People Are Sharing Tales About the Most Terrifying Animals Encounters They've Ever Had

Venomous snake removal. Got a call to a 3 foot Eastern Brown snake under a horse water trough, and standard scenario is most snakes end up being smaller normally than as per described... God dam, i went out into the horse paddock adjacent to the house found the water trough, rolled it sideways to have a look under and out shot a genuine monster of a brown snake havin' a bad day.

After a split second thought of "f%& thats big!!", instinct kicked in to grab the tail first chance had and next second I have this bloody thing coming at head height maybe 10inches away mouth open! Big brown can bounce around and when i crouched to grab him he reacted, and used the water trough to sort of accidentally bounce off and gain some more height to his strike...lol At this stage i decided the best course of action was defence so whacked him away with only thing had, snake hook (modified shortened golf club with u shaped hook) and made him even angrier and snappier....Good times,lol

By this stage the safest option was to release the hold on him and re establish it once made a bee line for cover, the bloody house. In between the house and paddock is a fence so i hop that in a flash to find the snake in rapid motion moving towards the house and the owner standing at edge of house with a lawn rake smashing it down on the ground as the snake approaches!!!...

I start yelling "dont hit it, dont hit it" while running at the snake trying to beat it to under the rake or house....While running the brain says gotta get him to turn back to me, so i wisely stand on the tip of his tail best i could and sure enough he swung around like a whip and was focused on me again thank christ...

I managed to dodge him for a few (sphincter tightening) minutes and get his tail again so everything seemed good to go for pinning him and getting a proper hold on him. While holding the tail i pin him as practical as possible at that time and only manage to get him halfway up the body...

I then found out the 3foot long snake hook i had used is way to short for the job and now have palm,fingers outstretched trying to push down on the hook with my palm. With this snappin mad (2nd most venomous) snake on the planet within maybe 2-3inches of my hand and fingers on the hook striking and swinging wildly....again,

Good times.. I thought about it for second and realise if gently placed my foot on his head region i could restrain his movements more, let go of hook (brown has small fang so was pretty safe to do wouldnt bite thru boot) and then get a good hold behind his head and bag him.

I managed to get a hold behind head after few seconds of trying and get other hand on body so now had full control...Still fightin but under control i could now think.... And remember the snake bags in the car allready had couple tiger snakes in them and how do i ask this home owner to change them around to give me a empty snake bag...If i put the snake down to do it I'm back to square one really so i decided to ask him for a pillow case if had one and use that...

I contemplated asking him to hold the pillow case open cause both my hands were still fightin with the mad assed brown. But common sense kicked in and realised that was too dangerous too ask him..lol So i eventually hold the bag on ground with one foot, try open it with the hand holding the body, wrangle this thing in bum end first and lower him down inside... closed the bag around my wrist holding the head and in one action attempt to throw his head down and rip my hand out at same time...after a few minutes i had him in and tied off....

The home owner and kids just had a look of shock on their faces offering thanks during pack up, I could now start breathing again and the snake was hissin and having a fit in the bag as we said goodbyes. I collected my $20payment and went on my way... later that day on drive to release him, i called into a vet to weigh/ measure the snake as knew he was above average for a brown snake....2.8kgs and 195cm!!!!

Hot unhappy Brown snakes=hand grenade with scales..lol ;)

Username: dogboy1973

I've answered a similar question on a different thread, so sorry if you've read it before. I was in the Air Force in 2016, a young, green Airman. I grew up in the Northeast US, so I thought I was pretty decently used to extreme wildlife like bears, fisher cats, and moose.

That belief went thoroughly out the door after this incident. On a cool, damp September morning at an ungodly 3:45 AM my unit was assembled by the gator infested woods at the back of the installation for our biannual night vision goggle certification. One of the sergeants also had the FLIR (thermal imager) which we took turns handling.

Before I got a chance to don the NVGs, the senior Airmen had decided to play a prank on one of the sergeants in good faith- they stashed a clown mask before the test started and jump scared one of the sergeants (many laughs were had, we were trying to keep morale up in face of the cold wet morning). The NVG test was simple the way we administered it. We broke up our small office into groups of 3- an airman, a senior Airman and a sergeant.

The senior Airman stands at one end of a designated deer trail in the woods. The trail is about a half mile long, and you can sort of see to the end but not well with the naked eye.The Airman puts on their NVGs and navigates through the uneven forest ground to meet the Sr. Airman. Sr. Airman puts on goggles, hikes back to sergeant, sergeant hikes out to the Airman, every gets certified and goes home to shower. Now, since the path was narrow and uneven and there were known alligators in this section of woods, we went one group at a time. Group 1 went, they pranked the sergeant, started over and passed.

Group 2 passed no issues. My group is group 3, and I'm impatient to get a move on since the sun would be rising in under an hour and I was not interested in the fallout of having to come back at 3:45 AM AGAIN the next day. Group 3 is Sr. Airman Q, Sergeant BW and Airman me. Sr. Airman Q hops on her ATV and zips along the back road to the other end of the path. As the lowest ranking, I'm the first to go for our group. I'm not great at using NVGs to begin with since the color scheme gives me a head ache but my goggles (since I wear glasses) were also fogged from my heavy breathing. The path we had to navigate was uneven, muddy in places and criss crossed with fallen limbs.

I was focusing entirely on not rolling my ankles when I saw movement to my right, off the side of the path. Thinking that my coworkers were trying to get me with the clown mask too, I foolishly called out "Nice try!" But the rest of my taunt was cut off. Sergeant BW had tackled me to the mud, his tactically gloved hand pressed over my mouth.

I struggled, confused, but stopped when he went "SHHHH!" and pulled the FLIR out to show me what had happened. He dumped a few handfuls of wet leaf matter over my head as he panned the thermal camera from side to side.

The movement I had seen to my right, which I had thought was my coworkers, was in fact a litter of piglets. At first I didn't recognize the reddish purple heat signatures... until Sergeant BW aimed the FLIR at the movement to my left that I hadn't seen. And the unmistakable shape of a roughly 200lb pig came into focus as the Mother Pig trundled across the path, following her young. She paused for a moment about 60 feet from where Sergeant BW and I were now laying flat on our stomachs covered in decaying leaves.

He quietly reached down and readied his flare... but Mother Pig moved on. After what felt like a lifetime, Sergeant BW gave me the hand signal to move. I made it to the end of the NVG course with him covering me to ensure there wasn't a whole sounder of pigs, and as soon as he could stamp my certificate we bolted out of there.

The other 2 sergeants had already headed back, and we got a bunch of shit for taking so long. Once they heard why they made a point of telling me I was lucky to be alive, since few people walk between a Mother Pig and her piglets and live to tell the tale. The Senior Airman who was part of our group was disappointed in not getting to see "cute little piggies".

Username: CaffeinatedHBIC

Ohh finally something I can answer, although I'm a little late now.

So I grew up in Bremerton, Washington, which is on the kitsap peninsula (the thing that sticks out on the northwest side of the state). My best friend from school at the time lived up on this small mountain/large hill called green mountain. I would go up to his house on some weekends and he, his brother, and I would go out into the woods together and mess around like kids do.

We had trails all through the probably hundreds of acres of woods that we would follow. We had multiple little "base camps" that we had set up which were pretty much just little clearings in the forest where there was a campfire spot in the middle with logs around it to work as benches. I was around 8 at the time, so this was in like 2007.

Anyways, now that you've got the idea of where we are, here's the story of the animal encounter. One day we were playing fantasy Star Wars. This was when episode iii: revenge of the sith was fairly new, so the prequel hype was a big thing.

We were acting as if order 66 had just been executed, and my friend and I were Jedi. His big brother was anakin/Vader, and his goal was to find the remaining Jedi (us) and exterminate them. We all picked up the "lightsaber" (just a big stick) of our choice and split up to try and hide from vaders wrath. About 10 minutes into the hunt, we're all by ourselves in the woods, I hear something along the lines of [this](https://youtu.be/UE7YOJVSoIs).

We all knew of the possibility of really two dangerous animals on that mountain, brown bears and mountain lions, but that didn't stop us from playing. Though when I heard this noise, this loudly, as an 8 year old, by myself in the middle of the woods, it terrified me. My first reaction was to break down and cry, very loudly, and uncontrollably. [Bad idea](https://youtu.be/ywsaNKJF_2I?t=33s).

You get the idea. I cry, it hears me, the woods go silent, besides my sobs. At this point I was a smart enough kid to understand that I was likely being hunted. Still crying, because I can't make myself stop, i start running up the trail back towards their house, and that's when I run into my friend and his brother, who were both looking for me because my friend had already been "exterminated."

They're messing around and trying to challenge me to a lightsaber duel, and somehow through my sobs I manage to squeeze out that there's a mountain lion and we need to go back to the house which is just a couple hundred yards away at this point. We all run as fast as we can and make it to the house safe and sound. We run up the porch stairs, go in the front door, run into the kitchen and look out the window.

The mountain lion was literally at the base of the porch stairs. It had been following us probably within 50-100 feet behind us the whole time. I don't know if it was playing with its food or what, but I do know two things, that it was hunting us, and it could have grabbed any of the three of us at any point if it wanted to, and with the size of that thing, there's nothing any of us could have done about it.

We had returned to our shenanigans on the hill by the next weekend. I have no idea why in the hell my friends parents let us be out there by ourselves.

