So what do you guys do if a Moray Eel bites you? Is it hospital worthy, or do you just suffer for a bit?
I’m going to have to be more thoughtful about mucking about in rivers… although I’m reading right now that they’ve been declining in dammed rivers and that’s most of what we have here.
There exists a video of a moray eel tearing off a man’s thumb. Otherwise, even the lesser of the wounds they can inflict will mess you up and may require anesthetic to offset infection
Never fails, eh? For some reason, poison ivy doesn’t bother me. I’ve tramped through bush in my shorts all my life, and have never knowingly had it. My son got a bad case of it once, but I don’t even really know what it looks like.
EDIT - “what the plant looks like”.
I used to be immune to poison oak but one day I was riding a horse and we had gone through a poison oak patch. I let the horse run on the way back and ended up getting a chaffed spot on the inside of my knee and my pants rubbed the poison oak residue into the abraded skin. I had a rash for weeks and now I can’t touch it without breaking out. So be careful and don’t let it get into any cuts.
I agree, accipters can be fearsome having been dive-bombed (but not hurt)
myself by a Northern Goshawk near their nest, in the summer.
I’m surprised that your Sharp-shinned used a nest in midwinter.
As long as I can remember, I’ve had a fear of bears. I don’t like seeing pictures of them, I don’t like thinking about them, I never wanted a stuffed bear as a child (despite having stuffed animals of virtually every other species in existence, including kangaroos and narwhales). I had nightmares about bears as a kid constantly.
We had them come around our property now and then, but they always ran off when approached and never seemed threatening - so one day I mentioned to my mother how strange it was that I should be so scared of them. She gave me a funny look and said, “What, you don’t remember?”
Apparently when I was about 2, and my family lived in a bus in the woods, a bear came into the yard and was trying to break into our outdoor pantry, so my mom went running outside with a broom to chase it off, as was her habit. But this bear … didn’t run. Instead, it decided to chase BACK. She barely made it back into the bus in time, and then we all sat inside while a big-ass bear rocked the bus back and forth as it tried to rip through the metal siding panels. Eventually it got bored and gave up.
I have zero memory of this, but it apparently left a big impression on my subconscious, because I still hate them.
Another time, I got stalked by a mountain lion when I was walking home from school as a kid. I had about a mile of forested dirt road to traverse, and I kept glimpsing movement on the hill above me, keeping pace with me as I walked. It seemed to be trying to match its footsteps to mine so I wouldn’t hear the crunches in the leaves. Never got a proper look at it, but we found the tracks later.
More recently, my mom and I were hiking and accidentally got in between two groups of feral pigs that were in the brush on both sides of our trail, and were charged and briefly chased by a group of about 20 of them. Fortunately they dropped the pursuit as soon as we weren’t between them and the other pigs any more.
One time I came within a couple inches of stepping on an enormous rattlesnake, and had to hold perfectly still and pray it would just crawl off without biting me (it eventually did, but it was a tense couple of minutes).
Ah yes, fire ant attacks. There have been a few times when I was standing in tall grass, photographing something, not realizing that I’m standing on a fire ant mound. One time the ants got into my pants before I noticed them biting me. I took off my pants, shoes, and socks, then ran up and down a park road screaming expletives while brushing ants off me. Luckily, no one was around to see me. ;p
Last year I had a rattlesnake I hadn’t noticed rattle in the grass between my feet. I didn’t decide to jump, I just jumped, about two feet up and four feet backwards, which I don’t think I could do if I tried. The snake never moved, just kept rattling. I did have 14 inch high boots and thick pants on, but I was still glad it opted for communication over violence.
I once woke from a nap, when I had left the back door open, to find a Sharp-shinned Hawk chasing my kitten into my bedroom. I sat bolt upright and the hawk fled into the kitchen. Another few seconds and the kitten would have been lunch.
For me the moray bite was like being slashed with a razor blade several times (several straight, quite deep cuts). It bleed a lot, but the cuts were clean and tidy, and its teeth were so sharp it didn’t hurt much. It was only a little eel though, so it was only a small wound on my hand. I just put antiseptic on it and bandaged it up, and that was it.
They aren’t always aggressive though. I’ve seen many under the water diving and have never been threatened by them. Once I even held on to some coral rubble while I took a picture of something and looked down at my hand, and there was a head of a giant moray right beside it! It must have seen I wasn’t tasty. It gave me a fright though!
Both my bites were minor- the eel was going for some food in my hand, rather than trying to defend itself or viciously attacking me. they were just large holes oozing blood. I just washed out the wound, put antibacterial cream on to prevent infection and keep exploring!
Your mom sounds like one awesome woman!
You quickly jump away and strip off your shoe and sock and swat off any that got up past that. Just leave your shoe and sock there for a while and they will eventually go back in their nest and you can get your shoe and sock back. If you see someone walking around outside with one shoe and sock missing, “Step in an ant pile?” “Yes…” An ant pile is automatically assumed to be fire ants since other ants in the area don’t make above ground nests that are piles of dirt.
PS It’s really bad if you are wearing sandals. You will hear the person making lots of noises and swearing and hopping on one leg trying to get them off their other foot.
OMG!!! 
I’m glad your kitty was okay.
