# Coolest thing you have seen in the woods



## huntmore (Feb 7, 2011)

I was once deer hunting with dogs. I was put next to an old fence and had been sitting there for a while. I noticed something moving in the bushes, it was a covey of quail. They feed around for a little while and started to leave. One of the male bobs flew up and sat on one of the posts and watched the group wander off. He had been sitting there for about 3 or 4 min when a grey fox jumped and took him off the post. It was wild, I didn't even see the fox untill he had made his move. They where no more than 10 feet away. 

Lets hear yours!!!


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## Lukikus2 (Feb 7, 2011)

First coolest was two fawns playing tag with two hen turkeys. They were within thirty feet of me and played around like that for a good ten minutes before one of the turkey's had enough and tried to flog the fawns.
Second coolest. I was watching a steep mountain trail the deer usually used to come to the fields at night. A doe with three fawns in tag came were halfway down when the doe stopped and the fawns piled up behind her like dominoes. Now that was funny.


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## Wishin I was Fishin (Feb 7, 2011)

I watched a red tailed hawk pluck a running squirrel off a limb. That squirrel made a heck of a sound when it happened. 

Oh, another cool incident with a hawk was just last weekend! We were crow hunting, we shot one that got hung up in some vines, another red tail come in and snatched that sucker up. The crow was bigger and still a little lively so the hawk dropped him but it was still cool to watch him just swoop in seconds after the shot and grab it.


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## 242outdoors (Feb 7, 2011)

saw a big fox squirrel get trapped in a buried 5 gallon tin bucket. the bucket was turned on its side and buried with just enough lip open for the squirrel to crawl in. once inside he started bangin and beating the bucket. it went on for maybe 2 or 3 min until he squeezed back through and walked off calmy as if nothing happened.


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## Arrow Flinger (Feb 7, 2011)

The coolest thing I have ever seen in the woods is every sunup and sunset I have been blessed to see in the last 51 years!


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## scandmx5 (Feb 7, 2011)

a fighter jet out doing maneuvers. i know he saw my orange, i saw his helmet thats how low he got.


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## Shug (Feb 7, 2011)

Shot a dove once that a hawk caught before it hit the ground


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## godogs57 (Feb 7, 2011)

Had a hawg beat me to a dove I shot on a dove shoot....bought a lab after that....


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## deerbuster (Feb 7, 2011)

This year while we were duck hunting one of my buddies folded a duck and out of no where a Hawk or Owl came and swiped it out of the air. Needless to say everyone was stunned, we found the duck and it had a huge hole in it from the other bird. Crazyness!


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## Wishin I was Fishin (Feb 7, 2011)

scandmx5 said:


> a fighter jet out doing maneuvers. i know he saw my orange, i saw his helmet thats how low he got.


 

We see those alot down at our hunting land. I think we decided they come from Warner Robins most often. It's about a 4 minute flight for them.  They can do some amazing stuff, I just wish they were a touch quieter. 4 fighter jets running maneuvers at midnight isn't a pleasant thing when you are trying to sleep. I appreciate what they do, but they need to quiet it down at about 10pm.


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## Lukikus2 (Feb 7, 2011)

Arrow Flinger said:


> The coolest thing I have ever seen in the woods is every sunup and sunset I have been blessed to see in the last 51 years!



X2. That is what drives us. Amen brother.


```
242outdoors saw a big fox squirrel get trapped in a buried 5 gallon tin bucket. the bucket was turned on its side and buried with just enough lip open for the squirrel to crawl in. once inside he started bangin and beating the bucket. it went on for maybe 2 or 3 min until he squeezed back through and walked off calmy as if nothing happened.
```

And that had to be entertaining!


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## huntmore (Feb 7, 2011)

I like to watch the jets in action myself. I was hunting the edge of a clear cut in jefferson county. At about 9:00 a warthog came flying over at about 200 feet. I was in a tree about 30 feet up and waved at him as he went by. I didn't think he saw me. Then a little later he came back by and made a pass at my blazer on the dirt road. He banked it hard and was only about 100 feet away then he turned his head and waved at me. It was way cool. They were there every weekend for about a month. Someone told me they were from North Carolina and where flying to a dam in South Ga and used it for practice.


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## smessler34 (Feb 7, 2011)

once i hunted a wma here in central florida and "did'nt" see a single person the entire morning...yea you heard me right...no one walked up to my tree after seeing me a 100 yards out and asking me in plain voice if ive seen anything. then proceeding to walk into the beding area im watching. wearing obviosly the same pants and white sneakers he no doubt wore to wal mart and the gas station the night before !well not until 9:25 am ..then the yahoo patrol was in full swing. then my "still hunting stalker friend proceeds to come back and advise me that he didnt see anything and does'nt think the deer are moving and that he will be back this evening to see if he cant catch one feeding on the "whiteoaks"that everyone and there brother talk about on the edge of the swamp. yea the ones that quit dropping acorns during bow season....man im goin to the house.lol


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## Wishin I was Fishin (Feb 7, 2011)

huntmore said:


> I like to watch the jets in action myself. I was hunting the edge of a clear cut in jefferson county. At about 9:00 a warthog came flying over at about 200 feet. I was in a tree about 30 feet up and waved at him as he went by. I didn't think he saw me. Then a little later he came back by and made a pass at my blazer on the dirt road. He banked it hard and was only about 100 feet away then he turned his head and waved at me. It was way cool. They were there every weekend for about a month. Someone told me they were from North Carolina and where flying to a dam in South Ga and used it for practice.


