What animals have you seen on your rides?

[youngoldbloke]

On the quiet straight stretches of two of the lanes I frequently ride I'm often preceded by a barn owl, flying maybe 10 - 15 yards ahead, above head height. It's as if it has been waiting for someone to turn up, and then flies ahead until the road bends when it disappears over the hedge. This in daytime. Perhaps my passage disturbs small creatures hiding in the roadside undergrowth.

 

[Regular.Cyclist]

The usual UK animals, various deer, hares, rabbits, foxes, badgers, otters, donkeys, horses, loads of birds including pheasant, oystercatchers, heron, plus a few animals on my travels, wild elephants, water buffalo, crocodiles, Ceylon blue-eared kingfisher.

 

[cougie uk]

I often see elephants when i use the bike path through the zoo.

 

[fritz katzenjammer]

I almost hit a turkey with my Vespa a few years back, that woke me up.

 

[C R]

I almost hit a turkey with my Vespa a few years back, that woke me up.

I've had pheasants flying at me, though no hits yet, hitting a turkey might be a bit of a different level of damage, though.

The scariest I've had was a deer bounding across the road in the dark just ahead of me. If it had been a second later it would have wiped me out.

 

[fritz katzenjammer]

I've had pheasants flying at me, though no hits yet, hitting a turkey might be a bit of a different level of damage, though.

The scariest I've had was a deer bounding across the road in the dark just ahead of me. If it had been a second later it would have wiped me out.

I once came over a hill on the Trans Canada highway to find a caribou crossing the road. I was going about 70mph in a small Nissan at the time and so would have got his butt right in the windshield if we’d made contact. I just manage to stop in time, crossways on the highway with all four tires smoking.

My wife and kids were all snoozing when this happened. The kids started crying when I told them what happened because they didn’t get to see the caribou. My wife just gave me that wide eyed look you get from someone who realizes how close they just came to loosing it all.

 

[TheDoctor]

Probably a skink. I was rather surprised because I didn't know lizards had made it to NZ. I once saw penguins from my bike, but I was cycling past Whipsnade at the time. Lucky it wasn't polar bears or wallabies, I suppose.

 

[Jenkins]

All the usual deer, badger, hawks, buzzards, etc as already seen my many above but also farmed alpacas and a sight of one of the ospreys in flight while on a circuit of Rutland Water.

 

[Illaveago]

Here are a couple of pictures of the Peregrine Falcon. It was lucky that I was carrying a camera with me that day.

 

[sevenfourate]

UK’er here. Often see Birds of prey, Foxes, Deer, Herons etc in my semi-rural location in Suffolk. This week I’m in Fuerteventura - and this Morning we took a bike ride up the coast **especially to go see some ground squirrels. They look like Chipmonks. But they are ground squirrels apparently……

**Not me in the pic. But I do sport the same hairstyle: so you don’t have to use your imagination 🤣🤣

 

[cougie uk]

Probably a skink. I was rather surprised because I didn't know lizards had made it to NZ. I once saw penguins from my bike, but I was cycling past Whipsnade at the time. Lucky it wasn't polar bears or wallabies, I suppose.

Oh this little fella scared the bejesus out of me as I built my bike up in the garden after traveling to Australia with it.
Thanks for letting me know he lived in the rain drain guys !!

 

[Supersuperleeds]

Had six swans fly low over me this morning as I went over the canal and they came in to land on the canal. They must have been 25 foot in the air.

I've actually ducked before when one came over the same bridge a bit too low, it must have only cleared me by about 6 foot as it is coming down, I've no idea how it didn't clip the bridge.

 

[Gillstay]

Nothing special. Live mammals - squirrels, rats, deer, badgers, rabbits, foxes, a brown wiggly stoaty thing. And also dead examples of all of those except the stoaty one. And one squirrel that was alive before doubling back under my wheels and probably not after the bump-bump of both wheels going over it.

Birds of interest, both on the same ride, coincidentally - A peacock running clumsily down a lane in Kent. A small bird of prey, a kestrel I think, that came and flew alongside and ahead of me, flicking from side to side, low and very close. Perhaps it was expecting me to alarm a mouse or two into breaking cover.

That would be a sparrow hawk using you as cover for its ambush approach of small birds in the hedges.

 

[Gillstay]

Got very close to a Goshawk once which was fabulous. Realised on a route near Bishops castle that if you wizzed down this tight lane all the sparrows came out of the hedges both sides and you ended up cycling along in the middle of a flock of sparrows. Got my young son to do it and he loved it.

 

[sevenfourate]

Not on my ride. As todays ride is on foot 🤣 Around an interactive wildlife park. Fascinating in a way no zoo etc I’ve ever been to has been. These were fun ! (Below) ***Not sure how ‘good’ this really is for the animals though…...