We didn't even have walkie-talkies, so if any of us had anything happen to us, it would have been over for us, who knows how long it would have taken for someone to find us. It was a bad situation in general, and I feel like I'm lucky to be alive not just from the specific encounter in this story, but from all these years we spent playing out there.

Username: optimegaming

Sharks are amazing creatures. Literally one of the oldest, most adapted species to their environment. I have always loved sharks since I was a little kid, in part from when Shark Week on Discovery Channel was actually good and informative.

So when I went to visit South Africa, there was only one thing I knew I *must* accomplish. I absolutely had to go on a Great White Shark cage dive. First off, I have to say that the cages seem incredibly trustworthy and solid. I never once worried about any danger from the sharks "getting in" or anything. The way shark cage dives usually work now is the cage is attached to the boat anchored off the coast.

Customers get in the cage, about 8 at a time, shoulder to shoulder, wearing a wet suit, and a mask. No snorkel or scuba gear. The top of the cage is about 2 or 3 ft. above the surface of the water, so you float there, and then hold your breath and descend under to watch the sharks as they go by.

The employees chum the water to draw sharks near, and then use a line of bait or a seal decoy to "reel" the sharks close in, and then turn sharply along side the cage. Think of it like pulling string in front of a cat. They lunge for it. When they are about to "reel" the sharks by the cage, they will yell at all the people in the cage to go down and watch. If you're lucky, most of the shark will be in view for MAYBE 1.5 seconds, and then it will be gone.

Even so, there is something so eerie and frightening about being in an environment where you are no longer the apex predator anymore. You can look down into the water, and see the bottom of the cage beneath you, and through that, just a very dark blue-green. And you know they're down there. You've already seen their fins from the boat, so you know they are around you. You just don't know where.

On the trip, there were so many incredible encounters, and most were truly awesome. But for the purposes of this question, there are some that were genuinely terrifying. The first was when one of the younger males was coming for the bait, and we went down to watch. I had seen this guy before, he had been around the cage for about 10 minutes now.

As I put my head under the water, the **very first thing** I saw was jaws. Rows of teeth swimming directly at me. And without any control over my body, I let out a completely uncontrolled, primal scream. I had no conscious effort, my lizard brain took over. It was just so entertaining looking back on it, how *completely* involuntary my scream was.

The second was when one of the large females chased the bait that one of the employees was not pulling fast enough. Shark cage dive companies are not supposed to feed the sharks, and they are supposed to keep the bait just out of reach of sharks that they are viewing. However, I guess this one female surprised everyone with how fast she actually was.

While lunging at the bait, everyone went down under to watch. But we didnt realize the female had actually got a hold of the bait. As we came under water, the female yanked the bait with her at a sharp, almost 90º angle. But because of the momentum she had already built up chasing the bait, the sharp turn caused her to crash into the cage we were all in. Basically, a 2100lb swimming rocket did a hockey stop into the cage we were watching from.

There was an enormous **BOOM**. The force of the water alone pressed everyone inside into the back of the cage. But she still had the bait in her mouth, and still wanted it. So after the hockey stop, she thrashed against the cage, attempting to rip the bait off the line.

Since I was near one of the ends of the cages, I was almost directly in front of the massive tail that repeatedly slammed into the cage about four more times. Not as loud as the original impact, but still unbelievably loud. I think the entire event lasted less than 4 seconds. And after that, she was gone again.

Username: Boofer_C

At Havasu Falls in Arizona. It's a beautiful location, but access is controlled by the village of Supai, which is 8 miles into the canyon. You must pass the village to check in and then access the falls area.

It was a nice-enough village, but it has lots of feral dogs hanging around. I noticed that most of the dogs find tourists and pretty much stalk them for food as they pass. One started stalking me as I headed towards the campground, but I was able to get rid of it.

After I set up camp, I decided to leave the tent and catch the falls during sunset and take pictures. My brother decided to stay in the tent, so I was alone. As I went to the falls, I noticed some other campers had indulged some of the feral dogs, had led them the 2 miles into the campground, and were feeding them. I remember being pretty annoyed since it's common knowledge not to feed strays. Now, the dogs were in the freakin' campground because of those asshat campers!

Anyways, I had a good time at the falls, but as I walked towards the campground I noticed the feral dogs again. I don't know if they were emboldened since they were in a group, but they started to stalk me. I just walked past them, trying to ignore them. Most of the dogs got the hint and scattered, but one of the bigger ones started pawing at me and trying to bite my ankles.

I didn't grow up with dogs, so I was quite alarmed and didn't know what to do. I ran, listening to my first instinct, but that was definitely not the right thing to do. It chased after me and then really started getting aggressive. It got in two good bites, one on my ankle and one on my wrist. I started yelling at it, and attempted to kick it. However, it growled louder and kept trying to jump at me and bite me more.

I yelled for help, but it was the off-season and almost sunset, with most of the tourists already having gone to the village. Also, the falls were loud and drowned out a lot of sound. Finally, I was able to make the dog stop attacking by facing it and picking up a rock. My heart was racing and I was quite scared since I now had a few puncture wounds and my adrenaline was going. I gestured like I was going to throw the rock, but didn't throw it because I didn't want to hurt the dog and part of me feared that the dog's aggression would escalate if I hurt it.

Facing it was the only way to keep it from trying to jump and bite me, so I just sort of walked backwards until I found a campground bathroom and hid inside. I pretty much sat on the compost toilet in silence for half an hour, hoping the dog would go away. I thought to yell for my brother, who may have been able to hear me. However, I decided to stick with plan A and the hope the dog would just forget I was in there.

It didn't. I opened the bathroom door a bit and saw it. Finally, in a flash of genius I decided to get a piece of salami, which was in my backpack. I then got out of the bathroom. At this point, the dog was a bit calmer and not trying to lunge at me. I threw the piece of salami into the bathroom stall. The dog went after it and I closed the door behind it.

I finally found my brother, who was wondering why I had been gone so long. We treated my wounds with some Jonnie Walker we'd brought along. Eventually, we found the campground director and told them about the dog.

She kind of rolled her eyes and I remember getting angry at her reaction. I wanted to say something along the lines of "We traveled x miles to be here and paid x amount of dollars for a decent tourist experience and you let these strays run around!" However, I realized it would look like a couple of city slickers denigrating poor Native Americans and I let it go.

Same for the other campers who led the dogs there in the first place. I saw them the next day and wanted to go off on them for the lack of basic camping knowledge. However, I decided against it. The rest of the trip turned out to be a blast.

Username: goodfences

So, I've dealt with the regular gamut of critters. Been chased and stung by bees, wasps, and yellowjackets. Fought with dogs, and had them chase me both walking and cycling. Hit a few with rocks when necessary. Had fire ants chew up my arm. Picked up snakes that needed to be moved, killed a couple when I had no choice. We lived in the country, so wolf spiders and scorpions running around were normal. 

I've even had a few situations that were a bit pucker-inducing. In a small boat moored to a little subsurface mooring buoy two miles off the beach, and a large competitive group of male humpbacks came galumphing by less than 100 yards away. Humpbacks aren't scary at all. Unless they are sex-nuts crazy and r**** strong and might capsize your boat because they are trying to bash each other senseless. 40 tons of horny beastie is worth keeping an eye on. 

Also dove with plenty of sharks. Mostly just reef sharks, but also Galapagos and hammerheads. Had one gray reef shark that got too interested, and my and my dive buddy got out of its area quickly. Tiger sharks and bull sharks can fuck right off- I haven't seen any, but I wouldn't stick around. 

But I've had two encounters that were pretty damn scary:

One was a pissed-off northern fur seal sitting right in front of the ladder that led to the walkway we were trying to get to. They have these sketchy little walkways on the Pribiloff Islands for observing and counting the fur seals. The goal was to ascend on high, and go scootching around this walkway consisting of one 2x4 board as a footrail, and one 2x4 as a handrail. Don't slip. 

We couldn't get there, though, because this bastard had set up camp right by the ladder. He waddled over towards us, and wouldn't let us up. A male northern fur seal is 600 pounds of hormonal testicle and teeth. And us standing upright is telling him that we want to scrap. I'm a big dude, and think of myself as a fairly tough nut, but I'm also smart enough to know that fur seal would fling me like a fucking rag doll. Marine mammals spend their lives pushing around a fluid 40 times denser than air- they are so incredibly strong. 

Fortunately for us, fur seals don't like to chase people far because then they will have to fight some other asshole for their spot back. Laying down and acting submissive gets them to stop fighting, true. But then they figure you're a female, and they don't take no for an answer. 

The other scary moment was when I was sneaking off my college campus in Hawaii. You could walk down off the road, through some fields, and avoid answering uncomfortable questions by the security guards when you were leaving the dorms embarrassingly late. The little fields had a couple patches of jungley bits next to them. As I was slinking by, I heard rustling in the woodline. I figured someone was also making their clandestine way to or from the dorms, so I stood still. 

I was in one of the open grassy fields, with a stand of ginger behind me that led up a very steep hill. Out from the woods pops a low-slung grunting black shape. Then a tiny shape, then another bigger shape at the end. Wild boars had decided to roam through, and they had young with them. I remained still, and kept very fucking quiet. The male moved towards me, got within 20 yards or so, and whuffled at me. I kept very still, and very quiet, and very puckered. They moved off, and I took a moment to breathe before I did the same. 

The only escape I had was up that damn hill through the ginger, and I wasn't sure I'd be the faster. Pigs are fucking fast. Boars will wreck your shit, kids. Be careful.

