Do You Ever See Wild Animals

Yes, I see wild animals every day despite living in a large city (Dallas). I see squirrels, rabbits, coyote, bats, birds of all kinds, crows, owls, hawks, pelicans, blue jays, mockingbirds, rats and mice, and I see snakes every now and then. Not too long ago we had a rat snake in the sink. I live in Texas and here we have 116 snake species.

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Do you ever see wild animals?
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I guess insects are animals too, and we have cicadas and crickets, wolf spiders, spider wasps of various kinds, including mud daubers and tarantula hawks, and sometimes I see them inside the house. We also have a lot of coyotes in the neighborhood. A few years ago, a coyote ran up to me as I was walking my two small dogs, a pug named Daisy and a Japanese Chin named Ryu. I was worried about my dogs, so I stared him down, and he ran off.

Wild Coyote – (Canis latrans) Stock Photo ID: 1629174541 by Tory Kallman

Every now and then we leave the city and there’s plenty of wild animals in the countryside. Two days ago, we visited a dark spot in Oklahoma. A dark spot is an exceptionally dark place intended for sky watching. I saw a skunk in the middle of the night. But we’ve seen foxes, coyotes, deer, antelope, wild turkeys, turkey vultures, wild pigs, bobcats, eagles, fish of all kinds, and many other types of animals. In the past we’ve also gone fishing and hunting and we’ve seen many wild animals that way.

We’ve also visited national parks, for example, Yellow Stone and Grand Teton where we’ve seen grizzly bears, black bears, cinnamon bears, wolves, bison, elk, moose, prong horn, big horn sheep, marmots, whizzle pigs, and much more. I can add that sometimes we also visit other countries where we’ve seen more exotic wild animals, kangaroos, crocodiles, sharks, koalas, lynx, dolphins, etc.

Bison in Yellowstone National Park
Elk in in Yellowstone National Park, photo by me
My daughter caught a rainbow trout in Jackson Lake in Grand Teton National Park, photo by me.
Grizzly bear in Grand Teton National Park, photo by Gabriel Goncalves, a fellow traveler.
Grizzly bear cubs in Grand Teton National Park, photo by Gabriel Goncalves, a fellow traveler.
A whistle pig in Yellowstone National Park. Photo by me.
A marmot in Yellowstone National Park. Photo by me.
A grey wolf in Yellowstone National Park.
A moose in Yellowstone National Park.
A tarantula hawk (wasp) is stinging a tarantula and then dragging it. This was in Oklahoma. Photo by either me or my friend Mark Segal.

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Author: thomasstigwikman

My name is Thomas Wikman. I am a software/robotics engineer with a background in physics. I am currently retired. I took early retirement. I am a dog lover, and especially a Leonberger lover, a home brewer, craft beer enthusiast, I’m learning French, and I am an avid reader. I live in Dallas, Texas, but I am originally from Sweden. I am married to Claudia, and we have three children. I have two blogs. The first feature the crazy adventures of our Leonberger Le Bronco von der Löwenhöhle as well as information on Leonbergers. The second blog, superfactful, feature information and facts I think are very interesting. With this blog I would like to create a list of facts that are accepted as true among the experts of the field and yet disputed amongst the public or highly surprising. These facts are special and in lieu of a better word I call them super-facts.

51 thoughts on “Do You Ever See Wild Animals”

  2. Even though I, too, live in a suburban area (again) in South Florida, I see wild animals here from time to time. Lizards, various species of birds, mice and squirrels, mostly. And bugs, too. I don’t go out to the backyard much, so I can’t be specific about which species are out there, but this being the subtropics, we’ve got lots of birds and bugs out there.

    Of course, during my 10-month stint in New Hampshire, I lived in a rural area surrounded by forests and wild animals. I saw lots of squirrels, chipmunks, several species of birds, skunks, and (once) a black bear. I sometimes miss seeing a wider variety of fauna than I do here, but I’m glad I’m not going to see snow again for a good while. New England winters are too cold for this Florida native!

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      1. Miami is, after all, adjacent to the Everglades.

        In my old neighborhood (several miles from here) you can sometimes see alligators in the canal…and every so often you’ll see them trying to cross NW 97th Avenue. It’s not an everyday occurrence, but it does happen.

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    1. Thank you so much Robbie. Yes there are a lot of wild animals in Texas because despite the big cities it is very spread out and a lot of country side and forest, and the wild animals come into the city, because most of Dallas is semi-sub-urban with creeks and small forests. I should say that the Tarantula Hawk photo was taken at girl scout camp in Oklahoma but we have them here too.

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    3. The comment made me curious so I looked up some facts. Texas has hotter summers and south africa has a more varied climate across the country, but otherwise the climates have many similarities. Texas is about half the size of South Africa and has half the population of south africa, so about the same population density.

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    1. Thank you so much Sara. I love seeing wild animals too. The spider wasps are certainly very cruel to spiders. My daughter ran to get her Jewelry box and asked me to put the pair in her Jewelry box. I hesitated and my friend Juan was telling me “Ha ha Thomas I want to see you do that”, and Mark Segal said, I don’t think we should intervene like that. I am glad I did not pick them up. The Tarantula Hawk allegedly has the most painful sting of any insect in the northern hemosphere,

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    2. It was the first time I saw a Tarantula Hawk and it was the biggest wasp I’ve ever seen. A few years later we had one inside our house and this time I knew what it was. I think I emptied the half the can of bug spray on it. I was spraying on it long after it was dead. But I agree with you. Wildlife is fascinating.

