Stupid Human Behavior With Wild Animals

Just for a hoot, what incidents have you witnessed? I can remember four - an old man who insisted on pestering a bull bison, who promptly got up and knocked him on his ass - an idiot who almost got him arm torn off by a panda - a buck attacking and kicking the hell out of some guy - and a woman taking a “selfie” with a cobra. And, of course, the running of the bulls, which produces multiple casualties. Time to “thin the herd”. Another I remember is when a couple adopted a pair of orphaned racoons - racoons are related to bears and are intelligent, curious animals - while the couple was away, they got out of their cage, and completely trashed the kitchen. What part of “wild” don’t you understand?

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I’ve seen people try to pick up a rooster and kiss it on the beak, and then look shocked when pecking him on the nose.

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Yellowstone National Park used to play a video in the visitor center of a father videoing his young daughter in front of a bison. The girl is looking nervously over her shoulder while her idiot dad keeps saying “back up a little more honey”. You can tell the bison is not happy. It finally has enough and charges. Fortunately brushing right by the little girl and straight into the father. All you can see is the camera spinning wildly.

Not sure how badly he was hurt but sure hope he was charged with child endangerment.

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The one natural resource we’ll never exhaust is plain damned ignorance and stupidity.

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Does anybody have details on the “Red Bull…wings.” meme? On the ranches that raise these bulls, they have to keep them calmed down by loosing them in herds of cattle.

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The most common Accidents are with horses I think. Just a General lack of training or Knowledge.

  • bite very hard

  • step on your feet

  • squash you against something

  • Roll over while your riding.
    image

  • kick in all directions ( hard enough to kill you )
    In most cases horses will go out of there way to not do most of the above but once they get a bad attitude
    be alert they can hurt.

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Remember the one in Yellowstone where the people thought the bison calf was cold, so they loaded it into their car and took it to the rangers station to get it some help. They got a ticket for harassing the wildlife.

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Here’s an oddball story my dad told me. When he was stationed in Fort Riley, KS, in the last cavalry outfit that went to tanks, there were always a pack of dogs hanging around. One soldier had athlete’s foot really bad, and let one of the dogs lick his feet - miraculously, his feet cleared up. Supposedly, the nasty bacteria from the dog’s mouth killed the foot bacteria or fungus - go figure.

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I live in FL, and saw a neighbor feed bread to some ducks… and a 4 ft alligator.

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This reminds me of a story my dad told me when he was in the cavalry in the '30s. They had a really big white horse called Samson, but he was too mean and headstrong to make a good mount, so they used him as a packhorse. One day on maneuvers, Samson reached right over my dad and bit down on the trooper in front and off to his side, pulling him by the shoulder out of his saddle. Based on the level of medical treatment then. the trooper had to be hospitalized, and the bite was so deep they had to constantly monitor him for signs of the nasty infections they produced. Later, Samson had to be put down - he fought the farrier trying to shoe him so much that he put one of his eyes out.

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When I was in my teens, I once rode a horse bareback. The horse decided to stop dead and drop his head. I kept going. It was a long walk back to the barn.

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I worked with some horses that would dart off the trail at a fast Pace thru the woods under tree limbs to knock you off. Sometimes if you don’t show them whose the boss they will test you. There was one horse that pretty much didn’t give two zhits about anything and, no matter what you did he would not run. One day I took him out and brought him back to the stable at a full gallup all lathered up and a couple of people said how the hell did you do that and I told them that we had a talk.
Another horse named Wayne was a young stallion that was full of piss and vinegar and work up a lather holding him back at a walk. The Instant
You put slack in the reins this horse would actually peel out.
If you spend enough enough time with ( some ) horses and they bond with you they will go out of their way not to hurt you.

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Too much of this!

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Engineer I worked with has a paraplegic wife who used to give horseback riding lessons…She got thrown.
My sister got thrown by her horse “Buttercup” and messed her back up. Sent that horse to get trained, it came back and first thing it did was bite my sister, so my sister smacked it in the head with a 2x4. My sis and bro in law had 4 horses, think 3 now…feed them, muck the stalls, and look at them :roll_eyes:. I have… fish :sweat_smile:
No real stupid animal stories here,but driving to work one day, I smelled a cookout going on, and a big bear headed to the backyard to join in.
Another local girl, sunbathing with the lotion, eyes closed, had a bear licking her.
I used to body surf Stinson Beach north of San Francisco. Bigazz waves, nobody ever in the water except me and my buddy, or so we thought. One day a keg with “Cal-Berkeley dept. of Marine Biology” went cruising by us. Turns out this area was the number one spot in the world for Great White shark attacks (before killer whales attacked a shark, leaving a scent that kept the Whites away for some years, and claim to #1 status per Jacques Cousteau) and the keg was what was used to track sharks , attached to the shark with a rope,as they cruised the “circle of death” around the Farallon islands before gps or computers were a thing. Damn good waves, we’d get 40-50 second rides…starting well out…in the “circle of death”.

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Once a horse gets a bad Attitude caused by people it’s hard to get them back, it takes a lot of time. ( just love horses and cats of all sizes )
Be safe Mr. mattm.

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You as well. Yeah, I don’t agree with how some raise animals. I don’t have domesticated pets except for my fish (haven’t bought a fish besides plecos for 30 years), but hang out with a couple squirrels and chipmunks, and a million birds or so. Used to have snapping turtles, keep them over the winter. Dog growing up, she’d go to school with me, lay at my desk, go out for recess… different world…had loads of cat’s and kittens mainly growing up but had a few strays we took in more recently.

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Plenty of people got dogs and cats as companions to help them through the pandemic. Now many of these wonderful people are dropping them off at shelters or out here in the country to become wild and fend for themselves, since they don’t need them anymore. That’s some heartless folks!

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I saw a guy (I couldn’t stand) at our deer camp leaning on a wooden fence. A horse in the pasture came up and nudged him a few times (it wanted a treat). The guy turned around and hit the horse between the eyes, hard. The horse staggered back and shook its head a few times and the guy leaned back on the fence, satisfied with having put the horse in its place. The horse turned around and donkey-kicked the guy between the fence posts, picked the guy up and throwing him several feet. The guy got up, limped to his truck and left while the rest of us were crying. I loved that horse… Always had a treat for it after that…

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Sad…

I see a pet as a family member. You have an obligation once you adopt them. I’ve had to give up a dog because of my young daughter, but I made sure it went to a good home…

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It was a female friends horse. It didn’t like males. It would act docile for a while until it saw a chance. I wasn’t the first to experience this outcome. These facts were not disclosed to me until AFTER the walk back to the barn. My friend got a kick out of it. Me, not so much.

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