Username: Muerteds

A 50 lb Alligator snapping turtle encounter stands out although I’ve had a few.

I used to work for a zoo and occasionally had to transport animals in my car for shows. It was late at night and I’m stuck in traffic heading back to the zoo with my car filled with animal totes. The snapper popped the lid of his tote (which was right over my shoulder) and thrust his head out of the top, mouth wide open. While still driving, I used the free lid to push his head back down and held it on with one hand. If you don’t know, they are strong, dinosaur looking bitches and he was soon pushing it back off as I struggled and simultaneously kept driving. But there was nowhere to pull over on the highway and I was boxed in on all sides. A real Jesus take the wheel moment.

I stopped at a gas station after that for some duct tape and had a trucker standing by the car. He asked if I wanted help and laughed a lot. He said it was one of The weirdest things he’d ever seen and that a girl like myself “shouldn’t be messing with snappers” or some bullshit.

I also had an alligator escape his tote in my car before too. Not as scary because his mouth was taped. The best was seeing another drivers face as they drive by and see 5 ft gator in the back of my hatchback lol.

Another time, I saw my life flash before my eyes while cleaning the anaconda enclosure and he decided to strike at my water bucket. His name was Andre and he’s usually a 200 lb fat lazy piece of fanged spaghetti but that day he was hungry for some zookeeper. I had a coworker with me (protocol so one can hold the shield and the other can clean).

He struck and I tried to close the door but his body was stuck in the door so it wouldn’t close and he kept striking at the bucket for some reason. We had a snake killing knife Incase any of the constrictors latched on and I had had training on how to kill it if I needed to save someone but I never thought I’d have to. Thankfully, i didn’t. I shoved his fat butt out of the door behind the shield and slammed it closed.

I watched a tarantula bite my coworker Greg during an expo. He had a rose tarantula in his hand showing it to passers by. Out of nowhere, it unfurled it’s fangs and sunk them into his palm. The weird thing is, it was like in slow motion and greg was so fascinated that he just kind of let it happen. He was a super big/reptile guy - really smart.

He had never been bitten before and thought it was cool (albeit painful) to watch it milk the venom into him. We finally pried him off with a pen and over the course of a few hours we watched Greg’s hand, arm, and shoulder swell and turn yellow. For such a smart guy, it was really stupid lol. But he was intrigued. He lost feeling in his fingers for a few days while the venom was metabolized.

At that same expo, we packed up the animals around midnight and wheeled them back to our van. We had a binturong (bearcat) named Hagrid in a large tote and covered it in a blanket to keep him from being scared of the city sounds. Once we got in the empty parking garage, however, we took the blanket off and had a race down the long incline of the garage. Hagrid vs Big Al, the 10 foot gator.

That expo was in a famous local stadium where they play sports-ball of some kind and since it was a weekend event, the first night we left the animals in the team locker rooms. We left big Al in the shower all night and had to make sure we left a sign in the door to keep the cleaning crew from barging in. Haha

Lots of surreal experiences like that lol

Username: meccadeadly

I have a couple. Being mock charged by an unseen black bear in the brush. We were in some thick swampy woods, the brush was 5 yards to our left and 15 yards to our right.

We were in this pocket clearing in the middle of an impenetrable screen of brush. We were black bear hunting over a bait site sitting on the ground and it must have winded us.

We never saw it but it sounded like a giant bear charging the brush on our left. Stopping, and then retreating, only to repeat this 3-4 times. Eventually it must have lost interest since we didnt move off. The unknown made it that much more terrifying.

The previous year we were lucky enough to take a black bear from the same spot. Although this bear decided to walk up to our ground blind within armsreach before looping around to the bait. Amazing adrenaline pumping experience.

Not to mention tracking a wounded bear in the dark of night with a lantern in thick brush is also a harrowing experience. We about walked up on it, heard it breathing and backed off til morning.

Lastly I had a night camping in my tent, in northern Minnesota, with my two dogs. They are house dogs mostly, they spook pretty easily. I was in the front yard of my parents cabin and we usually have no creature problems there. Unfortunately this night the local wolf pack decided to patrol the property.

I initially heard them howl right as I started dozing off, estimated them to be at least a half mile away or more. Wasn't too worried and I was able to calm the dogs no problem. Now stupidly I had left my sidearm in my vehicle and all I had with me was a tent stake. So I was a little on edge. The next time they howled they were noticeably closer.

Within that half mile for sure. If you havent been in the wild with wolves before, let me tell you, you can feel that howl deep in your bones. It ignites that primal fire and pumps that adrenaline. The last time I heard them howl, they were within 400 yards. The dogs are growling but I'm able to keep them from barking. Last thing I need is a dog fight or any reason for these wolves to come investigate.

I'm wide awake clutching a tent stake. Admittedly I'm too terrified at this point to leave the tent, and go to the vehicle. I didnt want the dogs out in the yard, and my mind is imagining the wolves closing in. This is when I hear them again, running. I could hear them running through the grass and the brush behind my tent.

Quiet assassins silently slipping through the brush, hunting. I'm solely focused on the dogs. Keeping them calm and quiet. Luckily they were just passing through, as the last time I heard them was probably another 400 yards away in the direction they were running.

I didnt sleep much that night. First howl to last howl was probably over the course of 2 hours. I did however find big wolf prints in the mud 25 yards from the tent in facing down the trail to my tent. I don't sleep without my sidearm anymore.

Username: dark_age_hunter

I’m a geologist and sometimes need to camp as part of my job.

A couple of years ago I had one such job. I spent two months north of Sault Ste Marie, Ontario camping out of a tent with the other geologist I work with. We were doing a pretty serious prospecting job. We were camping right next to a small lake which we swam in to wash ourselves, wash our clothes, etc.

Most nights we would hear wolves and foxes howling and screaming, we got used to that. Most nights we’d hear beavers slapping the water with their tails or moose swimming in the lake or walking through the brush.

Almost every single morning we’d come out of our tent and see bear prints through the camp, conning right up to our tent and walking around. We were pretty good about keeping things clean, we’d store our food in air right coolers inside our truck, burn any garbage, do our business away from camp, etc.

We had a small generator so we could charge our equipment like gps, cameras, laptops for movies etc... It turns out black bears really like the smell of gasoline. We had a bunch of jerry cans that the bears kept trying to chew; a few had puncture holes in the handles.

Our second to last night in camp we had left our generator running (forgot to turn it off and we were just going to let it run out of fuel). I was sleeping in my cot in the tent and something pushed agains my back from outside the tent.

I was at the stage where you aren’t sure if you’re dreaming or not and I wasn’t able to move so I just sat there are whatever animal kept pushing against the tent. I could hear it sniffing and grunting and I eventually moved and asked my buddy if he could hear it too. He was also awake and said that it’s had been there for a while.

I was getting tired of it so I made some loud noises and it eventually ran off. A little while later we hear something walking around the tent again, this time going towards the generator.

All of a sudden the generator starts surging as if it were running out fuel, the we hear a really loud “zzzt” noise, a squeal and then as then something crashing through the bush running away from the tent.

We take out our lights and check to see what happened. Around our tent were more bear prints than I’d ever seen in one place, the extension cord coming from the generator had been chewed to hell and the gas cap on the generator was all mangled. The bear was going after the fuel in the generator.

It was one of the most uncomfortable and creepiest nights of my life. The amount of tracks around the tent was wild, there was definitely more than just one bear. It was good thing we were leaving the day after since the bears were getting way too comfortable having us around.

Username: newfrank

I worked as an au pair for a family in Italy last summer and I bonded with the youngest girl over our shared love of horses. One of my jobs was to watch her at the stables and help her out with some basic things like grooming and racking up.

Fine by me as I loved doing this and I was friends with the stable girl who was the same age as me. My host family liked me being there because their daughter broke her arm the year before and they weren’t there to help so they felt a little more at ease with a horsey person there who could could help out.

Now, I’ve ridden lots of different horses in lots of different places but I’ve never met an instructor quite like the lady who owned these stables. She was very fierce and had a habit of losing her temper at the young kids she taught.

Most of her clients were adults who wanted to go for treks in the mountains and so the kids rode on full size horses that could sometimes be... difficult. I kept my mouth shut to avoid her wrath for the most part because while she was strict, nothing bad happened until two weeks before I was due to go home.

One of the girls was riding a particularly stubborn mare who was refusing to move faster than a walk. This kid was ten and was as skinny as a rail and this horse was tall and well muscled and looked as if she was descended from some type of carthorse.

I learned to ride on a similar mare so I wasn’t too concerned until suddenly this horse absolutely flipped. I’ve never seen anything like it. She reared up and when the kid stayed on she went absolutely wild, charging into a fence, whirling and kicking until she came flying out the saddle.

The kid landed hard and the horse then brought her hoof directly down onto her thigh. It sounds ridiculous but I swear it was deliberate. The scream that came out of this kid’s mouth was inhuman. She had to be carried out of the arena and was absolutely delirious with pain.

We ripped her jodhpurs off to see the hoof had ripped a gash into her leg. The instructor was absolutely no use and so I was the one who held a cold hose on her leg until her mum arrived to take her to the hospital.

I had been struggling with my Italian for weeks until that point but I suddenly found myself speaking full sentences to her as she just clung to me in agony.

A few days later I saw photos of her injury and her whole upper leg was black with bruising and she had stitches over the gash. She apparently had severe muscle damage in her thigh and was incredibly lucky not to break any bones. She had to see a specialist doctor and would be unable to move her leg for the next two months.

