retrobikes and wildlife

late evening ride with my pop last night (lets call it a bimble - i love that word. dont know its actual definition but it certainly feels right for this kind of ride.

anyway, bimbling along in the setting sun just getting use to the idea of not having any gears when all of a sudden a badger runs out of a field and straight out in front of me. i slammed on the anchors and started to endo (first ride on new brakes). luckily it vanished as quickly as it appeared and i neither hit it nor went over my bars.

it scarred the living bejesus out of me.

my mrs was gutted too - she was supposed to ride with us but decided against it at the last minute and she is desperate to see a badger in the wild.

anybody else have any bike related wildlife stories?

nearly ran into some deer once...

plenty of dogs chase me :evil:

I used to ride near Belvior castle when I was younger and there were a lot of Squirels in the woods. I once came round a corner on a very tight piece of singletrack and there was a Squirrel sat about 5 yards in front of me, it legged it along the path and just kept running about a metre in front of my wheel, I didnt slow down or stop cos I assumed it would dive off to one side but it just kept going for about 40 yards, it was pretty funny.

I also got chased through a field on my bike by about 20 cows, that was less amusing.

saw a badger run across a road once , it went head first into a kerb , got knocked back , sat a moment then carried on running . thats fooking tough

see plenty of sheep , cows , rabbits , pheasants etc . had a few squirells run infront of me , fooks me off that they dont just run to the side . i had to shout at one a few weeks ago "THE SIDE RUN TO THE FOOKIN SIDE!" and it did

ive had so shout "SQUIRELL BASTARD!" a few times when they appear mid corner and run out

badgers are double hard b'stards

Pheasant nearly took me out last year - flew up from the verge diagonally accross my path and graze my left cheek - whan a bloomin' fright :shock:

Hit a deer before that. Unfortunately for the deer I was in the landrover.

All the time!

Suicidal deer, rabbits, birds... all sorts.

Ironically, I even had to bunnyhop a rabbit once...

Evening/night time is the best to catch wildlife as they are used to the trails being theirs after hours.

I was riding through Parham Park estate (big country house at the foot of the South Downs) a few years ago, when a barn owl swooped out of a tree right next to my friend, glided in perfect time with us for about 30 metres and then pulled up into another tree. It was close enough to touch and was such an amazing feeling - we both got a bit of the Jo Burt style 'This is Why' from that ride...

Almost ran over a stoat and very fresh rabbit kill in the Sidlaw hills. Countless deer/fox/badger of course. I often choose my route according to the season and what I can expect/hope to see.
When I was a lad I used to do a 50m round trip to go birdwatching, so bike and wildlife go together for me.

I see loads of squirels at Kirroughtree, next time i see one im gonna shout squirel bastard at it for the banter
Had something hiss/scream at me from the side of a trail in the grass, fook knows what that was.

Had a big ass hare come bouncing out some woods and hop towards me, got about 5 meters then sat looking at me, then hopped off. Amazing moment.

In Glasgow, you see plenty of Neds, do they count?