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  7. Those are impressive wild life photos, Thomas! I’ve not seen a whistle pig before. Interesting! As for coyotes, my dog was bitten by one in September, in a public park, during a sunny afternoon. These beasts are everywhere and getting bolder all the time! 

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    1. Ouch I am sorry that happened. They can be nuissance and they are dangerous to dogs and cats, and they are clever. You are right, they are not afraid of people and there are about three million to five million of them in the US. I don’t know how many in Canada.

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  9. You have some great photos, Thomas. I hope to get to Yellowstone and Glacier someday to see some of those amazing animals. I think we forget how often we encounter wild animals when we include chipmunks, birds, and insects. But there’s nothing quite a glorious as seeing the big ones. 🙂

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    1. Yes you are right. I’ve been to Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Park three times and everytime we’ve seen interesting animals, and it is special. You always see Bison and Elk but to see wolf and bears the best time to come is June. One grizzly bear that you always saw in the Grand Teton was grizzly 399 and her cubs (she had 22 over a period of 30 years) because she came down to road every day and stayed around the road. She wanted human company likely because she wanted to protect her cubs from male grizzlies. Unfortunately, she was recently killed by a car.

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      1. I remember your post about grizzly 399. That made me so sad. I spent two weeks hiking in the backcountry of the Tetons in my early twenties. and never once saw a bear. 😦 We made lots of noise on purpose, but now I wish we’d been quieter.

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    2. It is sad. An era ended with her. Hiking in the Tetons for two weeks sounds like a great adventure, but I would not like to see a bear while hiking, at least not a grizzly bear. Seeing grizzly 399 along the road is a different story. I think it was a good idea to make noise. You won’t see many bears that way but at least you will live.

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      1. We had little clanky things on our backpacks. We were wisely discouraging bears, but I still haven’t seen one on any of my hikes. Just a little one from the car at Yosemite, munching on berries at the side of the road. And causing a traffic jam. Lol

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    3. A on-line friend of mine was pursued by a grizzly bear while hiking in Yellowstone. The bear stalked him as he was trying to walk away. Luckily he came across rangers. He thought that was an unpleasant experience. Those clanky things were probably a good idea. At least you saw a bear and it was safe.

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  10. Great post Thomas. I think we all see animals that we sometimes don’t even realize. There are plenty of wild going ons here in my neck of the world. For instance, we have our Canadian geese who are a pain and rule wherever they are. Yes, they will even take liberties of crossing a main road and halting traffic to a stop until they decide if they’re going to ever finish crossing, lol. Also, we have lots of cayote warnings here in the burbs, warnings and sad stories on the news of people walking their dogs and getting mangled by cayotes. Really not surprising as I live in a cement jungle and the more land they take away from the animals, they have to go somewhere. 🙂

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    1. We have Canadian geese too. They are everywhere now it seems. It must be the world’s most successful bird. We are certainly encroaching on the coyote’s territory but the other side of the coin is that they come into the cities to look for food that we people provide, trash, cats and small dogs. Coyote is another very successful animal, largely thanks to us. There are an estimated 4.7 million coyotes in the United States. I don’t know how many in Canada but probably millions. The Grey wolf has not been as successful because they stay away from people and don’t seem to be interested in pizzas in the trash.

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    3. Yes the neighbor tore down her house and built a big two story house and the neighbors around her, including us, had to deal with the rats. However, I learned how to catch rats and how not to. Don’t use glue traps/mats. When they work they are cruel. When they don’t they are comedy. Seeing a rat with a glue mat on their back, looking like a cape, like super-rat, running through the house was a sight. Then the dogs stepping on the glue trap and you had to get it off their paw.

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  11. Yeah, it’s coyote-palooza around here. Also frequently spotted are hawks, ravens, and turkey vultures, and the occasional Great Horned Owl. Oh and rattlesnakes, like the one that tagged Bean that time. Yay. Not long ago we saw a bobcat out at the park ― he (or she) was pretty startled at sighting humans and dogs, dropped the waterfowl he (or she) was carrying, and ducked into the reeds along the lakeshore while we hurried on our way.

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  13. Fun to hear about all the animals. At the observatory where I work in Arizona, I see lots of desert wildlife. I regularly see coyotes and roadrunners (so far, I haven’t seen any coyotes attempting to drop anvils on roadrunners, though…). I also have seen creatures a little more limited to our area such as ringtails, coati, and javelina. I’ve seen bobcats and a black bear. I regularly see deer. Recently I encountered a rattlesnake on the path to my room at the observatory. I left him alone and went the long way around to my room.

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    1. Ha ha I see a lot of coyotes in Dallas but no roadrunners. However, I’ve seen roadrunners on the country side. No coyotes with anvils chasing roadrunners though. I’ve seen bobcats in the countryside but not in Dallas even though we allegedly (Nextdoors) have a bobcat sneaking around our neighborhood. I’ve never seen a rattlesnake in the wild but I know there are many. That would be freaky. I think it was wise of you to take the long way.

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