I am eternally thankful that it didn’t happen to the child I was in charge of and that the horse was not wearing metal shoes at the time. Horses can be pretty scary animals and I wish I knew how that kid is doing now.

Username: [deleted]

Years ago, I lived in an old house that should have been demolished years ago but somehow still stands (I won’t go into detail about the undulating floors, the sagging, leaking ceilings, or the fact that you had to sit side-saddle every time you had to take a shit because the toilet was built directly in front of a wall), and I had an alligator-sized house centipede living somewhere in my bathroom. In an attempt to encourage interspecies diplomacy, I nicknamed the monster "Benjamin."

Benjamin and I had coexisted in this house for an uneasy two years, and interspecies diplomacy had failed to occur. Since I had lived in this house, there had been several attempts made both on my life and on Benjamin's - he would often try to attack me while I sat vulnerable on the toilet seat, and just as many times I struck him squarely with a shoe or a book only to see him scurry behind the toilet.
All of this came to an end one Saturday night.

I was getting all situated to take a nice midnight sidesaddle pee when I spotted movement behind the toilet seat. There, above the toilet, was Benjamin, in all his leggy glory.

I knew that a book or a shoe wouldn't be enough, and more than likely he'd jump off the wall and go crawling up my wrist, so I went out to get a fly swatter. I came back in and struck.

For about two seconds I had him trapped against the wall, grinding into him with the swatter. He managed to escape and go crawling down the wall, but I was able to take off two legs.

They landed on the toilet seat, and I swear - this is no exaggeration, I would not make this shit up - as they sat there twitching, I could HEAR them. They hissed. I think I could hear Benjamin, too - another faint hissing sound coming from behind the toilet.

The hissing ended and the legs were flushed. I cleaned off the seat, sat down to do that deed I'd come in to do, stood up, and suddenly -

LEGS
COMING STRAIGHT TOWARDS ME
BENJAMIN'S REVENGE

Everything, except for Benjamin's attack, happened in slow motion. I levitated about three feet off the floor. I grabbed the shower curtain and then the sink. I tried to jump on top of the sink.

This did not work, and I bruised the heck out of my kneecap. Still about a foot off the floor, screeching at full volume, I found the doorknob, threw open the door and ran to safety in the kitchen.

It was time to put this madness to an end. I found the fly swatter and bravely marched back into the bathroom. Benjamin waited next to the spot between the bathtub and the sink, planning his next strike. I found him easily. He made one last lunge towards the swatter as I ground him into the linoleum until he twitched no more.

That night, Benjamin died a warrior's death, fighting to the last. I did not give him a Viking funeral in my toilet bowl, but I thought about it.

Username: tm-project

Back when I was in Nepal not too long ago I decided to go on a hike in the near by woods. I've been hiking around the woods for a while back in the US so it seemed pretty normal. Before I went on the hike my grandad told me about a man eating tiger prowling the woods.

It happened a few months ago, a lady who was doing dishes late at night (it's not common to have a place to do dishes inside the house in this part of Nepal) and she was eaten by it.

It could of been just one of those stories my grandad told me as a little kid to keep me from running around the woods. But I was grown up so I went in anyways since it's been a few months.

When I walked into the woods everything felt really creepy. The Flora was way too dense to see any thing n the underbrush just made me wonder what could sneak up on me.

I went along the path checking my back every 5 seconds, I heard that wearing a mask behind your head was a good way to make it hard for big cats to sneak on you since they thick you're facing both directions.

After going some distance into the woods I decided its probably best I turn back since it seemed that the path just kept getting deeper into the woods.

On my way back I started to hear something ruffling behind me. It was very distinct and odd since it didn't sound like the wind blowing on the leaves like it had been. I turned around n looked but saw nothing. I kept walking along the path and I'd hear it everytime I turned my head back around from my "look back every 5 seconds" routine.

I began to freak out as it the sound got louder. I turned around n it didn't stop this time, I grabbed a rock and hoped to god I could get what ever was coming in the nose hard enough to give me time to run or spook it off.

Soon I realized it the sound was coming from above me n when I looked up I saw monkeys. It was a pleasant surprise but still I felt spooked, as my paranoid mind asked could they be running from something?

I eventually concluded that monkeys have the high ground :Þ and it was probably nothing and went on but still holding on to the rock. I eventually got out. I threw away the rock and sighed in relief.

As walked back home I looked back into the woods and I saw the striped pattern of a tiger walking near the edge of the woods. It wasn't looking my way but still ran towards the near by village n told some shop keep about it.

Eventually police came to check the area and found foot prints. They had a search for it so they can knock it out with a dart n relocate it but they couldn't find it.

Username: ashtefer1

Snake catcher here / herpetologist.Brown snake crossing over my feet walking down to the beach.

Being isolated in the middle of no where and a pack of dingos trying to rob me of my sausages. ( I was in the bush looking for snakes)

ALSO, I'm going to call BULLSHIT on anyone who says a snake "chased" them..

I'm a person who actively goes into the bush, pulls wild snakes out from rocks and holes and I actively harass these animals for the collection of data and fauna surveys. Boy let me tell you I have found some fucked off devilish snakes that are pretty much born out of a bad attitude and hate.. Yet these cunts have never, ever, ever chased me. The most they will do is lounge or charge you, however a Bipedal human can run / move 100x faster than a snake who's asshole is licking the ground. That rock you just jumped over, is going to take that snake 30 seconds to move around.. If you for what ever reason cannot put enough distance between you and a snake in 3 seconds flat then you should NOT be in the bush in a fucking wheel chair.

Its fucking annoying, cunts will flat out make up a story about when they were chased by a "taipan hybridised with a python" and the cunt also had 3 heads and spit venom that chased them for 5km in the bush.

Bullshit.. utter utter bullshit.. I actively annoy the living fuck out of these creatures for science and yet I never have ever had one chase me.Considering my exposure to these animals will be 1000x more than the old bogan at the pub trying to spark up a conversation.

Also, My work is referenced in 2 books. Keeping and breeding Australian elapids by Scott Eipper ( the brown snake on the cover is my personal pet brown snake ) and Keeping and breeding Australian frogs by Scott Eipper.

Just to add to this as well, but biologically snakes cannot give chase like people say they do.
These animals cannot sweat to cool their body temp, they needs to thermoregulate so if they are overheated they need to find a cold spot ( under a log) to cool down, high temps will kill a snake faster than cold temps.

Cold temps slow down their metabolism and over all body function, allowing for hibernation. Heat raises the body temp and they cannot sweat to cool down which is why heat kills faster.

Now with that in mind, lets look at this logically Australia is located about 4 blocks from the sun, its fucking hot here so there is already that, and the ground is fucking hot. A snakes body is basically pressed against this hot earth.

Its already hot, so giving chase other than hiding is a dumb idea, especially chasing something that is 100x bigger than them, they want to hide its logical. Why raise our body temp when it could kill you.

Username: [deleted]

I feel that bullocks are getting a free ride here. Bullocks are one of the scariest herd animals I've ever encountered.

I used to walk home from work occasionally, along a path between a sloped sea wall and a tidal river. The ribbon of land that the path took was maybe 40 metres wide, but several miles long.

The land was divided by stiles into long thin fields that weren't really used for much, being just coarse grass with sea wall and thick mud on one side and bullrush marshes the other. I occasionally saw a few cows being grazed and they mostly minded their business when I walked through.

However, one day I crossed one stile and realised there was a herd of what I thought were cows at the far end of the field. I continued on the path and was around half way to the next stile when the herd stated moving toward me... quickly, and all in a group. I slowed down and realised that they weren't slowing down and I turned round and began to walk briskly back to the stile.

My brisk walk became a jog, which became a run until I got over the stile, out of breath and just in tone for the herd to pull up at the fence. This is when I realised they weren't cows, but all male, adolescent bullocks with swivelling bulbous eyes and they seemed simply curious.

This story could end here,but it doesn't, because I was still 4 miles from home and 4 miles from work, so the only feasible option was to keep going. Somehow. Between the river and...The deep blue sea. The herd moved away after a while so I jumped over the stile again, thinking I could just go round the herd, they would lose interest and I could make my way along the path. I was wrong.

One individual started to move towards me and the rest followed. I walked faster, and did a few "jazz hands" with accompanying "RAWWWRRRRR" which seemed to make them back off in the first instance, but then more of them became even more curious. I realised the herd had cut me off from the stile.

I had to keep on going now, and I had about 1km to the next stile. I looked back; the whole herd was trundling towards me, so I speed up and left the path, moving down onto the sea defences, made of concrete bricks. The space between the bricks was deep mud. I stepped from brick to brick at first and still the herd was following, although the bricks proved difficult for their hooves.

I went right down to the bottom of the sea defences, ankle deep in the mud at times, almost in the water, and the bullocks were still slowly chasing me along the wall, picking their way through the mud. I ended up clambering the whole distance 1000m) along the sea wall, and sped up at the end so I had enough of a head start to climb up and run across the grass to the stile.

The 1000m took me an hour, but the final 50m maybe 30 seconds. The bullocks were behind me all the way to the stile. I was exhausted from the clambering and my heart was pounding after the final sprint, but I vaulted the stile, covered in mud.

I took the opportunity to taunt the bullocks with some long grass before I left. I have nightmares about bullocks occasionally now, their bulging eyes are the worst :/ I understand this behaviour is fairly normal for young bullocks, but I have no idea why a farmer would put a herd in a busy coastline footpath without posting a notice. But hey, Suffolk. I moved away.

