What the closest face-to-face encounters you've had with animals while hunting?

[Drenalin]

That poor snake was just looking up thinking to its self what an ASS and then the lights went out!
Say it did bite you on the Ass, think your Hunting buddy would have sucked the poison out ?
You know that is how the Lone Ranger died, got bit taking a dump and Tonto told him to go to hell !

My brother was along that day, and I can confidently say he would have let me die. My fury in dispatching the snake caught him totally off guard, and might have scared him more than the snake scared me - he was about arms’ distance away when I went off.

 

[Capn]

Lots of close encounters with wild hogs around here. I killed one with a pocket knife and one with a flounder gig when I was younger and dumber. Have nearly stepped on them in the dark many times hiking in. Most hair raising was settling into a stand of cane before daylight as a makeshift ground blind, and having a sounder of 30+ come in silent in the moonlight. Black shapes moving all around me in all directions. Drew and shot one at about 5ft in the dark with no light. I thought they would all run off, but no. The sound of 30+ jaws clacking teeth and tusks and snarling, in the moonlight, all within 15 yards, is something I will never forget. They could not find me, and I could not find a tree to climb. It was a tense, and LOUD, few minutes. They finally bailed out full bore, with some coming so close I could feel the cane moving. won't ever forget it.

 

[robtattoo]

Hunting in a ghillie suit I've had a javelina bite my boot & a grey fox take a shit right next to me.

 

[sneaky]

Had elk at different times come up and sniff me leaned up against a tree. Had a whitetail within 3 feet on the ground. Nothing too terribly exciting.

Sent from my SM-G955U using Tapatalk

 

[kaboku68]

I almost had a large Mountain Grizzly (at least 8ft bear) take my ass on a lateral moraine two years ago. I had left my rifle with my pack as I was trying to get a plan to cross the glacier. I stepped around the corner of a pingo and the bear was up on his hind feet about four feet away, locked right on me. I had an orange jacket on and said the nastiest thing that I could think of(Hillary Clinton) and backed away, yelling all the time, working my way to the rifle. I was right on the edge of a 300 ft edge of the lateral moraine so the bear did not want to try to bum rush me. He knew that we would both go over. But when I took a step back, he would take a step forward. Finally he went down to all fours and was looking to see how he could get me off that ledge. I had worked the 50 yards to my rifle while he was growling and popping his jaws. It was early on the hunt so I didn't want to pack his hide and hams off of the mountain so I sent a round right by his ears and lowered the crosshairs right on him. He blasted out of there and I could see him moving at top speed about 2 miles away. I later found that he had killed a sow and cub grizzly and was feeding on the carcasses about 450 yards down the glacier.

 

[Outdoor Writer]

I've had closer encounters with all sorts of things, but the one I'll most remember:

Slipped in on some feeding elk in some timber. Got kinda caught in the open, more open timber, and a group of cows calves and spikes fed into me and my buddies. I was kneeled on a knee and they were lying flat on the ground. Closest one got was maybe 8 feet. I could hear all the breathing and sniffing and biting and chewing. I got so amped I almost passed out, vision started closing in, and I had to flex my abdominal muscles like a fighter pilot to keep it together.

You jogged my recall a bit. This happened on an archery elk hunt during the 90s when I was with Cory Richardson & my friend Kurt vonBesser, owner of Atsko (Snoseal).

The a herd of cows, calves and a shootable bull were in the middle of a big meadow about 200 yards from the thicker stuff. It was turn to 'shoot,' so Kurt waited in the trees while Corky and I crawled across the meadow on our bellies to reach the only decent size tree -- a 3-ft. tall pinion. About 1/2 way there, we looked up and saw a cow and calf headed directly toward us. So we buried our faces in the grass and laid perfectly still for what seemed like an eternity. We could literally hear the crunching of their hooves as the two elk passed within a mere few FEET of us. They then walked into the trees, passing within feet of Kurt, who had been watching it all unfold. He said if Corky had rolled over he would have been stepped on. I eventually missed the bull by parting the hair on his back because we over estimated the distance by 10 yds.

