I’ve seen lots of crazy stuff honestly. Once I was on my back porch watching the mockingbirds and I see one come swooping down across the yard. Hot on it’s tail is this hawk that just pins it to the ground, grabs it and carries it off. It happened so fast I had no chance to go inside and get my camera.
Another was when I fished a Green Anole who had fallen into a full rain barrel. I was taking photos of him on the rim when he turned and looked at me. I don’t know what it was but we made eye contact and I just knew what was about to happen. All I managed to do was choke out a “no don’t.” He leaped through the air and landed right on me. I got him to perch on my hand instead of my chest and moved him somewhere safer. Such a diva haha The photos I took of the guy (I lost a bunch of photos awhile back so I had to post them today even if some were 2 years old oops)
My undergrad advisor told me a similar story once! He watched a bullfrog swallow a newt only to flop over dead a few moments later, at which point the newt crawled its way out of the frog’s mouth.
A coworker and I were once birding in NW Minnesota and found out that a Geo Metro’s horn sounded just like the Marbled Godwit standing in the road. The darn bird spent 5 minutes walking around the car trying to find his rival.
And the rat snake design expert who was exploring my assortment of things left on the back deck in pursuit of RT hummingbirds and E. phoebe nestlings. That I followed it with camera and video and it didn’t seem to care or try to make a run (slither) for it was a very cool experience:
One more–I swear it happened. I woke one night and could not fall back asleep because I couldn’t shake the feeling someone was watching even though I knew I was alone. Finally, I reached over and turned the light on. Sitting atop my pillow looking down at me was a small katydid. I caught it, released it outdoors, and then went peacefully back to sleep.
I was sitting at my desk in my home office. It is set so when i sit i am looking out the window. The garden has fairly good tree cover - mature hickory, black oak and elm. Not especially conducive to work, but more enjoyable! I was wirking one day when something made me look up. I saw a hawk fly through the branches to come under the “canopy” and fly straight into window at high speed and hit with a heck of a thump, not 2 feet from my face. it was being chased by something much smaller, tho it happened so fast thT i couldn’t tell what. The hawk fell right down into the bushes under the window. I ran outside to see if it was ok, but it had already flown away. There are still talon tesrs from where it twisted its body at the last instant to hit (mostly) feet first.
I was trying to buy ice cream and dropped a coin (old 50 sen coin, more than an inch across) and before I could pick it up a toad jumped out and ate it. :(
I was trying the Pokemon Go game when it first came out, and suddenly a mourning dove landed on my head. It sat there for several minutes while kids pointed at me saying, “It’s a pidgie!”
I started to walk around slowly and the bird stayed on my head. The next time I went to a bioblitz, people said, “I know you! You’re the lady with a bird on her head!”
I live on a dirt road with many mature trees. One day I was driving back home and saw something moving oddly in the underbrush. When i got closer, I realized that it was a squirrel sitting on the ground the way a human might, except that instead of the “bend” point being at the hips, it was halfway up its back. Its upper body was moving all around but its lower body was still. I guess it must have fallen out of the tree and broken its back. It was gone (predictably) by morning.
It never occurred to me the this could happen, but i suppose there are clumsy squirrels too, although i imagine there is pretty strong selection pressure against it.
Maybe, but it was a good 6 feet from the road, and the road was really washboarded so you have to enjoy serious shaking if you go more than 10 mph. Still, it could have been thrown.