Username: stoopidweazel

Dog groomer here. It was with a cockapoo.

Had a guy drop off a medium-sized, fluffy tan cockapoo at the shop I was working at. The dog is acting really off, with a lot of bad body language. Sitting with her head down, whale eye, lip licking, and being very still. Dogs to the shop usually are a bit shy the first visit, so it’s not a biggie.

Lots of pats, sweet talking, and treats later and everyone’s usually happy butt-wiggling on the way out. The guy walks her into the back to put her into a crate at my request, thinking if she had fifteen minutes to cool off and relax she’d be fine. Her owner leaves, and the dog seems to chill out.

Fifteen minutes roll past and I go to take her out of the crate. The second the door opened she came flying out of the crate, howling like a demon. I wound up jumping onto the table we have nearby, and I’m using my foot to keep her at bay as she’s jumping up trying to bite me.

She put a few holes in my work shoes. I’m pretty sure I’m going to get mauled by that point and took a risk to jump from the table into the big stainless steel tub we have a few feet away since it’s slightly taller and harder for her to get at me. I listen to music on my phone while I work (ear buds double as ear plugs for loud blow dryers), and I was able to call a coworker that lives nearby to come in.

There’s a dutch door between the lobby and the work area that was closed so the dog couldn’t get out there, and my coworker comes in about ten minutes later. She starts laughing at me because I’m in the tub, wide-eyed, with a 20-something pound, fuzzy dog with a pink collar circling me like a vulture.

She tries to come into the back... Dog goes after her in the same way. She slammed the door shut and called the owner to come get his dog, and made it clear she was running loose in the shop attacking us. He showed up about an hour later.

The owner immediately gets mad at me, saying I must have hit her or something to make her act like that. He marches back, grabs the dog by the collar, and lifts her up onto the table I had been standing on before and holds her there. I tentatively crawled out of the tub and booked it for the lobby, and my coworker and I were very firm that he needed to leave with the dog.

He refuses to leave, and tells me if I just pet her, she’ll like me. He puts the dog in a choke hold on the table, and demands I pet her. We had a weird stand-off for about five minutes before I relented, thinking that if he saw how aggressive the dog was towards me, he’d realize I was right and leave.

The second I walked back through the dutch door the dog loses her mind again, screeching as if possessed by some kind of cockapoodly hellspawn. Her eyes are bloodshot, she’s drooling non-stop, snapping at the air in my direction, and straining so hard he can barely hold her back.

We eventually got the guy to leave by telling him we’d call the police if he didn’t. He left a negative review for us on our Facebook business page because he said I was rude to him.

Username: Roranting

In Rwanda my stupid stupid stupid friend tried to "bond" with a lone bull elephant. We knew there was an infamous bull elephant that was aggressive in the area and assumed it was that one (he had sat on a friends car for an hour).

Anyways, the bull elephant was no interested in "bonding" with my friend and it went behind a tree... and vanished. We waited for a while... where the hell did it go. Eventually we decided to move on.

The road passed the elephant disappearing tree and through some brush to a plain beyond. We were going maybe 5 miles an hour past the overgrown area when the elephant stepped out and began to charge/bluff charge. Ears flapping and blocking the road.

We all screamed, I slammed it into reverse and one guy in the back (a local Rwandan) jumped out, landed hard, got up, and ran for it. We backed up, missed the road, and was off the site and ran into a tree. Luckily it was dead, toppled over, and I was able to clear the trunk.

We had gone about 100 to 200 feet backwards at this point, and the elephant decided to let us go. It stopped. I kept going another few hundred feet.

the rwandan was able to make it back, while we waited for the elephant to clear the area. After about 30 minutes we gave up, and found a different way around (it was pretty swampy so some offroad areas were very very muddy, and of course damaging to the environment.

In the end we decided that maybe it was not *really* charging us. Jut trying to tell us to back off.

I went back to the park a month later, and there was an announcement that an american women had been gored by the elephant while inside her car, the event was VERY similar to our experience. She had a tusk through her shoulder and was air lifted to nairobi.

We also found out that this was a young male, and the infamous one was old and had no tusks (lost, cut off... I don't know.). The one definitely had tusks.

I went back to the park a number of times, but could feel my fear build around the elephants from them on, and sometimes you would be among a herd of 15 to 30. I was bluff charged two other times, but both were just back off charges (one was very far away, and one was around a blind corner so I did not know she was there).

EDIT: To be clear, Mutware did not charge us, it was another one. The young bull has supposedly been allowed back into the herd and is calm now. Also, Mutware may be dead, not sure, but thats the last I heard. :(

Username: Khelek7

This is the scariest encounter with any animal I ever had and hopefully will ever have. This happened when I was in third year of my bachelor of Veterinary Medicine program in year 2011. I wrote to director Forest Department to allow me to take part in annual water hole census at Ranthambore National Park, Rajasthan, India.

This is a very well known tiger reserve in India. The census happens for a full day in month of May every year, when the summer is at its peak and temperature easily remains above 45°C (113°F) for the most part of the day. So on the day of the census volunteers like me, about 50, were given different spots spread across the whole national park.

Each volunteer was accompanied with a forest guard who had a complete knowledge of the area and many of them to some extent had familiarity with territories of few well known tigers. We were given a 5-6 feet long bamboo staff and an empty earthen pitcher for storing water.

As the way to my spot was very hilly, I and the guard with me were dropped around 7 miles before the spot and we had to walk the rest of the way in dense forest where a tiger or a bear could come from any direction.

Fortunately, we reached the spot safe, Foota Bandha, Zone 2 at 9 AM, after 90 minutes of walking. Since it was a water-hole census, the spots were already prepared for us. Our spot was at Foota Bandha, Zone 2, on a perch made from logs and tied with ropes on a Dhak/Palash (Butea monosperma) tree on the side of a small pond. The perch was only 12-15 feet high from the ground.

We filled the pitcher with the pond water, cleared it with alum and chlorine tablets, placed it on the tree, collected leaves from the tree and made a camouflage. At around 10 AM we took our positions on the perch on the tree. Those days a tigress T19 and an alpha male, T24 (I don’t remember the ID exactly) were frequently seen around in that area, my guard told me.

We ate our food packet given to us before leaving and sat there, counting different animals coming to the pond, on a stat sheet. At around 2 PM I realized that the food in the packet given to us was not so clean after all. I started having cramps in my stomach but was holding up. Around 3 PM the guard spotted a tiger coming to the pond. Soon the tigress T19 was there.

After she drank from the pond, she went inside and sat there. The sun was at its peak and heatwaves were scorching. My stomach was aching like hell and now there was no chance I could go and answer nature's call. Suddenly, because of my discomfort, I adjusted myself a little and she became aware of us. We were frozen in fear as we were well aware what could go wrong.

We were not sure what she was thinking but we knew for sure that she was not happy with our presence in her area as she urinated the pond and then growled looking at us. After few minutes of staring at us and growling, she all of a sudden decided to come at us. We were barely 15 feet high on the tree and there she was slowly coming towards us.

The guard was not prepared for this and he was just as scared as I was. While we were counting our odd, she jumped at the tree and tried climbing it. I saw the face of death that day, it was barely a couple of metres away. Fortunately, the tree was atop a little rocky area and the trunk was straight without any branches to a height. The tigress was standing on her hind limbs holding the trunk there and was looking at our perch constantly.

I could not decide whether to close my eyes or keep a watch on her. After few tries she gave up climbing and sat under the tree in the shadow panting and growling. Never in my life, I had so strong flashes of my family, my friends and my life in front of my eyes. We sat there frozen to our bones trying not to make the faintest sound.

She was there for half an hour or so after which she got up and went to the pond, sat in there for some time and eventually went back into the forest. Those 2 hours of my life are still crystal clear in my memory. The animal was gone but the danger was still there because there was a whole night ahead of us to pass. Moreover, I had to answer nature's call twice before the night.

Fortunately, the tigress did not return but we saw few bears, a cackle of hyenas and few foxes for the rest of our time there until we were picked back next morning. That was the scariest encounter with any animal I ever had and hopefully will ever have.

Username: Memisperm

When I was a kid I grew up next door to my grandpa. I basically had a trailer out in the middle of the woods and to get to my house, you had to pass through my grandparents yard and follow a trail through the woods.

The trail was slightly windy so you couldn’t see my house from my grandparent’s or visa versa, even though it was only like a 10 minute walk between houses. We had no other neighbors for like 5 miles in any direction.

My grandpa breeds and raises chickens and generally has about 1000 chickens on his property at all times. The critters (opossums, raccoons, bobcats, ect. sorry, I’m a country boy) were really bad about getting into the chicken pens and eating the chickens, or even catching the “free roam” chickens my grandpa had and eating them.

To protect his livelihood, one day my grandpa bought 6 great pyrenees dogs. 1 was full grown, and the other 5 were pups. He named these dogs Ima, Hesa, Shesa, Itsa, Atsa, and Erza. (I’m a dog, He’s a dog, She’s a dog, It’s a dog, Thats a dog, and there’s a dog.) This story is about the full grown dog, Ima.

Because I lived so close to my grandpa, (and i was like 9 or 10) most of the time he would babysit me. One day, while he was making us lunch, he realised that he didn’t have any macaroni and cheese. I told him I had some at my house and volunteered to go get it. He agreed and off i went, with Ima in tow to keep me company.