And later -- when I returned by myself to the unit to hunt the last day of the season -- I had an even funnier thing happen as a nice 6x6 and I tried to stare each other down for at least a minute at 5 yards apart. And I even had a cigarette in my mouth at the time!

I had driven up the night before, parked in an area where I could hunt right there and spent the night in my camper shell. Before it got light the next morning, I had two cups of coffee from my thermos, then unpacked my gear and got ready. While I was still standing next to the truck, I let loose with a bugle and got an immediate answer from a bull that probably was less than 1/4 mile away. BUT, the wind was terrible, blowing right from me to where he was.

I decided to skirt around and approach him from the side, get close and then cow call. So I detoured to the left about 200 yards and followed the edge of treeline to where I thought I was at least even or slightly behind him. Then I began moving back to the right. I hadn't gone 30 yards and just stepped out from behind a pinion when the bull did the same from the other side of the same tree! At this point, the wind was blowing in my face. The bull stopped dead in his tracks and so did I -- with a cigarette stupidly dangling from my lips, my bow at my side and every arrow neatly in its place within the bow quiver. There we stood -- staring at each other. Doh!!! Now what??

First thing I did is gently spit the cig to the ground and move my boot on top of it. Next, I started to slowly bring the bow in front of me without raising it so I could maybe get an arrow out of the quiver with my other hand. So far, so good. Just as I finally pulled the nock end of the arrow loose from the rubber dealie, the bull decided to take two steps forward and stop behind another tree. Then as I got the arrow all the way loose and started to put it on the string, he moved again, this time getting more parallel to me. Two more steps, and he now had the wind in HIS favor. His eyes suddenly got really big, his nostrils flared and his neck hair appeared to stand erect. Within a couple seconds, he was 100 yds away in the meadow. I cow called and stopped him, though. He looked back at me, and I could swear I saw his head shake like he was saying, "No way, pal. I already know what you are."

 

[TheGDog]

n00b Question: For you Elk guys who've had close encounters... When it's real close, do they ever get pissy and aggressive with the hunter? Like if the wind changes direction, or if he sees you move?

And If they do decide to go aggro on you, what do you do besides shoot it or try to climb a tree?

 

[EastHumboldt]

n00b Question: For you Elk guys who've had close encounters... When it's real close, do they ever get pissy and aggressive with the hunter? Like if the wind changes direction, or if he sees you move?

And If they do decide to go aggro on you, what do you do besides shoot it or try to climb a tree?

Show them your elk tag. While they are busy trying to decipher whether you’re in the correct unit, quietly slip away. ( they are very slow readers and usually confused about which unit they are in)

 

[Outdoor Writer]

n00b Question: For you Elk guys who've had close encounters... When it's real close, do they ever get pissy and aggressive with the hunter? Like if the wind changes direction, or if he sees you move?

And If they do decide to go aggro on you, what do you do besides shoot it or try to climb a tree?

I've never had one get agressive while HUNTING but have when taking photos. See #73 in this thread.

 

[TraderMike]

I had two different 5x5 bulls within 12-16 feet of me, looking for love. One encounter had my buddy standing right next to me to witness the event and that was very cool. Most exciting encounter was using the muzzle of my shotgun to separate a very pissed off badger from my lab. Badger lost that fight...

 

[HuntHarder]

On an archery hunt a few years back, my buddy called in a 5x5 that proceeded to piss so close to me that it got on my pants. I could literally feel the splatter and his bugle shook me to the core it was so loud. As he approached I knew it was not a shooter, so I sat still, wind was perfect and I tucked into the juniper as deep as I could get. He stopped literally 2-3' from me and let out an enormous bugle and starting pissing all over himself and me. haha

 

[ODB]

I was hunting turkeys once and happened to see a lovely coyote running off to my left. When I turned around, his mate was running straight toward me, in full hi-pro-glo mode, tongue lolling out - the biggest, most full-coat coyote i've ever seen. He simply didn't see me but was looking right through me. I said, "HEY!" and he shit himself and turned 90 degrees about 3 feet from me. I could have easily hit him with my shotgun barrel. That was awesome. Then I went and killed a turkey that afternoon - win/win.

