Encounters with Snakes/Wildlife while riding?

Dug her nest right in my rut, had to carve a new line for the rest of the season

When I lived in California, mostly coyotes, deer, snakes, dogs, big ass grasshoppers that suck when they hit you in the face. 

Here in Washington, deer, coyotes, elk (they’re fucking horses with horns), bear, cougar, raccoons, possum, birds, god damn bees. I had one lodge itself in my helmet once while riding. 

 

Bears can be reasoned with. Crocs and snakes are just assholes.

I've had encounters with bears, wolves, yotes, lynx and bobcats (never a cougar though), all manner of ungulates, all of which can wreck your day, but too cold here for the poisonous snakes and spiders, so there is that.

Growing up racing/riding desert in so cal I’ve only seen a handful of snakes while on the bike.  Seen far more desert tortoises actually, a couple years ago I think I counted 13 tortoises on a single 150 mile ride, absolutely blew my mind as I had only seen maybe 5 in the 25+ years before that. Seen lots of deer up in the mountains, a couple bears, heard of elk, and wild horses.  Drilled a turkey vulture at about 80mph at the Baja 1000 one year and nearly got taken out by a kangaroo at the Aussie 4 Day Enduro a few years back. 

Elk, deer, antelope, black bears, mountain lion, bob cats, foxes, armadillos, rattle snakes, bull snakes, garter snakes, box turtles, sliders, snapping turtles, cotton tails, Jack rabbits, red tail hawk, bald eagle, lots of lizards, ect. 

Worst thing I've ever came across is a herd of sheep and 2 big guard dogs in a national forest. Those fuckers came at me and my 5 year old, so first I tried a different trail that dead ended and had to turn around. When we got back to the herd I said fuck it and waited for them to come at us, then went right at them. They turned tail and got out of the way until we passed them, then one took in after us. I pulled the clutch in and then dumped it shooting a shit load of rocks at it's face. First time in 25 years of riding that I wish I was carrying at least bear spray, preferably a pistol. Why the fuck would you drop off you heard of sheep on a public ohv trail with aggressive dogs?

Also had a run in with a badger, mountain bike in the late evening in Somerset, hard bastards those things and they can be pretty aggressive can't they.

I'd still take a badger over a rattlesnake or a bear though 😂

Meanwhile 

I'm scared to death of snakes. Once, i was on the road between two trails on an enduro trip, following the guide and in front of a friend. The guide swerved suddenly, which kind of woke me up, and saw thos big ass snake the road. It was too late and anyway i frozed, just putting my legs up. I ran it over and it sticked in the knobbies, passing just besides my friend helmet ! One of the most crazy thing that happened to me riding. My friend was pissed because he's an animal lover . 
Riding enduro everywhere, i saw a huge and magestic deer in Croatia, wild horses, scary herds of dogs, bears in Romania and Bulgaria (too close for confort once) and also one in Canada with his cubs, camels in Morocco, elks in Finland... 

Plenty of snake, spider, deer, coyote, bobcat, dog, and bear encounters while riding, and one incident with a scorpion. 
Three that stand out as the silliest were one of the snakes, the scorpion, and spider. The spider incident was shortly after riding through a large web that I didn’t notice until just before I hit it and seeing a pretty big spider on it, I damn near undressed on the spot while looking for that damned spider, and spent the rest of the day wondering where it was hiding on me. 
   The craziest snake encounter happened while I was kayaking in a lake, snakes may not be able to chase you too quickly on land, but they can do a reasonable job of it in the water! I was far enough off shore that my kayak must have looked like a great spot to slide up on and take a rest, after a bit of zig zagging and hard paddling trying to ditch the thing I finally paddled closer to shore until eventually that looked like a better option than my kayak so the snake just went there instead of following me any further. 
     The scorpion incident happened after a crash, after I got to the bike and hit the kill switch I turned the fuel off and decided to have a seat for a minute and check myself over for cactus, cuts and scrapes, etc…  and I inadvertently sat on a scorpion so it stung me on the ass, which just added a little bit more injury and some insult to the situation, but it was funny as hell!

🙂

I have come across a couple mojave greens while riding out near Spangler as well. 

I’m here in Southeast Texas. When I was a kid, Dad had us on a deer lease that we would ride a lot during the off season. We also rode the national forest around San Augustine Lake, as well as a local spot, that everyone called “Rad Cliff”.
 We battled beavers on and off for years. They would build dams that would cause water to rise too high to where we couldn’t cross the creek. We would tear them down, come back the next day and they would already have the dam built back up. They are some hardworking fuckers, I’ll give them that. 
 I ran over a hog nose, that got hung up in the front wheel of my Tri-Z 60 3 wheeler when I was probably 6. Scared the hell out of me!

 Through the years of riding I cannot even list all the incidents with snakes, bee’s and hornets. The bulls in the neighbors pasture would always get quite upset with us kids also.

I’ll list a few other wildlife. bald eagles, road runners, gators, beavers, porcupine, huge ass crickets (black and orange/yellow), wild boars, so much more.

My son had a deer run out in front of him a few years back at the old Highlands track (Freedom MX)  Wish this track was still around!

I've never had a wildlife encounter while on an MX bike, but had rattlesnakes coil up and hiss at me several times on the MTB. They don't know you're coming on a bicycle until it's too late, and most of the time they're posted up right at the edge of the trail. The rider often doesn't see one in time, either. A few times i rolled right past one as it was coiling and I thought I was going to get struck. 