About halfway to my house there was a little clearing in the woods to my right, and it that clearing there was an old empty 55 gallon metal drum with the top cut off of it. There was a piece of plywood laid over the top of the barrel. There was also a tree branch that had fallen and was leaning up against the barrel and piece of wood.

While walking past this barrel, I heard an odd noise coming from it. Like a thumping noise. So, being a curious kid, I decided to investigate. I started walking towards the barrel and IMMEDIATELY Ima started growling and barking at me. She ran around me and positioned herself between me and that barrel and faced me then just started growling and barking at me.

I just kept walking forward and when she realised growling wasn’t working, she bit my hand (softly, yet firmly so i couldn’t get away but didn’t hurt either) and forcibly PULLED me away from that barrel and towards my house. So i went and got my macaroni and headed back to my grandpa’s house.

When i got there, I told him about what had happened and he decided to go check the barrel himself. So he and Ima walked down to the barrel while i ate lunch. About 30 minutes later he back white as a ghost and covered in blood from deep scratches in his arm.. Apparently, when he flipped the piece of plywood off of the barrel, there was a bobcat inside. It attacked him and scratched deep gashes in his arm before Ima was able to chase it away from him.

I will never forget the way Ima, who was the kindest and most gentle dog, turned aggressive towards me because she was smart enough to know i wouldn’t “listen” to her otherwise.

She was a good doggo and i miss her.

Edit: Clarification, My grandpa was tall so his arms got scratched. If I would have moved that board, my face would have been right there and that's where I would have been mauled. In the face.

Username: Ultimateace43

Last fall a friend and I were staying in Mill Valley for a few days to hike the redwoods. We had prepared the quintessential Haight-Ashbury experience and procured some magic mushrooms, went out to the forest on a beautiful sunny day, and both took a light dose. Several hours later, we were miles into the trail, no one in sight, serenely tripping and taking in the beautiful silence.

All of a sudden there was an explosion of noise somewhere in the brush, it sounded like a collision, we froze and exchanged silent glances, not sure if it we could trust our senses due to the obvious tripping. Well everything was silent once more and we continued walking, tiptoeing now, only slightly rattled from the surprise.

Then all of a sudden BAM three adolescent male deers (bucks?) came barreling down the steep hill to our left, in the middle of an intense battle, and landed less than 10 feet from my friend and I, blocking the way forward on the trail.

The mix of emotions went as follows: “oh good they’re just deer... no wait they’re male deers and they’re fighting.... shit, fall is mating season isn’t it.... huh I guess I have heard that male deer can be extremely aggressive.... oh shit they have antlers what am I gonna do if they charge?

Should we run or hold our ground?!” so my friend and I are frozen in place feet away from these violently fighting animals, not in our right state of mind. Consider that we were tripping, we were still intensely silent and we hadn’t moved an inch, just frozen in shock.

It was then that one of the deer turned and locked eyes with us, he looked startled, I don’t think they had noticed our presence at all considering their epic battle and our silent tiptoeing. Well that sucker looked at us and didn’t run away. No, he took a step toward us like he was going to charge.

The other two deer at this point had locked antlers and were gracefully plummeting down the next steep hill, battle in full force. The deer that had seen us took another step forward.... then seemed to change his mind and leapt down the hill to rejoin the battle.

Needless to say my friend and I were pissing ourselves. We stared at each other silently for what must have been three or four minutes, listening intently to the ramble in the brush to see if they might return or cross our path again.

When we were finally convinced they weren’t coming back, we started running, for almost a mile to “get away” from the intense energy, and didn’t stop until the forest was silent again. Took an hour long breather to calm down from the energy of that moment.

Drugs aside, that experience made me feel humbled in the face of nature. We were outsiders in the deers’ world, and it made me realize I had never encountered a wild animal in that proximity, and that I would have lost in an unarmed matchup.

What am I but a humble ape with no tooth or claw (or knowledge) to defend myself....

Username: Rosieforthewin

I have 2 so allow me to begin these tales of great travesty.

The first one occured in my bedroom, I was in there just for a moment when I noticed a cockroach on top of my wardrobe, it must have been at least an inch and a half long it was no joke.

So naturally I just left, went out for the day, but the problem was that when I got back it hadn't moved an inch, and as soon as I walked into my room, the beast jump attacked me.

I turned on the light but it was already too late, it was right in front of my face.

I could hear the buzzing of wings but just assumed there was a fly in my room, when I saw this demon staring me in the face I ran down stairs and slept on the couch for like a week before I finally went back to my room where I found its carcass. Definitely one of my less fun encounters with a roach ;).

For the second one, and by far the scarier of the two, it helps to know that I live in malaysia, where wild tarantulas are quite rare, especially where I live, but they can be seen commonly in the kampungs (small local villages usually consisting of thatched huts).

So there was this one time I was visiting a kampung which was very much secluded from the outside world, food was hunted with blowdarts and things like that. They spoke English and had some technology like phones and things but didn't really use them all so much.

Whilst I was there they taught me how to braid bags out of certain leaves and how to set traps for small animals which was really interesting. Whilst they were teaching me to weave the bags, suddenly the woman and daughter in front of me screamed and jumped away from me, so naturally I knew something was wrong.

At first I stayed completely still and looked around because if it was a snake or something I didn't want to startle it and get bitten dead, but I looked around and saw nothing. It was only when I looked down, on my own leg, that I saw a huge hairy lovely tarantula looking back at me.

It was a pretty big one, big enough for the locals to run away, and that's saying something. In my state of panic I did what any abnormal wierdo would do, I just sat there looking at it on my leg....

After about a good minute of this spider and I having a staring contest it suddenly moved and I flipped shit, damn near jumped through the celling and just ran. I ran straight outta that hut and just ran in circles for a few seconds because my heart was beating faster than it possibly could.

This was genuinely terrifying because spiders are the spawns of Satan.

Username: volticizer

I was like 7 and I had a neighbor who used to have 3 fighting pitbulls (terrible I know, what's worse is that we lived in a "didn't see nothin" neighborhood so those dogs died a cruel death and his other dogs were severely neglected).

One day I was playing tag with my friends and ran across his house. I heard a lot of yelping and I peek between the gate and see his son, who was just as horrible as his father, using a puppy as a bait dog and one of his pitbulls just mauling it to death.

The neighbors son had a cattle prod and kept prodding the dog until its legs start twitching. The dog is foaming and drooling while also chewing on this now dead puppie's neck.

The dog got fed up with it and lunged at the owner but was held back by a weak chain. Mind you, I'm still hidden behind this fence and peeking at this horror show. The neighbor's son gets a call and leaves the house and I had this shining moment where I wanted to be a hero.

I told my friends I would play with them later and head back to this guy's house. In my head filled with childlike innocence the dog would be thankful to me and make a quick escape and live happily ever after.

I was only a kid so it never occured to me that this wouldn't be a Disney scenario where the dog could understand what I'm doing. It doesn't know that I want to help him, it only knows pain. Those years of abuse scarred that dog. After I make sure the neighbors aren't around I jump over the flimsy fence and land in the yard where there are 3 pitbulls in cages and a weak bait doberman tied up under a tree.

They all go NUTS and start barking. Oh no, but I was an expert because I had a well behaved and well taken care off doberman myself. I was a whole cesar milan yes I was /s. I let go of the doberman and he just wanders to the front yard suprisingly well behaved.

I get to the rowdy pitbulls in cages and see the one from earlier. He is muzzled so that he wouldn't eat or drink any of the food and water in front of him. If I recall they do that to make them angrier and desperate to win. The torture is making him crazy and I let him loose.

Immediately he gets a look, jumps toward me and alarms go off in my head to RUN. I bolt and this feral dog is chasing me and I could feel his breath on my legs but couldn't quite catch up because of how badly he was hurt.

But that didn't stop that monster. The demonic growling coming that muzzled snout and my screaming was loud enough to alert a few other neighbors. The sudden growth of people in the area confuses the dog and he heads to a different target. I keep running and dont look back.

He was shot to death by another neighbor. The owner came back with his son furious and this set off a 2 day long feud that ended with him getting arrested for animal abuse. I was ashamed and conflicted. Had I left him there he would have died by the hands of the only people he truly knew. But me letting him loose ended 3 years of suffering and laid him to rest.

I was also constantly questioned and was scared to get in trouble so I said he escaped. Even in the end, this never deterred my feeling for dogs. I love all animals and even as a child I understood that that reaction was all that dog ever knew. Fuck Im crying.

Username: ZedasiriaDeRazz

I volunteer at a zoo, I'm mainly posed in a 'walkthrough lemur' exhibit. We have a mixed species group who are for the most part pretty friendly, chilled out fluffy little dudes that just do what they want and look cute and are a bit dim. That is other than our adult female black and white ruffed who came to our zoo about three years ago. Basically lemurs are female dominant, and it seems to be a thing that female ruffed lemurs can be 'grumpy'.

Most the year our female ruffed is ok, she's the boss in the enclosure in short, bit standoffish but generally tolerates people and you and just wants her space thanks. However as it turned out after she has a baby she gets quite aggressive. Because the lemurs are usually quite chilled out you can often feed them with you in the same room.

I can't remember if she'd had her babies yet or if she was pregnant but I was feeding I wasn't moving quick enough or got too close but she ended up jumping on me and biting my arm, thankfully she got a mouthful of sleeve mostly but I did get a nice bruise for my trouble.

