Whats your animal encounter?

When I lived in Kodiak, Alaska I would run and run on all types of trails. This one day I went on a familiar close to a neighborhood 3 mile loop run around Beaver Pond. I was running with my dog Doc Holiday which is 90lb Hungairian Viszla. Towards the end of the run I noticed a boulder that was never there before. Before I knew it that boulder started moving onto the trail and walking towards me. It turned out to be a Kodiak Grizzly bear about 8+ feet tall.
The bear got up on its hind legs and started to walk towards me. It was an amazing sight and scary too, since we were about 200 yards away from him. I was very lucky my dog didn't notice or smell the bear (bears are stinky animals). So I didn't panic, I just stopped made my presience known and started to walk backwards very slowly. You don't want to make fast movements, you don't want to trigger a charge. I only had to walk a few yards to get out of sight of the bear. When I was out of sight I made a 3 mile jog into a 6 mile jog.
On the returen trip I came up to an oldman and his 3 grandchildren. I told them about the bear, and they told me about the mama bear and her two cubs they just came across 1/2mile up the trail. The little boy asked me "why don't you have a gun out here" I just laughed and told him that his pea shooter would do nothing and that I was running and not hunting. Man was I in a pradicament. Should I chance the lone male or the Mama and the cubs. Mama and the cubs are more dangerous if you get caught in the middle. Since I never saw them I choose to change the mama and the cubs. I was lucky enough to not have seen them, but I did see all their tracks in the mud.
So the morale of the story is this. If you come across any wildlife big or small dangerous or not, stay calm and know your surroundings. Then everyone animals and humans a like will be safe and sound.

That's a great story! Around here some runners get concerned about cougars, and I've heard a few scary stories of people being stalked. That always crosses my mind when I'm out running, though the chances of an encounter are pretty slim.

I recently had a cow "encounter", though. I scared a couple of cows near the trail, and rather than run to the side, they ran down the trail ahead of me. I literally scared the crap out of them and I had to constantly do some fancy footwork and hopping to avoid splatters of fresh cow manure on the trail and low-hanging vegetation (I didn't entirely succeed) ... for 2 miles! I periodically caught up to them (surprisingly fast runners), scaring them down the trail, until they wised up and left the trail. The most annoying run I've ever had. Gotta love Utah grazing rights.

I know cougars (mountain lions) can be scary. Mountain biking my buddy and I scared one sleeping in Whiting Ranch, Southern California. It was the size of great dane. I have never peddled so fast, and I don't think the mountain lion ran so fast before the other direction. It was kind of comical.

Story about cows is good. I never have ran up to cows before, but I had to wait for almost 45min for a heard of buffalo to move. I was on a 4 wheeler trail, which is usually buisy, but this time no one came to chase them away. Oh well, it was awsome to sit there and watch them. Alaska is an awsome place to run and see wild life.

Very cool to have seen a mountain lion in the wild! That'd be amazing to see one while hiking or biking --- but running is cause for some concern because running is prey behavior :-)

Yeah, I can image Alaska would be a fantastic place for wildlife. Sounds like you've had some great encounters.

Late afternoon towards evening, I was coming in from a long run on the Silver City Trail, here in the Black Hills. The trail meanders along a creek on one side and a shale cliff on the other. The cliff is almost vertical and ascends for a couple of hundred feet before cresting. As we (my dog and I) came around a bend, I discovered a Mountain Goat standing alone calmly eating the grass between the trail and creek. My dog immediately launched into predator mode and went screaming after this newfound prey. In a bound, the goat was up and onto the shale cliff. I was able to call my dog back. It was a good thing to, because the avalanche of shale coming down the cliff behind the goat would have quickly put an end to my dog.
As I watched, the goat would leap across the air finding unseen ledges and rocks to cling to. At times, its hoof would find purchase above its shoulders and it would effortlessly pull itself up onto a new perch. Its athleticism was beyond anything I had even witnessed. A magnificent animal to behold!

That story sounds very similar to one told by Galen Rowell in his book Mountain Light, where he photographs a mountain goat climbing a 5.8 wall, performing all kinds of perfect climbing moves. The wall was at the bottom of a long route they had failed to climb a day earlier. I've seen a lot of mountain goats around Mount Timpanogos here in Utah but unfortunately haven't seen them do a lot of climbing

They are incredible animals. I just stood and watched in awe.

I have only seen one Mt. Lion. Flashes of it actually as it was streaking through the think trees. They say you might not have seen one, but you have been seen by one.

That would be an awsome sight to see. In Kodiak I have seen hundreds of the white mountain goats, but only from a distance and not doing much climbing. Maybe one day when I return to Alaska will I get to see something like that. Here in Hawaii you might be lucky and see a wild pig crossing the trail or sucluded road.

One day this past early spring(the snow was about 1/2 melted) I was about 2 miles into a 16 miler and the trail rises steadily up for the first 2 miles before cresting & opening into a nice meadow. As I started across the opening, I noticed a small herd of elk bedded just off to my right a short distance off the trail. I slowed to watch them & they all stood and began to trot away. What I had not noticed was the bull elk just off the trail to my left. As I'm watching the herd, I begin to hear the loud thunder of hooves & loud gutteral snorts, within seconds this large beast crosses about 6 ft in front of me, obviously trying to deflect my path, as he rushed to catch his harem of cows.
I stopped to catch myself, as my life flashed before my eyes, certain that that was the coolest thing I had ever seen & hope it never happens to me again. Jeff