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.

Daily writing prompt
Do you ever see wild animals?

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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A Tarantula Hawk Encounter

This is not one of my super facts posts but I think it is interesting information about a quite frightening insect that I had never heard of before I encountered it- a tarantula hawk encounter.

When my daughter was 5-7 years old, she was part of what you can perhaps call a pre-girl-scout organization. It was called Indian Princesses. It later changed its name to Adventure Princesses. They had meetings where they learned things, and they went camping as a group with their dads or moms. There were bonfires, grilling, nature, fishing, adventures, jumping in mud, riding horses, and staying up late at night.

My daughter Rachel camping at Camp Classen in Oklahoma. We are standing around a bonfire at night.

One time the Indian Princesses went camping in Camp Classen in Oklahoma. Since we live in North Texas it was not far away. One morning, as we were standing there talking and preparing breakfast, we saw a big black insect landing on the ground.

As we looked closer, we saw that it had landed on a Tarantula. It stung the tarantula, which stopped moving. Then it dragged the Tarantula through the grass about 100-150 feet and then under the girls’ bathroom. As we stood around the Tarantula and the big black insect, we saw that the insect had reddish wings and the body shape of a wasp or an ant. We did not know what it was. This was the year 2005 or possibly 2006 and cellphones with internet were not common.

This is a photo of the Tarantula Hawk that we saw. It is dragging a Tarantula that it had just stung. It is our photo and maybe not a great photo.

My daughter ran to get her jewelry box from her cabin. When she came back, she handed it to me and said, “Dad put them in here”. Another dad standing nearby started laughing and said, “yes Thomas I want to see you put them in the box.” It was quite lucky that I didn’t because the big black insect with reddish wings was what is called a Tarantula Hawk, a type of wasp, which allegedly has the most painful sting of any insect in the northern hemisphere. There is an insect with a worse sting in South America.

A Tarantula Hawk Wasp feeding on some flowers. Stock Photo ID: 2018945009 by Rix Pix Photography

The Tarantula Hawk is a wasp that feeds on nectar but the female Tarantula Hawk stings and kills Tarantulas to feed its larvae.  It stings the Tarantula between the legs, paralyzing it, and then drags the prey to a specially prepared burrow, where a single egg is laid on the spider’s abdomen, and the burrow entrance is covered.

According to this article one researcher described the tarantula hawk’s sting this way: “To me, the pain is like an electric wand that hits you, inducing an immediate, excruciating pain that simply shuts down one’s ability to do anything, except, perhaps, scream.

Below is a youTube video about the Tarantula Hawk.

Have you ever encountered a Tarantula Hawk or another scary wasp or insect?


To see the Super Facts click here