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31 Mar 10 - 11:10 AM (#2876508) Subject: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Ebbie Well, this animal is not so odd, really, but still, it's way out of place. This morning while walking my dog, she suddenly raced forward growling kind of puzzled like. I thought it was going to be a bear that she was growling at but she was not displaying her typical outrage. At the corner she stopped and peered in. When I reached her, there at the foot of the (outdoor) stairs lay a deer. Head up, watching us, and not obviously in pain but immobile. I checked the dog to her position and stood there for a bit wondering what a deer was doing out of the forest and in town. A deer is not like the ubiquitous bear looking for food. I told her to go back to the woods as soon as she could, then went on, wondering what my responsibility was. When I came back a half hour later she was gone. I hope she isn't injured. Like gnu's kitten (It was you, gnu, wasn't it?) I prefer to think of her as back in the woods browsing with her tail switching contentedly. |
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31 Mar 10 - 11:31 AM (#2876519) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: CarolC We have deer, bear, coyote, bobcats, and alligators in my city. |
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31 Mar 10 - 11:45 AM (#2876530) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Amos The strangest animal seen in my city is the Assertive Biped, a featherless crittur that steals other animal's skins to wrap itself in and is constantly emitting various mating, fighting, and social negotiating cries from its tiny mouth. It makes a huge spectrum of sounds but as far as scientists have been able to determine, only a small percentage of them have any real meaning. A |
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31 Mar 10 - 11:57 AM (#2876535) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: VirginiaTam I had a kingfisher fall down my chimney in the woodstove. It was cleaned out for summer so not much ash, but enough for me to not want a bird flapping around my lounge. We put a black garbage bag over the door of stove and my son stuck his arm in and nudged it to the bag. Put the somewhat dusty and stunned bird on the front porch and went inside to get a bowl of water to give it a rinse, but when we returned it was gone. But we were only half a mile up the road from a lake so I guess not too unusual. Last spring I saw a little muntjac fawn running up Springfield Road near the prison and town centre in Chelmsford, Essex, UK. That was a stunner. |
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31 Mar 10 - 12:24 PM (#2876550) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: katlaughing Well, Ebbie, not so unusual for Alaska, but I love the photo my sister sent of the moose in her front yard in North Pole, AK. She had one which spent a few winter mornings curled up on her back steps for a nap. I was shocked, years ago, to see a coyote run across the road in CT when we lived in Old Mystic. |
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31 Mar 10 - 12:36 PM (#2876558) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Ebbie Moose certainly are not unusual in many cities of Alaska. In Juneau they would be. There are photos showing moose 'out the road' (15to 40 miles) but I've never seen them here. CarolC, I know you have those critters all around you but do you have them on your streets? The biped Amos speaks of is fairly common here too. Bit unpredictably violent for my taste, but on the other hand, some bipeds have been among my closest friends. Go figure. |
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31 Mar 10 - 12:38 PM (#2876559) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: frogprince Glad I checked this, 'cause I've never heard of a muntjac before, and I had to google a couple of pictures; they're sorta "hobbitish" compared to the white tails around here. |
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31 Mar 10 - 12:50 PM (#2876565) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Sorcha Wild turkey, possum, coon, deer, all sorts of things but downtown Cheyenne had a herd of antelope last month! |
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31 Mar 10 - 01:10 PM (#2876583) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Jack the Sailor Aligators cross Carolina Beach road, a major commercial 4 lane every couple of years. There was a picture taken about a mile from our house of a black bear cub in a tree. But we are on the edge of a wild area surrounding a series of creeks within the city. I don't know about the bobcats, but A lot of things live in that wild area, too many deer to count. The most unusual thing I think are the flocks of juvenile white Ibises that we've seen for the past few years in our neighbor's yards. Up until then our 78 year old neighbor, who has lived all of his life here, had never seen them. That's pretty unusual. Eh? |
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31 Mar 10 - 01:18 PM (#2876591) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: CarolC JtS did a good job of answering. I would add that my experience as a wildlife rehabilitation worker is that wildlife do often use city streets, but it's not quite so frequent for people to see them because it's something something that would tend to happen at night or around dawn. So the fact that they are present in this area tells me that they do use the city streets from time to time. As JtS pointed out, though, the alligators can be seen on the streets during the daytime. |
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31 Mar 10 - 01:19 PM (#2876594) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Ebbie Ibises. Herds of antelope. Yeah! |
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31 Mar 10 - 02:44 PM (#2876702) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Zhenya The police just captured a coyote wandering around the Tribeca section of Manhattan, a few blocks from my office. According to the news, she may have come in through the Holland Tunnel, and was finally captured in a parking lot, hiding under a car. Another recent coyote sighting was at Chelsea Piers, a sports and recreation facility by the Hudson River. There was also a fellow some years back who was trying to raise a tiger in his Harlem apartment building. |
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31 Mar 10 - 02:49 PM (#2876707) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: gnu Snowy Owls. We get owls, but Snowy Owls only come into the city when we have a long stretch of cold weather, below -30C. The pickins are easy because birds will perch in the warmth at chimney tops, get poisoned by carbon monoxide and drop. Even if the fly, they fly slow and erratically and are easy prey for an owl... or others. Ebbie... injured kitten. I did tell a story about a kitten, but it wasn't injured. Of course, my memory is so bad that I often |
