Strangest Animal Encounters

[6thFairway]

[quote name='bluemonster' timestamp='1340561331' post='5158834']As a side note about bats and rabies, which I did not know much about, there is an extremely high chance bats have rabies and if you are bit or even have questionable contact, you need the rabies shots/ regimen. Rabies is interesting. If you get it and don't take the medicine, and symptoms start, pack your bags, put your affairs in order. You are going to die. Thats why he took the regimen. I did not, deciding that I did not have an exposure. We give him the Batman comments when appropriate.
[/quote]

Be very careful of foxes, too. If you can approach a fox, assume it has rabies. My wife was bitten by a rabid fox in a suburban driveway about a year before we started dating... she had to have the whole shots regimen, too.

[cardoustie]

I have some beautiful sightings:

Home course here about 35 mins North of Toronto:
- deer ... live and also one time a carcass stripped down to nothing left but a spine and head (I submitted the image a few years ago)
- coyotes
- Osprey dive bombing koi's out of ponds, impressive to watch
- wild turkeys (we seem to have about 30 this year)
- foxes
- baby raccoons
- beavers
- fisher or martin grabbed a goose and disappeared into the cat tails
- musk rat

Our geese chasing dogs have pretty much eliminated the Canada geese - thank goodness

While travelling:
- momma grizzly and her cub in Kimberly BC, should have seen the claw marks left on the green !
- black bear on the range at Whistler that eventually used his claws to tear thru the netting to get off the range (he had come from a hotel dumpster). Sharp claws and strong like bull !!
- Kangaroos in Australia (lots of them)
- Albino deer at BigWin Island ONT. You can get within 10 feet of the deer there
- 14 foot saltwater crocodile at the Dunes course at Sanibel Island FL ... massive and scary looking
- 12 foot gators in GA and FL, really big on Jekyl Island
- 4 foot yellow "iguanas" in the trees in Cozumel
- green monkeys horsing around in Barbados
- burrowing owls in a bunker in Aruba
- very friendly foxes in PEI
- Elk in Banff

SCARIEST
- I was once charged by a momma swan in Newmarket ONT, now that was scary .. she got within 8 feet of my buttocks before my buddy saved me with shouts. Those guys are massive up close
- moved a log at Rockycrest in the rough and a large 4 foot snake shot away . .startled me quite badly

[WildDog06]

Not really strange, but playing a round a couple weeks ago I sliced a ball into some trees where there were 20+ geese. Didn't want to mess with them, so i pull the club i wanted, set the bag down, and walked really slowly towards the ball and they all wandered off as i was walking to the ball. Had to hit over a few of them to get back to the fairway.

Later that round one hissed at me as I was walking past his place in the shade. I think I walked a little faster when he did that...

[Onewaggle]

Last night playing this muni known for its squirrel population I was witness to something strange.

Buddy and I are in a cart, park it between our balls and after we hit we notice one of the squirrels is sitting on top of the cart. No big deal we get closer he runs off to about 20 feet in front of the cart.

My buddy thinks its hilarious to chase squirrels in a cart, and it usually is. As soon as my rear hits the vinyl he floors it at this big ole squirrel. Now usually they just dart off and up a tree, and we laugh at never getting close to them.

Well this sucker darts forward as we are facing at him, ten spin around and stands on its back legs in kind of a flying tiger hidden dragon pose and stays there. My buddy yanks the wheel as not to hit him, I almost fly out of the cart and I'll be damned if that sucker didn't proceed to chase us for about 30 yards, gaining on us!

He went his merry way when we stopped, probably distracted by the blood curtling little girl screens and laughter we were making.

Apparently this squirrel is known as "big Walter" and is famous for standing his ground!

[IC3BURGH]

Best animal encounter I have had:

Standing on the second tee with my buddy. We are watching a squirrel trot across the tee box, when all of a sudden...WHOOSH. A hawk of some sort swept down and grabbed the squirrel by the throat.

The hawk just stood on the tee box mean mugging me and my buddy, while it strangled the squirrel to death. Good times...

EDIT:

Forgot my best golf story that is related to animal encounters.

My buddies and I were playing golf at a municipal course located in the city I grew up in. Small course, surrounded by a couple universities, and a park that was highly wooded. So, we get to #11, which is a short par 4 lined with woods on both sides. My buddy is first to act in the fairway and puts it right on the green. All of a sudden, a gorilla pops out of the woods and stole his golf ball!

Next hole, we have 2 cops on a golf cart asking us if we had seen a gorilla. Turns out a guy dressed as a gorilla was poaching balls on the 11th hole!