Since then she's also jumped on my head a couple of times and tried to bite me/has bitten me before. I'm not the only person to fall victim to her.

A few months ago I was helping out a keeper at one of our gibbon enclosures, said gibbon shot it's arm out of it's cage as I was walking past and grabbed my sleeve.

Had a couple of moments with dogs.

One where I was crossing a playing field with my own dog (a westie) this random lab came bounding across the field stopped, sniffed my dog and tried to attack him. it's not recommended but I ended up scooping my dog up and moving off (He's small so doesn't have much chance) the owner did nothing to restrain their dog but rather yelled at me for picking up my dog.

I used to volunteer at a shelter, we had this dog in once who wasn't aggressive by any means but got over stimulated easily and had mouthing issues. I can't remember exactly what I did but he ended up grabbing a hold of my sleeve whilst we were on a walk and I couldn't get him to drop it and he was pulling me around.

This was a fairly big dog (He was a staffy), I'm a tall person and not exactly light but as people probably know staffys and other bull terrier type dogs are rather strong so this dog was pulling me around quite a bit I ended up having to unzip my jacket and drop it to stop him.

Once years ago met a random American Bulldog, went to say hello this dog just decided to grab me by the sleeve and start shaking my arm around. Wasn't 'aggressive' about it but it was a bit unnerving.

Finally, A while ago I witnessed a pigeon get run over by a taxi. It was clearly injured/ill and wasn't moving fast enough and this taxi was slowly creeping behind it, the other pigeon got away this one did not I couldn't do anything to get it out of the way and just witnessed it get run over and then die a few moments later. It was rather disturbing to witness.

Username: nocte_lupus

So, I was about 23 years old and working for a carpet cleaning company. I'm in the middle of a job when my boss calls to tell me that my girlfriend had called in because our (rather large) cat had brought a dead opossum into our house.

Our (very large) German Shepherd was freaking out, so she wanted me to stop home after my job was done so I could get rid of the thing. I said no problem and got back to work.

About a minute after I started working again, the phrase "playing possum" went through my head. I tried calling my girlfriend, but there was no answer. So I called my boss and told her to get in touch with my girlfriend and tell her to poke the thing with one of my golf clubs to make sure it was actually dead.

Guess what? The little fucker was just playing dead. There was a live opossum in my living room that was now in full attack mode.

Now, I don't know how many of you have actually seen an opossum up close, but I'd have to estimate that they are about 70% mouth/teeth. I mean, they are vicious looking. And ugly as all hell. So it takes me about 15 minutes to get to my house to deal with this fucking cornered mouth monster , a dog and cat that are now attempting to kill said mouth monster, and a normally docile girlfriend that is now standing on the dining room table in absolute terror.

So, at that point in life, I considered myself somewhat of a bad ass. I mean, I had won both fights I had ever been in, so I was pretty much invincible, right? Well, I get inside and I'm eye-to-eye with all 1342 teeth that this fucking tree rat is baring.

I think even its eyes had a couple teeth poking out of them. My dog is absolutely losing it, my girlfriend is crying and can barely use words and the cat was licking its butt in another room or crapping in my closet or something--- I'm not sure. It's a cat. Fuck him.

Anyway, I don't know what to do, but I know that I'm going to be Joe Macho and get this done. So, what is my solution? I pin this little Danny Devito looking sewer raccoon down with my lacrosse stick. Then I slide the head of my golf club underneath. I lift up and... it works! I've got this wasp's nest mouth mother fucker trapped in the lacrosse stick netting and I walk it outside.

But here's the rub.... what the fuck do I do now? I can't just drop it outside. The thing is freaking the fuck out. If I just let it go, I'm getting attacked. So, I use all of the skills I learned in my two years of in-town lacrosse leagues, crank the stick back and I launch that furry little chainsaw into the fucking stratosphere. It's pitch dark out, so I have no clue where it landed, but I definitely threw this thing as hard as I've ever thrown anything. Peace out, fucko. Not on my watch.

Two days later, the cat brought the fucking monster in again and I find them playing together in my living room. I open the door and Jaws casually strolls out like he owns the place. Fuck you, cat.

Okay, good talk. I'm out.

Username: SkanksForTheMemories

I had been through some shit in Afghanistan, so I decided to go for a solo 120 mi hike through Shenandoah National Forest in VA, on a section of the Appalachian trail that runs through there, to "find myself."

I was aware that there were some things that could kill me out there, so I brought a 12 inch survival knife. As I was crossing the road, about halfway through the trail, I looked to my left.

Now, I am a big guy, even bigger back then. I was dehydrated and carrying a sixty pound backpack. I am tired. All of a sudden, a huge, athletic-looking black bear, in the heat of summer, is running across the road about 100-150 ft from me.

The bear looks at me, and we lock eyes. Bear stops. My hand is on my knife. Bear takes a few nonchalant steps towards me, and begins to pick up the pace. Eventually, the bear is at a slow sprint at me.

The surge of adrenaline was so extreme that my body completely forgot how tired it was. I pull out the knife, and pull back. My plan was to jump to the side as the bear was upon me, and stab it as hard as I could, as many times as I could.

The bear was freaky looking, not what I expected. It wasnt fat, and round. It was thin, athletic, and muscular. It looked like Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in bear-form. You could actually see the definition of its muscles, like it came out of a lab or something.

So, Bear "The fuckin Rock" Johnson is charging at me. Bear is now <50 feet from me. I start yelling and getting pumped up to attack. Then, like an angel from heaven, I hear some car coming up the road behind me. It was just the most perfectly-timed, random moment I could have ever hoped for.

The bear stops, like a dog trying to stop on a slippery wood floor. He lowers his behind, and posts his front legs. He looks up, and starts smelling the air. Then, as if he knew what was coming, he scurries off and down the side of the mountain, as the car comes around the bend behind me.

The car stops behind me about twenty feet. The people in the car were an Asian family from, I believe, China. They happened to see the bear, and all hopped out with their cameras. The two little girls had pink cameras, and the wife had a Nikon or something with a huge telescopic lens.

The husband goes around to his trunk while the family runs up, taking pictures of me with the bear running away. I felt like such a badass. The husband comes up with an ice cold bottle of water. My God, it was such an amazing moment. That was the best water I had ever tasted. I tried to talk to the people, but the husband only spoke several English words.

I owe these people my life, but I believe that I repayed them with, arguably, the greatest moment of their trip to America, complete with pictures. So, somewhere on Chinese social media, there is a picture of me, knife in hand, standing my ground to a giant black bear running away.

Username: TacoSession

So last December I went on a trip to Costa Rica with two of my friends, one of them being an experienced surfer and solo traveler. He pretty much planned the whole trip and I was just kind of along for the ride.

So we stayed in a small tourist surfer town called Tamarindo. It is a really beautiful town with a beautiful beach that just so happens to be right next to the mouth of a river, creating brackish waters where apparently crocodiles love to hang out. To give you a feel for how close/far I was to the mouth; if you are facing the beach in the middle of it, on your right 200 yards down the beach is the mouth. Every 75 yards moving from the river to the left are jetties (a large line of rocks going out to sea) and they create about 4 areas to surf between the jetties. We were two sections over from the river surfing, pretty much worry free because the croc's don't really like pure salt water.

So I'm sitting in the water on a nine foot board, and I feel something hard brush my leg. I thought it was just some rock or something. I look down and all I see is this MASSIVE tail that's obviously connected to a behemoth of a crocodile.

So a few things went through my mid really quickly as soon as I first sighted the croc;

First: You're about to get fucked, tell your friend to swim to safety. Had a friend sitting on a board about 15 yards away so I told him to swim to shore as calmly as possible.

Second: You're about to get fucked, better pray so if heavens real u can snag that last minute ticket in. Went something like "Please god don't let me die, Please god don't let me die, Please god don't let me die!"

Third: You're about to get fucked, but maybe you won't if you put your legs on the board and pretend like ur driftwood. So I put my legs up and slowly paddled with nothing but my hands on either side super slowly cause I didn't wanna make any splashes.

So flash forward about 10 seconds and I see the crocodile under me. I mean the WHOLE crocodile. Head to toe this thing was a foot longer than my board and wider... keep in mind I'm riding a 9 foot board and THATS NOT INCLUDING THE TAIL!!!

So it circles me one full time after the first sighting, and then just goes under me and out to sea...

I had never experienced raw fear until this moment. Feeling like your being hunted by an apex predator is something else.

So I swam back as fast as possible to where the other surfers were grouped and tried for a few min to convince them of what I saw but I wasn't giving them a very good account cause I was pretty shaken up.

Swam back to shore and sat on the sand for the next two hours contemplating life. All in all pretty solid vacation.

Username: TheCooch21

So I used to have dreadlocks and I eventually cut them off because they messed with my sleep. One such incident goes like this.. I was visiting my parents and staying downstairs in the guest room. I mention this only because that's where Harry lives.

Harry is my mother's affectionate name for the friendly huntsman who has moved in and has been 'helping out with keeping the other spiders away' (kinda like why the ghost busters keep Slimer around I guess).

But it turns out, Harry's a piece a shit. He just hangs out menacingly close, and follows you from room to room like a cat you don't want. Always on the wall around head height, and you catch him in your periferies all the time and he'll just start sprinting for no reason and you mildly freak out.

Anyway I don't really mind Harry because he's just a huntsman and does actually help out with other bugs. So I turn the lights off and go to sleep, Harry's on the wall above me and to my right somewhere. So everybody knows where this is going by now.

