Wow. Predators are getting brave!

[Laird Fraser of Lovatt]

That's why i don't go into the Big Thicket with out a "hiking buddy"... Usually in .45 caliber.    It won't stop a Wooley Booger but will drop most anything else.

[Mairte]

Yeah. We have those Wooley Boogers up here too, whatever anyone says. But thats another whole conversation!!

[groomporter]

Must have some awful big rabbits...
http://www.wooleyboogers.com/

[Laird Fraser of Lovatt]

Must have some awful big rabbits...
http://www.wooleyboogers.com/

Wooley Booger... *see Sasquatch/Bigfoot/Fouke Monster/Swamp Ape/Skunk Ape.* 

[Anna Iram]

This conversation is starting to remind me of Monty Python's killer rabbit.

[Mairte]

LOL, now Anna, dont you believe in killer rabbits? 

[LadyStitch]

Killer Rabbits?  Tell that to my friend who had a HUGE rabbit take a chunk out of his middle finger knuckle when he was trying to feed the thing.  The Doc said he was luck that no tendons were severed.  The Doc had seen some bad accidents with Rabbits doing QUITE some dammage.

When I was 4 or 5 I came face to face with a fox when I was out playing in my grandparents  back yard.  I don't know who were more freaked, me or the fox? 

[Sir Ironhead]

This conversation is starting to remind me of Monty Python's killer rabbit.

"Prepare the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch"

[Welsh Wench]

Back to topic--

Really when their space is getting crowded out by urban sprawl, are they really predators?
Or just trying to survive the best way they can.

[Merlin the Elder]

For most of these, predation is their nature, even when not being crowded. It's part of the self-sustaining natural order (if left to work). Personally, I think we need to be a lot more careful of how we continue to spread out. When we finally destroy all the trees, we will die along with the rest of the animal kingdom. When we kill off the natural predators, we will be overrun by the herbivores, until the trees are gone.

[Anna Iram]

Well, Welsh Wench, a predator is simply an animal that eats other animal. We are predators too, by the nature of that definition. So, of course it is their nature to hunt for meat. We've just learned to get others to do our hunting for us in many cases. Some of us have become herbavores and eat a vegetarian diet, though that in itself may not temper our nature to want to hunt. Someone made the case on the previous page that our proximity merely provides coyotes, etc, with an easier meal that they might find hunting in the wild. A poodle probably makes an easier target than a wild hare.

Sir Ironhead.

..and just because I think it's so darned funny. Mairte, won't mind I hope.  
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcxKIJTb3Hg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbit_of_Caerbannog

[Welsh Wench]

That is a very good point, Merlin.
Really what is needed is education so humans and wildlife can coexist peacefully.

[Anna Iram]

LOL...yeah...but first we're gonna have to teach the coyotes and gators how to read....

[Laird Fraser of Lovatt]

People
Eatting
Tasty
Animals


Most of us don't consider that whenever we hike into the deep forest, swim in the ocean or visit otherwise remote locals, we willingly take one step down the food chain... even if we are armed.  I've tracked mountain lions and had them track me....

[Mairte]

Yeah,lol, a Brit friend of mine was bragging on how we are "top of the food chain!!!". I told him to come and camp out in the woods here for a month and see if he STILL thinks that!!!!!!!
I agree we are encrouching too far into some areas. It makes you wonder what is next on the extinct list.