 
We hunt in the corner of Washington, Jefferson, and Johnson counties. Probably the same fellers, but we see them pretty often.


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## HermanMerman (Feb 7, 2011)

I watched a couple of foxes hunt in a clearcut last year for about an hour. Eventually they flushed a rabbit and chased it into a brush pile but never dug it out. 

Two years ago I had an owl land on a dead snag no more than fifteen feet from me and study me or half the morning. He would fly off but comeback every ten minutes or so just to check on me. 

However, I gotta say that none of it compares to watching a big buck walk through the woods. It gets me every time.


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## Piggy06 (Feb 7, 2011)

I was hunting on a Savannah River oxbow when I heard something headed toward me. Hair on my neck stood up. Two otters come running by about 10 yds from me. I yelled at them , they stopped, stood up & looked at me for a few seconds and then were off thru the woods again.Pretty cool!


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## Nytrobud1 (Feb 7, 2011)

Wasnt hunting,but today on the way to Rome round 10:00am.I saw a dark coyote on the shoulder of hiway 20 gnawing on a road kill deer.Thats 4 in the last month I've saw in broad daylight standing just off the shoulder of a busy hiway.


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## huntmore (Feb 7, 2011)

Wishin I was Fishin said:


> We hunt in the corner of Washington, Jefferson, and Johnson counties. Probably the same fellers, but we see them pretty often.



I saw them over 20 years ago. Just south of Keysville about ten miles.


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## huntmore (Feb 8, 2011)

My brother inlaw was sitting about 20 yards from an oxbow of the savannaha river this year and after about 30 min he heard something coming through the cane break. He kept looking and could not see anything but to him it sounded like hogs. He kept looking as it got closer and closer then he saw them. It was a bunch of wood ducks about 20 walking along.


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## Wishin I was Fishin (Feb 8, 2011)

huntmore said:


> I saw them over 20 years ago. Just south of Keysville about ten miles.


 
Well, I reckon it is probably _not _the same ones.


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## chewy32 (Feb 8, 2011)

Had a skunk come nosing around me got probably 10-15 feet away as I was on the ground. Probably the stillist and quietist iv ever been.


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## Dr. Strangelove (Feb 8, 2011)

huntmore said:


> I like to watch the jets in action myself. I was hunting the edge of a clear cut in jefferson county. At about 9:00 a warthog came flying over at about 200 feet. I was in a tree about 30 feet up and waved at him as he went by. I didn't think he saw me. Then a little later he came back by and made a pass at my blazer on the dirt road. He banked it hard and was only about 100 feet away then he turned his head and waved at me. It was way cool. They were there every weekend for about a month. Someone told me they were from North Carolina and where flying to a dam in South Ga and used it for practice.



That's really cool.  I was heading to a fishing hole at dawn in the fog on Lake Keowee in SC when two F15's ripped down the center of the lake about treetop high, really got our attention.  They used to do simulated bombing runs against the nuclear facility there.

I lived in Cochran, GA in high school, about twenty miles south of the Robins AFB runways.  I saw many cool things, but once, I looked up and saw what looked like a pregnant 747.  A closer look and watching the news confirmed that the Space Shuttle carrier (The shuttle landed in CA in those days and was ferried to the east coast) had been forced to land at Robins due to weather.

Sadder note, at Myrtle Beach, SC, when I was a kid, watching the Navy picking up pieces of a fighter that had crashed just off the beach.  Ships were salvaging the bigger pieces, but all sorts of small fragments washed ashore.  

Weirdest thing ever:
I was hiking in NC, (lived there at the time) and saw something laying slightly off the trail.  I picked it up, it was a name-tag with my old college roommate's (from UGA)name on it! I gave it to my brother and he passed it along to the old roommate (both still lived in Athens) who just about freaked out!


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## 7Mag Hunter (Feb 8, 2011)

Just a few....

Just got settled in my climber for an afternoon hunt and squirted
a few sprays of doe urine into the wind to drift into a swamp
thicket off to my left.....About 20 mins later I see this Fox walking
on its hind legs toward me with his nose in the air smelling something !!!!  Guess at least he liked the doe urine....

Was OTG on the edge of a pine thicket l looking down at a creek
bottom and had a hawk land on a limb 10 ft away from me !!!!!
I had just used a rattle bag and I think he saw the movement
and came in for supper !!!!   He sat there 2-3 mins looking confused
and finally flew off.....