Pleasant sleep until I wake up to a tickling sensation and think it's just the rediculous white boy dreadlocks I had at the time touching my arm. Slow realisation... they are whiteboy dreadlocks and surely aren't long enough to reach my hand on my belly... It's fucken Harry. So I get shivered and flick him off into the darkness quick smart.

Turn the light on and sure enough there's Harry, piss bolting along the floor from where I threw him, up to the wall on the other side of the room. Now I like spiders as much as anyone and I'm not scared of them, but like everyone loves their nan yeah?

But if you woke up at night and she had scuttled down off the wall where you had left her and crawled on top of you, you'd freak out too. So it was a little while before the adrenaline had settled enough to turn the lights back off and go to sleep...

Now there's this one deadlock that constantly flips over onto my face and tickles my nose and mouth (no hair is worth this btw). So that happens about two or three times through the night and I have a mild hearto thinking it's Harry again. But it isn't.

So I go to remove this piece of shit from my face for the fourth time, mostly asleep. And it's like in my mouth and nose and then it runs up my fucking arm! Straight back to my face 😂

So this time I flip out and yell and turn the lights on, and fuck Harry off again and tell him that if he touches me again he'd better kill me because I shan't be putting up with this kind of dickery! 'If you are on my skin or more time you've made your choice' I yelled.

I then heroicly stomped upstairs and went to sleep in my tiny childhood bed and haven't slept downstairs since. My mum still gives me shit about Harry.

Username: Billybones801

My first most terrifying animal encounter was actually just a dog. I was 12 years old and taking my new puppy for a walk. A skinny little (at the time) afghan mix that was more legs than brains. I'd been through the woods across from my house a hundred times, it was part of the local park and there was nothing scary about it.

But we had a new family on the street, and they had brought with them two extremely vicious rottweilers. Their property was bordered by a short chainlink fence, and apparently it was no problem for the dogs to hop it.

To paint the scene, I was on a path in the woods, up on a short hill that looked down on the back of the houses from my street. There was a stream between the park property and a stretch of open grass that ran behind the houses. All told, the rottweiler was about 50 feet from me.

He was snarling and barking at us, but I wasn't worried until he hopped the fence and started coming for us. I picked up my puppy and started to run, but the rottweiler stopped at the stream. It was barely half a foot deep, he could have crossed it easily and I had no idea if he was going to try, so I turned off the path into the woods and started running straight for the park where there might be people.

Fortunately the rottweiler didn't continue after us, but I don't know what I could have done if he had. Running and staying put would have been equally dangerous, and I don't know that I could have climbed any of the trees around me. There are few times in my life I recall being so terrified.

The second encounter happened while I was snorkeling in the Florida Keys. I decided to forego an actual snorkel because they never seem to work right for me, so I was only wearing flippers and a mask. I would just pop my head up and take a breath and then continue looking around.

I was floating along at the edge of a drop off, by myself, when I brought my head up to get a breath. I come back down and find myself face to face with a *huge* ray. There was like half a second that felt stretched out into infinity where we both froze, and then I jolted and he jolted and I turned around while he booked it down over the edge of the drop off.

I must have walked on water back to the boat. The guys pulled me in asking what happened, had I seen a shark?

I catch my breath, sitting soaking wet on the deck of the boat, and gasping I tell them "No, ray."

It's hard to still be scared when people are laughing at you.

(I know and knew at the time that stingrays are not dangerous unless you're in physical contact with them, but that didn't make suddenly finding myself a foot and a half from one any less shocking in the moment.)

Username: eclecticsed

My first job with the electric company that I work for was a meter reader. This meant going in to peoples back yards most days and getting a manual read on their electric meter.

We had set routes and did them month after month so I got to be pretty familiar with the dogs and which houses to avoid and simply leave a note saying the homeowner would need to call in their reading.

We also had a way of inputting into our electronic handheld which houses had dogs and which had "bad dogs". Of course on this day I was doing a new route in the middle of July on a 100 degree day. I'm close to the end of my ~10 mile walk and a note pops up on my handheld that simply says "dog".

This normally means its a friendly dog or at worst a little ankle biter that doesn't pose much of a threat. I go to the backyard and there's an 8' privacy fence surrounding the whole place. Wiggle the gate, let out a whistle, and listen. Hearing no dog I figure it's safe and that it's inside.

Go in, close the gate behind me, and creep around the house and see there's no dog. Great. Get to the meter which is just in front of the deck and I hear it. This dog is going crazy inside and he's got the bark of The Beast from sandlot.

Luckily for me he's locked up inside. At least until the owner, who must've been fed up with him barking, decides to open the sliding door and let him out. I'll never forget hearing that familiar slide of the door and the sheer panic that entered my body.

I take off running. The dog, which I can see now to be a giant German Shephard, is in full sprint. I know there's no chance of me opening the gate before being torn to shreds so I'm going over this 8' privacy fence somehow.

I get to the fence, throw my stuff over and jump and sort of fall/slide over.

I land on the other side thankful to be alive. My clothes are torn to shreds. I'm bleeding from about everywhere, sweat running into my fresh scrapes burning like hell. I decide to go knock on the door to confront the home owner who was completely oblivious to what just happened.

Knock on the door and a guy wearing a OPPD shirt opens the door. I tell him what happened as I'm visibly distraught. He proceeds to inform me that the dog is a Police K9 and if it had caught me wouldn't have stopped until he called him off me.

Escaped the ER if not death that day. He gave me some water and cool towel to clean up. I updated the notes to "bad dog" and took the rest of the day off.

Username: scottjew

I got stalked by a wolf when I was in high school. I lived in a relatively small town (<11,000 people) in the middle of Missouri. Pretty country by all accounts.

We lived near the edge of town and at the end of the cul-de-sac we lived on was a small lake with a couple of hiking trails that ran up around it. I used to go walk the trails on days I was bored and particularly like this one that looped around the back of the lake and ended at a pretty steep decline back towards my house.

I remember seeing evidence of some animal having been taken down towards the head of the trail, but we had deer and bobcats and all kinds of animals so I didn't really think anything of it.

Walked on, enjoying the day, but every once in a while I would hear a twig snap or some leaved crunch or something off the trail to the right of me. Again, wooded area, animals, generally didn't think anything of it.

Until I came to the top of the trail and looked down towards the lake, where I saw the den and the handful of what looked like pups milling about and the one very obvious wolf that was with them.

With no evidence to back up this theory I decided I was being followed by a wolf and that I was done with this hike, so I beat a hasty retreat to the end of the trail.

The decline that I would go down wasn't technically part of the trail, but it cut straight toward by house and I had used it enough to wear a little path along it's route, but it was remarkably steep. About halfway down it I stopped because I really had to pee and, since I was the only one of the trail, decided to just handle my business there.

In the middle of what was probably the longest pee of my life I heard something crunch behind and above me, then I heard the sniff and felt the breath. I froze as whatever it was looked me over and checked me out.

I never turned around, but during the examination it very slowly pushed it's obviously canid snout past my shoulder into my peripheral vision, so I had a pretty good idea that it was indeed the wolf I thought was following me.

I finished peeing, it finished sniffing, and we both stood there for what felt like an eternity. Eventually I heard it walk off and, once I was sure it was gone, I hauled ass to my house faster than I ever have and phoned the state department of conservation.

They said they had received reports of wolf sightings in the last few weeks and would send someone up to check it out. A couple of weeks later the trails were closed, so I guess they found them.

Username: TheSkinnyD

My father and I are avid scuba divers and do quite a bit of spear fishing.

A couple years ago we were diving off the Palm Beach County coast in Florida in approximately 60 foot of crystal clear water.

Late in the dive I was nearly out of air but my father was still very much on the hunt. He had just shot a giant mutton snapper and was struggling to remove the spear and get it on his stringer. I had about 150psi of air left and signaled I needed to go up without him.

I’m about 15 foot off the sea floor when a 8-10 foot tiger shark swam directly beneath me and headed straight for my father who had his back turned. I started grunting and screaming at the top of my lungs trying to get his attention.

He finally turned to look up at me and I gave the signal for shark. He looked to his left and then right, saw nothing and shrugged at me. He went back to his work with the mutton snapper.

By now the tiger shark had circled behind him again out of sight. My father now has the mutton snapper on his stringer, which is literally at his waist, and the tiger shark knowing it’s an easy meal went for the grab.

What happened next was like something from a movie. The tiger shark began thrashing his head with the mutton snapper in his mouth which, by the way, is still attached to my dad. I saw my dad begin to flail about violently and throwing underwater punches at the shark’s head.

I wanted to go help him but by this point if I do I’m a dead man. I simply don’t have the air left. I continued my ascent wondering if the last time I’d ever see my father again was him doing battle with a tiger shark. He’s a seasoned diver and not his first run in with sharks so I had some faith.

I surfaced and the boat came to pick me up. I grabbed on to the ladder and informed our group of what happened, I asked that we stay in the area hopefully waiting on my dad. My adrenaline was still in high gear and I needed to pee. I clung to the ladder, trying to cool down, and relieved myself.

I took my gear off, tossed it into the boat, climbed the ladder and when I turned to raise the ladder a 5 to 6 foot hammerhead shark was in the water exactly where I had just left.

Needless to say it was an eventful day full of sharks. My father survived and most importantly prevented the tiger from eating his mutton. We got to eat it instead. I’ll come back and edit this post with photos if I can figure out how.

Username: TheDengar8YourBobby