This is pretty wild:

https://youtu.be/oy0keWHgNO4?feature=shared

I've had water moccasins come at me instead of away from me. I hate those smelly things.

Sometimes you're the windshield, sometimes you're the bug . . .

 I did not think of bee's /wasps as wildlife until I saw some other posts. And it reminded me of a time when I was starting to cut in trails on my property.   It was fall so coolish weather. Cool enough to be wearing a hoodie and long pants.   I was trimming some brush and felt a sting in my hand. Through a pair of milwaukee work gloves. I had been working around thorn bushes so I thought it might have been a thorn at first. I saw that it was a wasp and than felt more stings start. That was when I noticed I was  surrounded by a swarm of wasps. 

I started to run away, there were multiple wasps stuck in my clothing, and stinging me over and over. So I started to take off my clothing as I ran from the wasps. I ended up standing in my underwear swinging my hoodie around to try and scare  the wasps away that had chased me 100's of feet through the woods. I pulled a bunch of them out from the clothing they were stuck in.And that was the end of the trail making in that area until I had an enclosed machine in the winter.

I am not allergic to bee stings , so I was not super worried. But I had been stung more times than I could count. Since some had stung multiple times . I was sick for about a week after that. and I had a vein that was sticking out on my thumb for about a year after. 

I had some very big very mean sheep dogs come after us way high in the mountains of Idaho. Big scary dogs, not sure if they count as wild animals but I’d rather see a rattlesnake than those dogs any day. 

Moose probably the most dangerous of that crew.

Off-roading in Zululand, two of us were almost taken by a hippopotamus whilst taking a piss.  You'd be surprised how fast one can run in boots when you have 9000 pounds of hippo behind you.

We had to wait an hour or so to retrieve our bikes.

Were the dogs were Great Pyrenees? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/05/casper-sheepdog-georgia-coyotes-farm-dog

They're definitely bred to protect herds, like Abruzzi Mastiffs.  Seems like sometimes people get them thinking they are bigger Golden Retrievers, but it is an entirely different temperment.

Pretty common for stock runners, beef and sheep, to be licensed to free range on public land.  Not uncommon to see sheepherder camps in Nevada when riding.   Directed a summer camp in the High Sierras for a couple summers in the early 80s and had a fair number of bell ringing cows wandering around the woods.

After the Washougal national in 2019 we headed back east. We stopped over at Area 51 for a race. My rider and myself were sitting on our camping chairs talking shit...Caleb opens his gear bag (last packed at Washougal) and this big dark brown fucking snake comes flying out the bag...we shat ourselves...the snake fucked off under a Camper parked next to us. A bunch of folk who saw it tried to find it but it was never seen again. I'm pretty sure it hitchd a ride in the camper.

I once rode through a swarm of bees. By the time I got back home my face looked like Mike Tyson had worked me over. My face was so swollen from the multiple stings that I could barely open my eyes.

That was Greg Albertyn who hit the deer. Apparently, legend has it that the fans barbaqued the deer that afternoon.

Albertyn and his deer

If you get in between a hippo and water you are done, they haul ass.  People think you need to worry about big cats in Africa but no, it's the hippos and buffalo you need to worry about.  

In California they would try to shut down the surrounding 20 square miles of land just for that one turtle.

Funny story: Riding the Kalkaska trail in northern Michigan a few years ago I was leading and a rough necked grouse shot out into the trail and straight into my front wheel. It was no issue so I kept going, and at the next trail crossing came to a stop and the guy behind me pulls up and me says "Did you see that bird break dancing in the middle of the trail?". I laughed and said I hit it! About then the 3rd guy pulls up and says "Did you see that dead bird in the middle of the trail?" Well it wasn't dead when I saw it!

Cool story: Last fall we were riding the Geels trail (mid-Michigan) and while leading I startled a red-tailed hawk out of tree and it flew down the trail in front of me for probably half a mile. I thought at one point it lost me, but I came around a turn and there it was again. My bud right behind and I had Cardo communicators on and we were both freaking out/laughing how long it just flew right ahead of us. It was the coolest thing ever.

Last one: In the late 80's I was riding my Yamaha 650 Maxim near Lake City, MI doing about 60 MPH on our way north and tagged a deer. It was about 11PM and cloudy so no moon, and I didn't even see it until I hit it which was probably a good thing because I didn't have time to react and hit the brakes or swerve. It was a smallish deer and I hit it in the neck just below my headlight and it for the most part just slammed into my left side. I thought at the time it broke my leg. I had deer fur on my left leg, and mucous on my right hahaha. I didn't go down, but it lay dead in the middle of the road. Up until the day I sold that bike there were a few strands of deer fur in the speedo cable fitting were it hooked under the speedometer. The reminder to myself that it really happened.

Yup, mamma hippos can become extremely dangerous and aggressive if one happens to get too close when they have a calf.

Hippos are responsible for the most human deaths in Africa by far...

Our Buffalo's are cunning bastards. They will circle around you and attack from behind.

Yes, on my first trip to East Africa I would be out in the bush before sunrise and I would get real sketched when I heard nearby Lions calling, probably 50yards away.  But after spending time out there I learned real quick the lions were not the ones to worry about.  I've now been charged multiple times by mad buffalo, and I've seen them ram safari vehicles for no reason.  I've been very very close to lions at dawn and they don't bother you unless a cub approaches.  Obviously, you never want to surprise an elephant in the bush either as they will take you out too.  But when not near water with hippos and crocs, you gotta always be on the lookout for the buffalo.