Found a red helium filled balloon hooked to a bush about 4' off the
ground deep into Paulding Forest....
Had a small sandwich bag tied to the string with a note inside !!!!
It was an invitation to a Baptist Church outside Birmingham Ala !!!!

Found my BIL stretched out under a dogwood tree fast asleep !!!!
Heard some shots from the area about a half hour earlier and we
agreed to help each other if we shot a deer.....
Scared me at first cause I thought someone had shot him, but
we laughed about it for years......


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## huntmore (Feb 8, 2011)

The first time I took my wife hunting we sat next to a creek. It was about 6 or 7 feet wide. We were sitting on a tree root and my legs were resting on a root that hung in the water. My wife noticed something in the water after about 30 min. She said it was coming towards us. I finally saw it was an otter hunting for dinner. He was going under roots in the creek and looking for crawfish. He got about 20 feet away went under some roots and came up with a crawfish. He swam up to the roots we were sitting on climbed up and got with in 2 feet of my boots when I decided he was close enough. So I leaned over and said hey. His reaction was comical. I am sure he didn't think so, he barked jumped in the water and swam away.


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## slip (Feb 8, 2011)

one of the coolest things i've seen in the woods, was a toad that sat on the top of my boot one morning turkey hunting. sat up there for aleast a half hour.

guess we were both hunting that morning.



Dr. Strangelove said:


> I lived in Cochran, GA in high school, about twenty miles south of the Robins AFB runways.  I saw many cool things, but once, I looked up and saw what looked like a pregnant 747.  A closer look and watching the news confirmed that the Space Shuttle carrier (The shuttle landed in CA in those days and was ferried to the east coast) had been forced to land at Robins due to weather.



i used to live near Eglin AFB and one time at the beach i saw that, told my dad (i was like 5 years old) "why is one plane giving the other plane a piggy-back ride?"

dad worked for the airlines, and the airpost shared run-ways with Eglin, so we got to watch it land and all that as long as we stayed behind the red line that had a sign, the sign said something along the lines of....cross this line and risk being shot.


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## pnome (Feb 8, 2011)

Watched a HUGE barred owl repeatedly dive in and try to catch a chipmunk one afternoon while deer hunting.   The owl had him trapped under a log, and every time the chipmunk would stick it's head out, the owl would swoop down.   The standoff was still going on when when I left.

Think I might have a picture of it around here somewhere...

I do...


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## snookdoctor (Feb 8, 2011)

I saw a cruise missile in Alapaha in 2006. It was close enough to tell exactly what it was. I don't know where it came from, or where it was going, but it buzzed by at about 200 feet, less that a quarter mile away.


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## Nooge (Feb 10, 2011)

Saw a hawk catch a dove in mid air by swooping in from above and behind. Also saw a timber rattler catch and swallow a cat squirrel that was digging around in the leaves.


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## mbhawkins123 (Feb 10, 2011)

whats a cat squirrel>?


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## dawg2 (Feb 10, 2011)

snookdoctor said:


> I saw a cruise missile in Alapaha in 2006. It was close enough to tell exactly what it was. I don't know where it came from, or where it was going, but it buzzed by at about 200 feet, less that a quarter mile away.



...do what???...


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## JustUs4All (Feb 10, 2011)

So far it is witnissing five generations of my family make a kill at the Farm.  Grandad - rabbit; Dad - quail & rabbits; me - quail, rabbits, and deer; Son - deer; Grandson - deer this year.


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## snookdoctor (Feb 11, 2011)

dawg2 said:


> ...do what???...



Exactly. I don't think they land very well. It must have been headed to a bombing range, or to the gulf or atlantic. Doesn't seem safe letting one of those fly across the U.S., but it was unmistakable.


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## Mike_SS (Feb 11, 2011)

JustUs4All said:


> So far it is witnissing five generations of my family make a kill at the Farm.  Grandad - rabbit; Dad - quail & rabbits; me - quail, rabbits, and deer; Son - deer; Grandson - deer this year.



This is the best post I've read in a year.  Congratulations to all involved!


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## slip (Feb 11, 2011)

snookdoctor said:


> Exactly. I don't think they land very well. It must have been headed to a bombing range, or to the gulf or atlantic. Doesn't seem safe letting one of those fly across the U.S., but it was unmistakable.



they did that at Eglin too. the Navy would shoot em from the gulf to the bombing range at Eglin.

it would make our windows rattle.


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## grunt0331 (Feb 11, 2011)

The last time I hunted with my Grandpa.  I turned to look as I was heading to my stand and he was sitting there with the most content, happy look on his face.  That is the way I remember him.


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## huntmore (Feb 11, 2011)

grunt0331 said:


> The last time I hunted with my Grandpa.  I turned to look as I was heading to my stand and he was sitting there with the most content, happy look on his face.  That is the way I remember him.



