our pools an otter , a real pleasure to to see.

[kVA]

I was sitting right here yesterday and a buzzard had to divert suddenly to avoid coming in the window, after being mobbed by a Rook and clearly not looking where it was going!

Fantastic to see one so close - can't have been more than about 2 metres away at one point) - pity I couldn't grab my camera in time...

(So here's one I took previously... )

[C3BER]

y2blade said:

wow
I didn't realise we had WW1 veterans on PH


joking aside,...how cool is that story? "VERY"....btw what is the background to your dress? are you part of a re-enact group or something?

Edited by y2blade on Tuesday 29th November 15:23

Escape and evasion exercise in my army days.

[C3BER]

To add a little silly history to it. My co-escapee went on to come second on the Weakest Link. Daft bugger should have picked the other person to be in the final with him.

[tenex]

Ace-T said:

I discovered at the weekend that next door and I share a pet hedgehog. I did wonder where all the slugs and snails had gone this year until I saw the fattest biggest, hedgehog I had ever seen about a month ago. Neighbourly chat reveals the hog uses the path between our houses on a regular basis and just sits there not bothered when neighbouroony goes out for a ciggie at night.

Then there is our robin, wrens, song thrushes, chaffinches, blue and coal tits, sparrows and blackbirds we have in the gardens, not very interesting for most folks but not bad for an estate of Barratt cardboard houses I think!

Trace

It's all relative. It's the fact that you know what you have got in your area that is commendable.( Including fat hedgehogs )
Buzzards up here are common and I hardly notice them.
Let's say I see a Nuthatch,(never have). That would be a "Fantastic" spot as I know they are not usually in the area.
A lot of people on here would think "what's he getting excited about? I see them every day at my bird-table."

[y2blade]

tenex said:

Ace-T said:

I discovered at the weekend that next door and I share a pet hedgehog. I did wonder where all the slugs and snails had gone this year until I saw the fattest biggest, hedgehog I had ever seen about a month ago. Neighbourly chat reveals the hog uses the path between our houses on a regular basis and just sits there not bothered when neighbouroony goes out for a ciggie at night.

Then there is our robin, wrens, song thrushes, chaffinches, blue and coal tits, sparrows and blackbirds we have in the gardens, not very interesting for most folks but not bad for an estate of Barratt cardboard houses I think!

Trace

It's all relative. It's the fact that you know what you have got in your area that is commendable.( Including fat hedgehogs )
Buzzards up here are common and I hardly notice them.
Let's say I see a Nuthatch,(never have). That would be a "Fantastic" spot as I know they are not usually in the area.
A lot of people on here would think "what's he getting excited about? I see them every day at my bird-table."

well said

[Mobile Chicane]

Yesterday, a tiny little wren, chasing off a blackbird who'd encroached on its territory.

I maintain that wrens are the Jack Russell terriers of the bird world for sheer pluck and voracity.

[kVA]

Mobile Chicane said:

Yesterday, a tiny little wren, chasing off a blackbird who'd encroached on its territory.

I maintain that wrens are the Jack Russell terriers of the bird world for sheer pluck and voracity.

and noise...

[tenex]

Thankyou Y2blade.

[jesta1865]

not really in the same vein as most here, but the wife and i went whale watching in Hervey bay Australia this year, and were just knocked out by the experience.

the boat was nigh on empty so in stead of finding one part of the rail and sticking to it, you could run round the whole deck and watch them check us out. we even had dolphins with babies coming in and the babies played with the whales.

it was a fantastic experience, beating diving on the reef by a country mile.

[omgus]

Towards the end of summer I noticed lots of track in the back garden. I was out in the garden one evening having a ciggie when I heard some snuffling under the plum trees.

18 years since they were last in the garden I am happy to say that we have badgers again.

I also regularly have deer in the garden when I leave for work, they are getting more used to me coming out first thing but watching them leap the fence is always a great sight.


We don't get much small animal wildlife but then I only generally see the small ones when the cats bring them in.

[soda]

I work in a large fresh food warehouse, regularly had a few robins staying over the colder months for a few years now. Very tame now and happily sit on the forklift as you drive around, had one the other night near enough sitting on my arm.

[C3BER]

I'm lucky to have a few acres which I applied for the entry level environment grant. Part of the grant means I have to cut my hedges only one third at a time...I don't cut them and the bird song from them is fantastic, before nothing.

I have seen most GB wildlife including the Scottish wild cat. But the one creature I have yet to see is a grass snake. It's one of my life's tick in the box must see or do.

[Bull1t]

People here will probably think I'm wierd but my recent one was a squirrel in the grounds of St Pauls when I was in London a couple of months ago. We dont have them here (NZ) so it was something different (and the only one I saw when I was there)