Location Taken: Arcadia, Michigan
Time Taken: June 2012
I seem to have a knack for spotting wildlife, like this fine Barred Owl I spotted while biking.
It flew across the road in front of me, at least fifty yards away, but when I got closer I managed to spot it sitting in a tree about twenty feet into the forest.
I watched it. It watched me. I grabbed a few photos. It flew away.
There have been plenty of times where I see a hawk or some deer or some other critter while out and about. And usually I’m the only one to spot them, even if there are other people around.
Maybe it’s just luck, but I do have a tendency to just watch the world go by without filtering out the unexpected like most people do. (If you think you don’t do so, watch this video and follow the directions to see if it’s the case.)
There are a lot of what we think of as “wild” animals scattered throughout even the rather populated areas where I live. I’ve seen deer in the forest in the park behind my house plenty of times, including a few times where they’re right by the back fence. I saw a hawk take off from a neighbor’s yard just yesterday. There’s also been foxes and snakes and of course all the common animals like squirrels and rabbits and songbirds.
In less populated areas, I’ve seen moose and elk and buffalo, bears and mountain goats, all sorts of frogs and turtles and birds, even some fish where the water’s clear enough for me to spot them. And owls, too, of course.
The world is still pretty well populated. Human presence just limits the size of the species that can live there. Well, that and it splits up habitats into areas too small for a lot of critters to find enough food, and blocks off paths for migration for the animals to escape bad conditions. Which is why those creatures that can adapt easily, like squirrels and deer, or those that move around easily, like birds, are the ones that do best.
But the others are out there, and you can see them if you keep on looking for them.
Still haven’t spotted the bear that supposedly lives by my Grandparent’s place, though…