That is a goodun there.


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## 828deerslayer (Feb 11, 2011)

Myself my dad and my grandfather all dragging one out together off of public land in the mountains


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## Danny Roberts (Feb 12, 2011)

I was sitting in my climber in a WMA in Fl in early morning and thought it had begun sprinkling rain.  Looked up above and saw a squirrel on a limb above me urinating. Thought about shooting that sucker with my 30-30.  Not 5 mins. later another came on limb in front of me and did same.


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## jmerrell (Feb 13, 2011)

I watched a momma bobcat and her 3 kittens come out of some thick pines and poked around in a clear cut I was hunting.  They hung out in the open for about 20 minutes before heading back into the thick pines.  First time I have ever seen more than one bobcat at once.


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## WNC Seabee (Feb 14, 2011)

Out west on a mule deer hunt in Wyoming, I watched 2 bull moose fight it out in the middle of the rut.   I wasn't 150 yards away and could actually feel the vibrations when they crashed together.


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## Danny Roberts (Feb 14, 2011)

I was sitting in my climber on private property near Melrose, Fl several years ago and had a panther come running in and caught a squirrel and laid down within about 50 feet of me clearly open to me and ate it, got up and walked away where he came from.  GW said there were no panthers in that area but refused to come look at tracks and sign I protected.  Within weeks a panther (cougar) was trapped just short distance away near Waldo , Fl.  No panthers in the area? Go figure!!


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## GONoob (Feb 14, 2011)

I always enjoy seeing rusted cars in the middle of no where


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## huntmore (Feb 15, 2011)

GONoob said:


> I always enjoy seeing rusted cars in the middle of no where



Aliens.


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## RipperIII (Feb 15, 2011)

I was doing a little stalking this year during a wet over cast day.
My plan was to move through a HDW draw towards a food plot, find a nice place to sit and see what showed up.
I picked a spot about 20yds off of the plot along a dirt road, sat on a stump and waited.
A flock a turkey hens came into the plot, 15 birds including 6 poults, they fed, froliced and fought for about 20 minutes, then began to move toward the road...and me.
My boot was sticking out just on the edge of the road.
Those hens got to with in 5 yds of me and the poults were scratching and pecking the road just inches from my boot.
I had on my hunter orange vest, and I guess the mature hens saw it, they would not continue up the road, they just turned and slowly melted into the woods with the younguns in tow.


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## RipperIII (Feb 15, 2011)

My avatar shows a 16'+ gator with it's fresh killed doe.
Took that picture with my camera phone on lake eufaula while bass fishing two summers ago.
Our boat actually floated over the gator, it submerged with out the doe, and after we had drifted off a few yards, the gator came back up, snatched the doe and did a "death roll"...awesome!


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## llanier44 (Feb 15, 2011)

My list is long...seems I see something neat everytime out. However, the best is probably when my brother and I were fishing topwater lures in a farm pond.  An owl started swooping down trying to catch our lures!  We quit (didn't want to hook him) for a while and then started back on another part of the pond.  That owl came out of no where, snatched my brother's lure and landed in a tree!  He finally dropped it in the water, we reeled it in and quit for the day.  My grandmother died still thinking we were spinning a yarn.


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## goastinstructor (Feb 16, 2011)

I once watched a doe when i was upside down... I was 16 and hunting a climber with a mesh seat..(I wont name the brand) but it was on a tree way to big so it was lacking bout 5 ft when i went as low as i could.  It was 10am and i was done so i climbed down and jumped out, my foot caught the mesh and there i was a doe walked out just before my dad came up the road... I swear she was mocking me dangling like a christmas tree decoration.


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## kmaxwell3 (Feb 16, 2011)

My 4yr old son with a smile on his face standing by an 8pt I shot will he was with me.


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## Lukikus2 (Feb 16, 2011)

goastinstructor said:


> I once watched a doe when i was upside down... I was 16 and hunting a climber with a mesh seat..(I wont name the brand) but it was on a tree way to big so it was lacking bout 5 ft when i went as low as i could.  It was 10am and i was done so i climbed down and jumped out, my foot caught the mesh and there i was a doe walked out just before my dad came up the road... I swear she was mocking me dangling like a christmas tree decoration.



Glad your still with us. Man that had to be hairy

I was once tree'd by a pack of hogs when I was twelve and out dove hunting. Twenty minutes of my life I will never forget.


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## coolbreezeroho (Feb 16, 2011)

Watching a heavy fog bank roll in .........


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## Ihunt (Feb 18, 2011)

My wife and I were sitting deer hunting and we watched a bobcat walk into the field. A short time later he chased a squirrelall the way to the top off a tree. The squirrel barely beat the bobcat to the top. The top of the tree had a hollow spot that the squirrel ran into. The bobcat stuck his paws into it trying to get the squirrel. After a few minutes the bobcat gave up and climbed back down to the last limb on the tree. The limb was parrallel (sp) with the ground. When we left at dark he was still sitting there.