Early last year I very nearly could have stepped on a baby timber rattler. It never rattled, it didn’t move a muscle. Luckily I was staring down at the ground as I walked looking for very well camouflaged orchids.
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/38944654 (snake)
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/38944655 (orchid)
Neither are particularly harrowing, but
I’ve almost stepped on rattlesnakes multiple times, the closest being my first and only Crotalus pyrrhus. I was hiking with my then-girlfriend-now-wife Danielle, kueda, and some other friends when Danielle said “snake!” as my foot was coming down on it. Luckily I was able to step over it and not on it. It rattled a few times and sped under the nearest scrub, where we spent some time trying and failing to get good shots of it. (Ken-ichi got much better photos) Anyhoo, they’ve had numerous reasons to bite me but never have, showing how little they care to do so.
Growing up on the east shore of O’ahu, I’ve been stung by Portuguese Man O’ War (Physalia physalis) many times, but the worst was coming up under one while I was swimming breaststroke. It wrapped around my neck then stung my hands as I was trying to take it off me. Not fun.
I was returning with a big snapping turtle in a bin in the back of my SUV during a road survey when I looked in the rear view mirror and saw a giant clawed foot coming slowly over the back seat. It was followed by the rest of a 25 pound, fighting mad snapper. By the time I stopped she had fallen between the seats and backed under the back seat, which meant the only way to remove her was from the front. She didn’t care for that. We didn’t care for that. It took three people, several garden implements and a lot of swearing to get her out. We bought new bins with better lids and some new garden tools the next day. Most didn’t survive the snapper onslaught.
Wow! So many stories!! It’s been interesting reading about all of these encounters with so many different organisms from all over the world! I didn’t read through any experiences including a crocodilian so here’s mine…
I live in South Florida and, thanks to iNaturalist of course, became interested in searching for wild orchids a couple years ago. Fakahatchee Strand is definitely the best place in all of the United States for finding the most species but on this August day (peak wet season), I opted for Bear Island under the guidance of a local botanist. I invited a friend who was equally eager to go on a swamp hike and off we went.
We had been walking in the swamp for a couple hours and were probably around 2km from the main trail, encountering water of various depths, including up to our bellies. As we hiked deeper into the swamp, we were using a walking stick to probe for submerged cypress “knees” (https://images.fineartamerica.com/images/artworkimages/mediumlarge/1/swamp-cypress-knees-carol-groenen.jpg) that come up out of the ground and are very easy to trip on. Alligators and snakes are less of an issue as they usually sense you and leave before you approach.
As we were walking in knee-deep water, I suddenly felt something push back hard against my walking stick and knew something was very wrong… I screamed “WHAT THE ****?” and in an instant saw the contrasting white mouth of a 4-5ft alligator against the black water. Thankfully this gator was only trying to scare me off and obviously succeeded. My friend was right behind me and was just as horrified by the experience as I was… I got several other shots of adrenaline with every cypress knee I bumped with my stick or feet on the long walk back to the trail. I had ALL THE CONFIDENCE IN THE WORLD that we would not have a close encounter with an alligator but it just so happened to be our lucky day. I have since walked in swamps many times and haven’t had anything like that happen again. I did almost walk into a big gator last summer (facing me on the trail) but thankfully saw it before I got too close and it showed no interest in moving as I approached. Here’s a link so you can see how hard to spot it was! https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/53807962
Unlike this alligator out in the open on the trail, the alligator that I walked into at Bear Island was completely submerged and in the shade of a close cypress forest.
Thanks for reading :-)
I have, multiple times, run head first into a snapping turtle in the middle of pond in New York State. It is quite a shock when you think you are hundreds of feet from anything and then ram into something large and rock hard, and then feel that large rock pivot and dive.
I can name two experiences from my end. The first one chronologically is too good so here’s the second. A couple years ago, I was doing a normal routine walk to my local cemetery. It’s a great place to look for birds and I did this about twice a week. Well, on this fateful day, I was on my back and I spotted a dog down a driveway sniffing away in a fenceless yard. Next thing I know, I had 5 pit bulls stalking him down the road, and they always matched my pace. Eventually, I couldn’t take it any more and I bolted the street and leaped over an 8-foot chain-link fence, into the private school’s playground. I evaded the chasing dogs by a couple steps. Though it was scary, I’m more shocked I got over the fence with such ease.
My most horrifying experience was in the Spanish Peaks of southwest Montana. I was about 10 years old and I was hiking with my family. We trailblazed some time on the east side of Spanish Creek (also the side of the campground) for a couple hours before taking the trail on the west side. We are about half a mile down the trail at the most and my brother (6 years old) keeps tugging my dad’s sleeve asking fearfully if we’ll see a bear. Reassurance did him little good. Eventually we stopped and looked behind us and my two older sisters and mother were not in sight (apparently they were taking pictures of “weird” mushrooms). At that moment, the calm environment was broken by a echoing crack, similar to that of a tree following down. In the space of probably two seconds, I whipped my head up the trail, saw claws extending towards me and I turned tail chasing my brother’s heels. After the initial fear and realizing we left my dad behind, it turned out it was yearling Grizzly Bear tearing open a fallen log, only fifteen feet from where we initially stood. It turned into a fun experience but I’m telling you, when I saw those claws reaching for me, actually the log, I thought that was end and that’s the worst image a 10 year old can see.