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31 Mar 10 - 03:01 PM (#2876718) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Rapparee Had a wolf in my back yard about a year ago. Cougars, moose, and elk are not unheard of. |
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31 Mar 10 - 03:04 PM (#2876719) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Charmion Wood ducks, supposedly a "shy woodland species", right in downtown Ottawa, mucking in with the loud-mouth mallards and Canada geese in the Rideau River. Years ago, a young bear behind the National Archives of Canada on Wellington Street in Ottawa. |
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31 Mar 10 - 03:26 PM (#2876741) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: GUEST,mg Supposedly there are cougars around here. Lots of bears. I swear I saw two bear older cubs in Seattle, at 65th and 15th NE while I was waiting for a bus. This was years ago. They walked like bears and hunched like bears and sniffed around like bears. I thought I was imagining things and they were probably big humped over dogs..but years later there was an article about at least one bear found in Ravenna Park and that would have been nearby. mg |
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31 Mar 10 - 03:29 PM (#2876743) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: SINSULL Every year Barnum and Bailey parade their animals through the Lincoln Tunnel from Neew Jersey into manhattan. And every year some poor homeless man awakes stunned as as elephants lumber by his once quiet sleeping place. A very strange sight. |
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31 Mar 10 - 03:50 PM (#2876755) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: gnu SINS. I sometimes cry when I see animals in such circumstances. I realize a circus treats animals much better than a zoo, but it stll bothers me. Even thinking of the sights I have seen at our zoo is disturbing. I can't go to our zoo as it makes me weep and I get extremely angry. The zoo doesn't even make money. And, we have the internet... it's not as if one cannot see these animals without them being caged for our curiosity. And, yes, as many of you know, I was a hunter for many years. Big difference between dispatching an animal (quickly, without it's knowledge of it's impending death) and torturing it for years. |
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31 Mar 10 - 04:30 PM (#2876783) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: beeliner Oddest I duuno. The crocogator is definitely the meanest. |
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31 Mar 10 - 05:14 PM (#2876825) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Ebbie "The crocogator is definitely the meanest." beeliner Ah, but that is a biped, is it not? |
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31 Mar 10 - 05:31 PM (#2876847) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Bill D We live in a huge Metro area north of Wash DC...2 major streets intersect a short way from our house, but there is a drainage ditch following an old creek bed and a line of backyards with trees behind us, which allow critters to sneak down a long way from 'open areas'. We have seen a fox, wild turkey, (raccoons & possums, of course)and both male & female deer in our backyard! (Have pics of the deer.) It's amazing what animals will cope with when they get hungry and/or curious. |
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31 Mar 10 - 09:56 PM (#2877017) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Ebbie The deer I saw this morning "felt" female to me but could have been a young buck. Sitka deer are very small so I'm assuming this small deer was an adult. Why on earth didn't it get up and dash away? |
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31 Mar 10 - 11:03 PM (#2877054) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: CarolC Bill, the first baby raccoon I ever raised was found in Dupont Circle. |
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31 Mar 10 - 11:07 PM (#2877059) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Bill D *smile*... I'm not surprised, Carol...they are among the most adaptable creatures. We had them in our attic last Summer & Fall...took some fancy timing to catch them OUT and block the hole. |
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01 Apr 10 - 03:26 AM (#2877154) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: VirginiaTam Oh I used to sing to the deer that came into my yard, they would stop browsing, look at me and listen. Was a stupid thing to do, because in later years when I put in kitchen and flower gardens, I couldn't stop them eating everything. |
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01 Apr 10 - 03:03 PM (#2877563) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: gnu I seen it today, just up the street. I ain't no expert on yer erotic wildlife, but it was over 6 foot tall and it had a shiney coat and it's head was a whole different bunch of colours. It weren't on a leash, but it had a collar on it's neck with metal spikes all round. Scarey damn thing. Saw it gettin out of a big Hummer with a sign on the back what said "Ba Da Bing Night Club". I figure it migrated here from St. Catherine's Street in Montréal. |
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01 Apr 10 - 03:14 PM (#2877568) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Bettynh The coming warm spell should be waking up our local bats. They're a little groggy on first awakening, and I've seen one hanging from a 10-foot sapling in the middle of a parking lot. Turkey vultures are gradually replacing the seagulls at our local dump. The combination of global warming and the ban on DDT has made them fairly common here in southern NH, where they were historically absent. |
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01 Apr 10 - 03:19 PM (#2877572) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Jack the Sailor punkapotamus urbanus? |
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01 Apr 10 - 05:18 PM (#2877663) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Ebbie VT, I think deer are inherently curious. I remember one day when my 7-year old daughter and I were walking in the woods, she started blowing on the harmonica I had recently given her. A movement caught my eye- downhill from us, maybe 20 feet away, a deer stuck her head out from behind a bush and was looking at us. |
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01 Apr 10 - 05:20 PM (#2877665) Subject: RE: BS: Oddest Animal Seen in the City? From: Ebbie I meant to add that we had walked by that bush perhaps 30 seconds before. |