Trail Animals

Found these old traditionally dressed Haggis hunters a while back on the trail down at Ecclefechan. Luckily they kept hold of them till I got past they can be pretty viscous when hungry.

I don't have a picture but there is a gal on Igram that posts pics of her dog that she has trained to find Chanterelle mushrooms....they grow here and we use our bikes to get into areas that people normally can't get to on foot but I know that we ride by patches all the time and that dog would be a great trail companion!

RustyIron said:

The most dangerous animal of all is the Southern California Trail Cougar. Rarely will you hear them approaching. One moment you'll be happily shredding the gnar. Without warning, , the Trail Cougar will appear out of nowhere, fixing her gaze upon you, and the next thing you know you'll find yourself upside down in the air with your bike headed straight for you.

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Reminds me of two puppies fighting under a blanket...

RipGroove said:

Technically speaking this is a terrible photo as I had to use digital zoom on my phone () but considering I'm in the UK and this was t

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Binhill1 said:

Found these old traditionally dressed Haggis hunters a while back on the trail down at Ecclefechan. Luckily they kept hold of them till I got past they can be pretty viscous when hungry.

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They are not real haggises. Real ones have shorter legs on one side so they can run around steep Scottish mountains without falling over.

Binhill1 said:

they can be pretty viscous when hungry.

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The haggises or the hunters?

Flew past this guy who did not flinch and even hung around for a photo. Nicest Aussie black snake I've ever met.

This is the wildest I have! I've also encountered badgers (real badgers, not Karens) and a lot of foxes and a lot of deers but only by night, during the day, it's all quiet.

Ooh skid.... Death adder!.... shit ay.... gum leaves and we're outa here.....

Mart-e said:

Ooh skid.... Death adder!.... shit ay.... gum leaves and we're outa here..... View attachment 136616

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It's flat did you ride over it ?

A recent local ride

Binhill1 said:

It's flat did you ride over it ?

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Nah got a good view when my mate up ahead unknowingly went in a bit too close... we road back for a quick view.... They flatten out on sensing to any kinda threat, before striking...

This is the most aggressive thing I've seen for a while.

Two weeks later they nearly had me off the bike!
They were migrating from the pond into the woods as half-inch long frogs, all black against the dark earth trail. There were millions, if not hundreds of millions of them. Not even a flock of starlings and blackbirds could made a dent in their numbers.

Mart-e said:

Ooh skid.... Death adder!.... shit ay.... gum leaves and we're outa here..... View attachment 136616

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Well I had a native nz tit on my front wheel at one point

I couldn't see the screen of my phone well enough in the bright sun to get a decent pic, so here is the best I've got. Bobcats are known to hang around my local trails (Pleasanton Ridge Regional Park), but it took 30 years of hiking and biking there to finally see one.

Surprised a pair of young moose on my ride last weekend. I stayed behind the tree for the pic. Thought they were too old for momma to be near, but didn't feel like getting stomped.

Desmopilot said:

Surprised a pair of young moose on my ride last weekend. I stayed behind the tree for the pic. Thought they were too old for momma to be near, but didn't feel like getting stomped.

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New Scottish saying .There's a Moose loose and they kin be afa coorse. English translation ( can be awfully bad ) .

I was travelling with a bunch of locals in Sweden almost 40 years ago. It was May and I'd been told that morning that they had had a meter of snow in the town centre (Norkopping) the previous week. We were out in the sticks, travelling to the Baltic coast, and I asked if they had bears or wolves in the forest. They told me that they only come over from Russia when the winter is a bad one, but that they get lots of Moose. There are many active hunters looking and about 100,000 Moose are killed each year. Just as they were telling me this the convoy of estate cars (Volvo, naturally) pulled to a halt and there was a Moose and two calves grazing by the roadside. That night we had Moose on the menu, in honor of the occasion.

We live in Chichester, West Sussex, UK. Two days ago noticed a very large bird in one of the large Oak trees in front of our house making a cry I had never heard before. Just as I grabbed my phone to get a picture it flew away but I got a fuzzy shot of it. A "bird bloke" I know photo enhanced my pic and confirmed what I thought- it was a White Tailed Eagle which have been seen in the South of the UK but to my knowledge never before nearby! Think they were reintroduced to the Isle of Wight in 2019.

irie said:

We live in Chichester, West Sussex, UK. Two days ago noticed a very large bird in one of the large Oak trees in front of our house making a cry I had never heard before. Just as I grabbed my phone to get a picture it flew away but I got a fuzzy shot of it. A "bird bloke" I know photo enhanced my pic and confirmed what I thought- it was a White Tailed Eagle which have been seen in the South of the UK but to my knowledge never before nearby! Think they were reintroduced to the Isle of Wight in 2019.

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Yes that's like the Basking shark we caught on a trawler 1970 no mobile phones them days . I could have got a few free drams if I had that on my phone.

irie said:

We live in Chichester, West Sussex, UK. Two days ago noticed a very large bird in one of the large Oak trees in front of our house making a cry I had never heard before. Just as I grabbed my phone to get a picture it flew away but I got a fuzzy shot of it. A "bird bloke" I know photo enhanced my pic and confirmed what I thought- it was a White Tailed Eagle which have been seen in the South of the UK but to my knowledge never before nearby! Think they were reintroduced to the Isle of Wight in 2019.

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If you can hear it next time this works well?

Plummet said:

Well I had a native nz tit on my front wheel at one point

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It's the Black K'nigget!

I had a strange encounter recently...but sorry, it wasn't in EMTB...

In the unlikely event that someone didn't get my black k'nigget reference.



I'll show myself out ...

I'm just gobsmacked that as a relatively educated 51 year old I had no idea that a Haggis was a real animal. And a damn weird looking one at that. Crucially, I feel cheated that Attenborough hasn't covered them. Some biologist he is, won't be bothering with him anymore.

Sitting having a cuppa and something crawling caught my eye. Must have carried it 6 miles home as that was all on road . It's family will be missing it

Plummet said:

Well I had a native nz tit on my front wheel at one point

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I had a native tit on my saddle last week!

Glen Etive

Deer, bears, snakes, rabbits, bobcats. The best sighting was a condor while driving to the trailhead. No photo unfortunately.