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## win280 (Feb 18, 2011)

In my younger days of mountain WMA hunting I found and took back to camp someones " sipping water".That was a fun trip. I did leave him a $5.00 bill.


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## Big7 (Feb 18, 2011)

scandmx5 said:


> a fighter jet out doing maneuvers. i know he saw my orange, i saw his helmet thats how low he got.



Similar to that happened to me in Jefferson County a couple
years back.

We were used to seeing the F-16's simulate "dog-fights"
over the wide open sky, high above.

One morning one came down just about to tree top level.
Right over the top of my head.
They can't go supersonic over land but he was hauling tail.

It happened so fast, by the time I heard him and he made the pass... he was GONE! 

     I'll never forget that one.


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## Maduro on Point (Feb 21, 2011)

Coolest thing I saw in the woods was a huge Snow Owl picking mice out of the snow like they were popcorn. This was in Alpena Michigan and we were in just a thin (25-30 yards) wide strip of woods between corn fields and he would swing down talons out punch through the ice crusted snow and snatch out a mouse fly up to a hollowed out tree dip inside and a couple minutes later he was back out to sit on a branch before doing it again. We must have watched him for an hour or so and he took 4-5 mice.


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## Dr. Strangelove (Feb 23, 2011)

Big7 said:


> Similar to that happened to me in Jefferson County a couple
> years back.
> 
> We were used to seeing the F-16's simulate "dog-fights"
> ...



They aren't _supposed to_, but if you've ever spent any time in Cochran, GA ('bout 20 miles south of the Robins AFB flightline) you'll wonder what all those "big booms" are....


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## Deerhead (Feb 23, 2011)

I watched a juvenile fox chase a rabbit as mom and dad fox kept the rabbit within the vicinity.  This went on for an hour.


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## Bucky T (Feb 23, 2011)

Wow...  This is a tough one.

But...  This one is still pretty fresh in my mind from last deer season.

On opening weekend of bow season, I witnessed a momma bobcat bring some breakfast to her half grown kitten.

I saw her walking up with a field rat.  I noticed the rat was still kicking and alive.

She walked into a thicket of blackberry briers out in front of me.  30yds or so.  She got into an opening in the blackberries and sat down.  Moments later the kitten came into view and started swatting at the rat in its mothers mouth.  The mother let it go and the kitten pounced all over the rat, chased it down, threw it in the air, and eventually killed it and laid there swatting it around.  

Looked just like a house cat playing with it's favorite toy in the house.

It was a pretty cool experience to say the least.


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## Nicodemus (Feb 23, 2011)

Watchin` an eagle hover over a flock of coots, till they panicked and got in a tight group. Then she dove into the midst of them and hit one on the water. She was even considerate enough to fly up into a big pine, close enough that I could still see her while she ate.


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## Washington95 (Feb 23, 2011)

On two occasions fawns bedded down 15-20 yards from my climber.

On another, when returning to pick up my son Keith (age about maybe 14 then?) from a hunting stand he was sitting on edge of road looking at something on the bank (about 2 feet higher than road). He was only couple of feet from the bank.  When I got closer, found it was a large jumping spider.  Spider (and Keith) both examining other closely.


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## dick7.62 (Feb 24, 2011)

Big7 said:


> They can't go supersonic over land but he was hauling tail.



We hear sonic booms amost every day in central Georgia.  One almost shook me out of my recliner 10 minutes ago.  They started allowing supersonic flights over land again after 9-11.  These are mostly F-15's that are repaired at Robins AFB and then test flown.


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## florida boy (Feb 26, 2011)

Once had a Redtail swoop down and grab my facemask while sitting by a tree turkey hunting . He came in from behind me ....guess he seen a piece of my head moving and thought I was a squirrel from that angle . I about had to go get another pair of underware ! 
       In the early part of rifle season on our current lease the cropdusters have fun trying to suck my hat off on low passes going and coming from a nearby landing strip . The tree I climb is a lone pine left on top of a clearcut hill . You can smell the exhaust in the air once they pass by .


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## Old Winchesters (Feb 26, 2011)

Found 6 guns (2 shotguns and 4 rifles)mostly rusted out barrels and receivers but 2 still had parts of the stocks all around one huge oak tree on an island that is surrounded by swamp in Pike co.  1 was still partially wedged in the tree and is what caught my eye. The others were partially to mostly buried but were all obviously propped against that tree at some point. I'll never forget that, I showed my hunting partner and we propped them all back against the tree and decided to leave them right there. That was about 10 years ago.