 

[Britt-dog]

I hit an aggressive black bear in the head with my water bottle once. he was huffing and started to climb the tree I was in.

 

[Outdoor Writer]

This is my only 'close' encounter with a deer that happened decades ago.

I was hunting on the North Kaibab along a canyon rim & busted a 4x4 buck out of the bottom. My first shot as he was running up the opposite side of canyon, hit him in a rear leg, breaking it. He then turned and went down into and toward the head of the canyon. I snapped off another shot but missed. The canyon side I was on was steep & nasty, so it took me a while to work my way down to the bottom. I immediately found his tracks in the soft sand, along with blood and even a few bits of bone.

As I followed the obvious sign, the canyon turned a bit to the left, narrowed and was now about as wide as dirt two-track. I started around the curve and here the buck came, head down, bad leg and all, headed on the dead run right at me. Fortunately, I was carrying my gun at my side but didn't even have time to raise it. So I shot from the hip at his chest. He fell about five feet from me.

After I dressed & quartered the deer, I found out why it had doubled back. When I walked farther up the narrow canyon on my way to camp, the walls became steep rock faces & a slide of big boulders had sealed off the end. So with no escape route, the buck had headed back my way. I also had to turn around & take another route out.

 

[Sherman]

Opening day, pheasant, I bent over to pick up a rooster, heard a rustling coming toward me from the side, looked over and my black lab pup, Sadie, layed a wet one up the side of my face.

 

[b0nes]

Not hunting, I worked for adfg for a couple summers on the outlet of Ugashik lake. We were cooking one morning and we had a tip out window right after over the stove. A brown bear cub stood up and stuck his whole head in the window which was easily 8 feet off the ground and I picked up an unopened can of soup and bounced it right off his face. Kneejerk reaction. We dealt with bears every day for 45 days each summer. The scariest was we would be seigne netting and the cracker shells(m80’s in a shotgun shell) quit fazing the bears. They gave 0 ***** when you have 500 sockeye in a 10’ by 10’ square area on the gravel shoreline.

 

[Scoony]

Walked up on a button buck snoozing. I thought it was dead at first and as it was deer season, started to look around for who ever might have shot him. Wish I had my camera out. As I am standing right over him, he suddenly got up. Shaked off the groggyness and wobbled off. Never paid me any attention.

 

[mattyharge]

While sitting in a tree stand one evening as it was getting close to dark I caught movement from my right through the trees. Coming at me very quickly I realize it's a large owl. I was wearing a face mask and the only things sticking out were my eyeballs. He got within about 5 feet and at the last second realized I wasn't prey and landed in a branch just above me. Freaked me out. I'm glad I didn't learn what owl talons to the face feel like.

 

[TheGDog]

As I followed the obvious sign, the canyon turned a bit to the left, narrowed and was now about as wide as dirt two-track. I started around the curve and here the buck came, head down, bad leg and all, headed on the dead run right at me. Fortunately, I was carrying my gun at my side but didn't even have time to raise it. So I shot from the hip at his chest. He fell about five feet from me.

Ooh... that makes me flashback to that recent pic of the dude who didn't properly make sure his nice WhiteTail was all the way dead and it shanked his scalp somethin' fierce. Strong work with the from-the-hip shot!

 

[Outdoor Writer]

Ooh... that makes me flashback to that recent pic of the dude who didn't properly make sure his nice WhiteTail was all the way dead and it shanked his scalp somethin' fierce. Strong work with the from-the-hip shot!

He was so close, it was like I couldn't miss. I only realized what had just happened when I needed to change my drawers.