Encounters with Snakes/Wildlife while riding?

Wild burro herd in the Mojave desert.

Bighorn sheep in Death Valley.

Of course we always pause for tortoise crossings:

GrapeApe is in Texas… I am straight north in Oklahoma, and my list is almost identical to his! 🤪 

I have encountered a fair amount off his list while off-roading on the YZ250, and a crap ton of them while out on the MTB! Here is a western Diamondback crossing the MTB trail out at Roman Nose state park in western Ok! It’s very common to see these guys crossing the trail or sunning on the rocks along the bluffs etc!

Oh…and I rode up on a black bear once while MTB riding in Angel Fire New Mexico! Thankfully he was more scared of me than I was of him I guess? He turned and ran off immediately AND I am damn glad because all I’d have managed to do was poop myself before he woulda been all over me! Started carrying bear spray after that! 😝

I’ve seen very little wildlife at the local MX tracks tho… 😎 👍❗️

So, where's the GoPro footage???  We'd love to see that!  

I agree! See my story a few posts above yours! 

Had deer run through the middle of the pits at Honey Lake

A few Bigfoot here and there but nothing too scary.

Does a riding lawnmower count?

I come up on wild horses nearly everytime I ride up here north of Reno. Makes for a pretty cool experience to come over a crest and be in the middle of a herd of 30+ Wild Horses.

Had a brown snake fling up and hit me. I think I screamed.

I’ve ran over a few snakes while riding mtb here in Ohio. Saw a few turtles while trail riding quads in Indiana. Last summer while in Florida in the east side of Point Washington State Forest I came across a angry 4ft rattle snake. Absolutley terrified. Screamed like a little girl. Snakes are my worst nightmare lol. I’d rather have a bear come across the trail 🤣

SouthEast Texas……..only thing I ever see riding are Black Panthers.  The folks who ride in Southeastern Oklahoma see Bigfoot from time to time.

McAdoo terrorised everyone with his snake last Saturday night.

One of our local club tracks has a big adder nest in the middle of it. I’ve never actually seen one, but a few people have. 
luckily it’s away from the spectator area, but the bikes ride right by it. 
(southern UK)

Australia - 9 of the 10 most venomous snakes in the world (depending on your definition)

As a kid I remember running over a snake, leaping off my XL250 and holding it by the end of the grip while checking if the snake was wrapped on the bike somewhere.

These days I ride my MTB in the desert, often in the dark.

Riding single track, down hill, I came across a Brown Snake (deadly and aggressive). I never saw the head or tail, but the body was as thick as my arm! With minimal time to react I “bunny hopped” him. Must have pissed him off as he reared up for my friend who was right behind me!

On another slow uphill single track I rolled past a coiled snake, inches from my tires, and ankle. I yelled back and mate stopped. I yelled, “it doesn’t look dangerous” (meaning aggressive, plus it was stripped and colourful.) He said “Doesn’t look dangerous?!!! It’s a Pilbara Death adder - you are dead in 20 mins if it bites you!” (Googled “Pilbara Death Adder”, and that’s what it was…)

With MotoX gear on, a bite is unlikely to get through. (Our cowboys, “ringers”, feel safe in jeans/boots.) MTB shorts and bare ankles feels exposed.

In a less deadly encounter, I’ve had a small kangaroo (maybe a Wallaby) run square into me. I think it was startled/confused by the powerful bike lights I was running. I didn’t get knocked over (saw it coming) he got up and bolted, with even more fear of the weird animal with wheels.

 2 years ago we were riding forest service roads by Spences Bridge and as I came around a corner a bald eagle dropped in front of me and grabbed a long snake that was on the road, I followed it for maybe 3kms down the road before it could get some lift and was gone. 

I've seen a few snakes, Fox's, Deer, Turkey , snapping turtles , the strangest thing I saw was a group of teenage girls with cats, swimming with the cats in a river. Out in the woods.  