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## jguffie (Feb 27, 2011)

one morning i was deer hunting and heard a crow make the worst sound in the world...then i looked and it was falling out of the sky and it 2 or 3 limbs on the way down...then about 10 mins later it got up and flew off


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## Diesel-7.3 (Feb 27, 2011)

Came out of the woods one night and walked up on a truck pulled off on the dirt road I hunt on, I had my head lamp on and when I walked up on the truck a girl jumped up with no top on (she was rather atractive to my suprise) all I saw was her very nice, well  she didnt seem to be to concerned as she looked for her top, as her male partner sat up (they were in the bed of the truck) I quickly realized what they were doing....., I said, dont mind me Im just passin by, I wish I had the camera phone ready.... oh well, I get a laugh every time I hunt that spot


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## thomas the redneck (Feb 27, 2011)

nothing as cool as some of this stuff but did have a guy cross the fence and use a climber stand and climb up two trees over from me
he didnt like me after it got daylight


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## LRanger007 (Feb 27, 2011)

About 20 years ago, I was deer hunting on a cold December 28th.  I kept hearing a clicking sound coming from a privet hedge thicket around daylight. At 8:00, the woods exploded with an 8 pointer, 6 pointer , 4 pointer and a spike that were all fighting.  I shot the 8 and 6 pointers and had to run off the 4 point and spike after I climbed out of my stand.  They were still hitting the big deer like they were still fighting.


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## huntmore (Feb 28, 2011)

Went elk hunting in New Mexico in 1997. I was walking up a wash steeping on rocks to be quiet. It was about 4 in the morning and dark. All I had for a light was a aa mag light with a red lens on it. I had to look down while walking so i wouldn't trip and break an ankle. Well half way up the mountain I figure out there is something at about 10 feet away so I look up. It is a black bear and he notices me about the same time. He stands up and lets out a loud woof spins and runs up the mountain woofing as he goes. Bears have very bad breath.


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## simpleman30 (Mar 2, 2011)

saw the jets flying LOW on approach to the Townsend Bombing Range many times this deer season.  at times it looked like they were going to crash into the pines.  

down at Lake George in Florida, i had an owl fly from dock to dock, parallel to us down the canal we were fishing.  i tossed a throw-back bream or warmouth on the bow of the boat and the tips of the owl's wings brushed my hat as he landed 2 feet away for a free snack!  he sat there for a couple of seconds and then flew up into a tree.  he was back within a half-hour for more.


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## max4hunterof thunderbay (Mar 5, 2011)

Heres one. Opening day of rifle 2010 i was at my family cottage, and woke up around 5am. We usually put a 5gal bucket of corn out to feed the animals so the first thing i do when i wake up is turn the outside light on and have a look. Nothing but a single cottontail, it stood there for a minute and took about 5 hops and a hored owl swooped down and got it on the spot. I waited about 5 minutes and stepped out on the porch for a smoke, the owl took off and left to rabbit, i went to inspect the scene to find the rabbit mostly intact, just a small bite taken out behind the neck, so, i picked it up and put it next to the porch to clean and put it in the freezer later. After an uneventful day of hunting I just did not feel like cleaning the rabbit, so it put it back in the woods for the critters to claim, and a opposum did, it tore it up for about 15-20 mins, i got bored so i went back to the front room to watch some persuit channel. A short while later i looked out the back door, and there stood i believe the same owl with the hairless tail of the opposum flailing beneath its talons. Great experience of nature for me. I guess the owl got a 2fer


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## flip0302 (Mar 5, 2011)

Was invited to deer hunt with a buddy on Merril mountain over in Alabama.
I got there too late in the afternoon to put a stand up for the next morning and ny buddy told me, dont worry I will take you in and show you a place to wrap your stand around a tree.
It made it kind of special, we went in pitch black and I watched a strange place to me unravel at daylight. I dont think I will ever see anything like it. At daylight, there were many noises of suirrels, even saw a small family of coons about 30 yards from the tree.
But then the woods went completly silent. The sun was cutting through the trees abd it was beautiful on side of that mountain. Then it happened, there was and AMERICAN EAGLE that was gliding through the mast of the trees and eventually got low enough that he was just under the limb line. The wing span I will never forget but what I will remember most was how slow it looked like he was moving, left me wondering how he stayed in the air.
He made two passes that morning and both times there was a silence in the woods that was unbelievable.
I know this was long but you would have had to be there to understand. 
There truly is something majestic about the great bird that is our symbol.

Actually took a decent Bama eight pointer out oif that tree the following evening after passing up two smaller bucks.


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## Denny2277 (Mar 5, 2011)

I watched a four point one year that had a little bird that kept landing on his antlers. He would shake his head annoyed, the bird would fly around a few seconds and land again. This happened over and over until the little buck wondered out of the food plot bird still in tow.


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## weekender (Mar 7, 2011)

What a great thread. Some really awesome sightings. I have several that I remember well. Two bears mating straight under my stand that was only 10ft high. A screach owl that landed less than a foot from my face and turned his head in every imaginable angle looking at my head I guess trying to figure what I was. A 42" copper head that crawled up to my tree and coiled up right where I would have stepped off the stand. A shiras moose in CO one morning at daylight, my wife and I were taking his picture and everytime the flash went off the moose came closer, at 10 yards my wife said "I think we have enough pictures".


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## Lukikus2 (Mar 7, 2011)

[/QUOTE]

Ain't none of that cool! The stories, yes. That demon on the ground. NO!


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## ADB (Mar 8, 2011)

I was probably 8 yrs old crappie fishing one night on lake oconee with my dad and granddaddy. I got tired and fell asleep on the front of the pontoon only to be awaken 30 minutes or so later to the blast of a .410 shotgun.... After a few minutes of catching my breath and throwing away my undershorts I heard my granddaddy say, "Ain't no snake getting in my boat".... I miss that man......


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## deerhunter388 (Mar 8, 2011)

not really in the woods but..I was sitting on my back porch on Lake Oconee and I watched a bald eagle do a dive off of a nearby tree, he got a good 2-3lb  carp and took it  a couple hundred yards away flew up in a big pine and ate it. I watched the whole thing through binoculars it was pretty cool.


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## weekender (Mar 8, 2011)

bald eagles are a thing of beauty, and seeing one catch a live fish is one of lifes amazing treats to me. Something most folks never get to experience. I can imagine the binos brought it up close and personal 388.


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## ADB (Mar 9, 2011)

We cut the hounds loose one night about 10 years ago after old ringtail and noticed they got out of the country pretty quick. So we got in the truck and drove around to the direction that the Tracking unit said they were heading. We circled in front of them and got out and walked from the field maybe 20 yards in a harwood holler when we noticted the dogs coming staight for us but still out about 200 yards  or so. I leaned up against a tree and got comfortable so i could listen to the music and noticed they were literally headed right for us. Wasn't but a few seconds when one of the dogs hit the same tree i was leaning against and just about knocked me down. I was about to get up and show him who was boss (because we thought they were playing around) when my buddy shined his light up the tree and saw the coons eyes. We let them tree for a while while we petted them up good. What are the chances of that happening again?? One of the coolest nights in the woods for me.


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## Son (Mar 9, 2011)

You'll wouldn't believe it if I told ya. So i'll just tell ya'll what I saw last week. While out on the dock, I watched a bald eagle and an osprey do battle in the air for over ten minutes. The osprey finally escaped.


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## BigBrett (Mar 9, 2011)

4 generations squirrel huntin. grandeddy, deddy, myself, and my son. coolest thing i have seen or done and i have been very blessed in my huntin and fishin experiences. grandeddy passed less than six months later...my son still says "remember when we all went squirrell huntin with pa?"


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## fishfryer (Mar 10, 2011)

If you keep at it, you could be pa,oneday.


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## willy57 (Mar 10, 2011)

while hog hunting hickory mound wma a few yrs back had 5 hogdogs on the ground dogs would snatch up any hog any size no problem dogs left out and the bay was on i ran to bay and in thick palmettos it was on but soon i realized something wasnt right i was seeing dogs flying in the air hollering and carrying on then all of a sudden i saw what it was ,a big full grown otter the score was otter 1, 5 hogdogs 0 wouldnt have believed it if i hadnt seen it.


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## willy57 (Mar 10, 2011)

watching a Bald eagle take a mullet from a osprey is even better the eagle wouldnt be denied.


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## Lukikus2 (Mar 10, 2011)

A friend of mine and me went running his coon dogs on the edge of the Tennessee River one night. He had eight coon dogs and they treed a big ole sow in no time. We weren't carrying a gun just running the dogs. Well we started squalling at the coon and throwing sticks up in the tree at it. It had enough of us, came walking straight down the tree about 4 feet up from the dogs, looked at them and jumped right in the middle. It was total kaos for about 30 seconds and then it was gone. It headed to the river bank and never was seen again. That was one bad coon.


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## lugnutz (Mar 15, 2011)

I was walking out from an AM sit deer hunting and decided to sit down and make a few grunt calls in a active area. I sat for a little while when a hawk lit in a tree about 100 yds from me. I started flicking my gloved finger on a nearby briar bush and the hawk immediately picked up the noise and zoned in,  so I kept on flickin my finger. The hawk took flight and was coming straight for me and I could see the tallons stretching out when i was going to duck out of the way, the hawk saw me move and cut hard left and flew away.


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## 1phast340 (Mar 18, 2011)

I watched two Gopher Turtles that came face to face on a trail fight it out. they would take turnsbacking up and ramming into each other.I watched for about 10 minutes,but had to leave,always wondered WHAT decided the winner? laughed so hard my stomach hurt.


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## huntmore (Mar 28, 2011)

Turtles fighting now I really have heard it all.


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## BuckinFish (Nov 3, 2015)

Great thread, worth a ttt...4 years later...


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## bulldawgborn (Nov 6, 2015)

I really enjoyed all of these stories.  I have a few to add myself.  All of mine involve grey fox.