Most have just looked at me and went on their ways. When I first moved to where I am now, I was out exploring the woods walking. And I saw what looked like a bear and a cub walking down the train tracks. Bear's are unusual in the area and only a few have been seen recently.  When I was looking at them it did not feel real. By the time I grabbed my phone out of my pocket they had jumped off the tracks and went into the woods. They were heading away from me. I'm glad that I have not been surprised by a bear up close .

There is a pretty good sized black snake that has scared me by seeking into areas near my garage. about 8ish feet long and coke can around. Pretty sure its not anything to worry about. Just scary to be walking through tall grass and see it slither by. And then I saw it by an out building that has a gap in the door big enough that it could get inside. 

Bobcats ,fisher cats and coyote's are the more common critters around here in higher numbers that might not be friendly if I run into them. But so far I've only seen them on trail cams. And seen the results of some sort of kill not long before I came along the snowy trail. We are lucky that most of the critters around will not want to try and do anything to a person as long as we do not try and get too close.

I'm most worried about deer when I'm going faster .If I'm going slow, they normally get away from me. I worry more about hitting one while driving on the street.

  I did see a deer try to jump an 8 foot tall chain-link fence. It bounced back like it hit a trampoline. Must have bounced 30 or 40 feet back from the fence. I was worried the deer was going to get hurt.  That happened 2 times and then it cleared the fence and went on its way the 3rd try.  Crazy how fast they can run and how high and far they jump!

A friend had one run in front of her. so she stopped . And while pulled over and stopped a second deer ran into her Jeep full speed and broke its neck, died right away.   

Have seen Rattle snakes, Javalina, Coyote, Fox, Coatamundi, Turkey, Elk, Deer. riding in the mountains all over AZ.

Came around a turn and accidentally interrupted these two while riding some single track in NJ last summer 😂

Here in Pennsylvania I've been knocked down by a deer, just missed by few, had a black bear cross the trail pretty far up ahead, rode behind a herd of elk, been in a crick and saw a water moccasin, had a BIG black snake cross my trail and just missed riding face first into a giant hornet nest that sagged down to head height. Yeah it's fun out there. 

Conroe MX in the late 90s (now called 3 Palms) there was a Zebra on the track during practice before a race. Apparently it escaped a nearby wildlife sanctuary. 

im in Southwest Florida, so occasional black bears sighting, many snakes (I hate snakes), gators, white tails deers, and until today, a 1 time sighting of a Florida Panther, while I was on my mtb, on a mtb trail. We freaked each other out in a corner in the palmettos vegetation, she jumped away immediately. 
Trying to post a video of that bear sighting but not succeeding.

Coulda done without reading that one.

Freaking brown snakes.....................scare the living crap outta ya, if you get bit more than likely you will die, ran over one last summer that was a thick as my arm at my place, also lace monitors, when it's hot the real big ones come out and they are really quick, some around here are up to 7/8 feet long but the worst is the stupid kangaroos, they are some of the dumbest animals I have ever seen, hit one the other night coming home................I was stopped and it turned around and bounced straight into the bull bar on my car and knocked itself out! 

Snakes yeah plenty.

Good thing about nature things like snakes only defend not chase and attack people.

Ironman 2020. Someone has a video of this somewhere.

I was riding in the hills up above the Little Shuswap Lake in BC Canada on my 07 KTM 525 XCW and had this Huge F'in Black dog run out from the bushes about 20' in front of me, at least I thought it was a dog until I realized it was a Bear.  The other cool thing I remember out in the woods was I was riding in a place in Washington called Tehuya and we came around this turn and there were about 15 BILLION frogs all over the ground, they were so thick it looked like the Earth was moving. 

One of the first races I ever went to was a desert race in Lucerne Valley, around 1972.  I was a 13 year old watching my older friend race. There was a huge line of bikes on the start line, I’m guessing 200 or so riders and it was a race to the smoke bomb off n the distance. Right before the start, there was a commotion on the line and I saw a couple of riders drop their bikes and jump back. One of the officials walks over, reaches down and grabs this massive rattler by the tail and begins swinging it like a rope over his head and lets loose of it and it flies what seemed like 30’ out into the  desert…crazy nut job starter!