I saw the first bobcat of my life come out of some hardwoods into a pasture and lock in on something at the opposite corner.  With an eagerness that came from my young age, I wanted to shoot him but couldn't get a clean shot.  I'm glad I didn't.  He ran to the opposite corner of the field and rousted a grey fox up that I couldn't see to start with.  They go off into the woods and a skirmish ensued.  You could hear the cat screaming and the fox barking or whatever it is they do that sounds like them hacking up a fur ball.  After less than a minute, I was surprised to see the bobcat bust out of the woods with a bird in his mouth and 2 grey foxes in hot pursuit.  I guess he went in there and took their meal.  Also saw a barred owl land in the pine next to me and do the ole headturn that evening.

On the last day of the season one year, I got in my climber about noon with plans to hunt until dark (in the same area from the encounter above).  About an hour before dark, I stand up to rest the hindquarters and see a grey fox slipping in behind me.  My dad had asked me to shoot a few because they kept getting his chickens.  I shot the fox and musta made a bad shot because he ran and fell in the same row of pines I was climbed up in.  He started crying and bellering, and I was feeling extremely sorry that I had wounded him and couldn't get a follow up shot.  He quit hollering and I could hear something moving in the hardwoods not too far from where I last heard him.  I thought it was him crawling towards the creek to die.  All of a sudden from the last place I heard him cry, something big and black took off loping through the hardwoods knocking bushes out the way as it went.  I climbed down and went to where the fox should've been, found blood, but no fox.  I couldn't figure out what just happened until I talked to one of my wildlife professors a couple days later.  He said given my proximity to the Ocmulgee population, that he thought it had to be a juvenile bear that was dispersing and heard a free meal.  I talked to my BNL who lived less than a half mile away, and he said something had come the night before and dragged a full rubbermaid trash can with the lid on out of his backyard and about 75 yards to the woods.

The last one was when I watched a grey fox take my neighbor's biscuit eaters on a chase around my deer stand.  He ran em in about 3 or 4 big loops around my area, and then hopped up in a wax myrtle.  I couldn't see it clearly because it was nearly dark by the time this all happened, but I got a chuckle out of thinking about that fox outsmarting those dogs.  They sniffed around the bush for a minute and then went back home.


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## Farm Club (Nov 27, 2015)

I watched a hawk catch a rabbit in a cut corn field and had a flying squirrel land right above my head in a tree stand, came down looked me in the eye and flew off. And Im with Arrow Slinger I have seen some magnificent sunrises and sunsets. Our God is an awesome God!


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## rvick (Nov 28, 2015)

Three of us were leashing the dog at the truck to track a wounded buck. As we stood 20 yards from the trail, a 4 point came out if the woods 100 yards away and walked up to us and started following the wounded buck's trail. We fell in behind an when we got to the river we found a drop of blood but decided to call off the track as non-fatal. The hunter wanted to cross the chest deep river just to see if the buck may have bedded on the other bank as they sometimes do. We watched him cross and on the other side we saw him raise his rifle. He then called out "it's the 4 point" still following the blood trail. Guess we should have leashed him up.


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## Deerhead (Dec 4, 2015)

I was deer hunting.  Sitting on the ground with my back up against a tree, on the side of a small hill which overlooked a creek bottom.  I had my legs bent  up and my gun resting on my knee. Around 7:30am a saw movement at the 11:00 O’clock position.   I darted my eyes over and noticed something approaching FAST.  I raised my rifle pointing it at the fast approaching objected and DUCKED.  I was a hawk.  He just buzzed my head missing me by inches.  He never heard a sound.


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## nmurph (Dec 5, 2015)

Every time we go by a particular ladder stand that has been on the same tree for more than a decade, my brother tells how a hawk landed on a limb less than a foot away from his head. He has told the story the same way every time so I tend to believe him. 

I've watched a buck breed a doe multiple times over the span of more than an hour. 

I've had a bobcat use the base of the tree I was in as a scratching post.

One time I had a doe come trotting up underneath my tree. She stood there, head down, an looking back where she had come from. I was expecting a buck but was surprised by a coyote. He ran up to her and they started circling. He would try to get close and she would put her head down and run at him. I watched this go on for 30 seconds or so. I finally noticed she had a fresh patch of skin missing from her front shoulder. The 'yote had managed to rip off a hand sized chunk. I finally had enough and dropped the coyote. The doe looked down at him, sniffed him, and trotted off. I could only imagine how studley she must have felt!

A month or so ago, I picked my son and a neighbor/buddy up from school. There's a county-owned pond just down the road from the school. As we got near the pond, I see an Osprey with something in his talons. We slow down as the hawk slowly turns and heads down the highway, barely able to maintain altitude. We could all make out the clear outline of a bass, jaws agape (probably a 4-5lb bass). The Osprey followed the road for more than a 1/4 mile bf he slowly headed over a cotton field. The whole scene was very surreal, like a Billy the Bigmouth Bass with wings.


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