My Favorite Animal Stories
Knowing that I grew up on a farm, you’d think I’d include stories about farm animals in my “favorite animal stories.”
You might also think that the stories about the first time I helped castrate hogs or deliver a new calf would be high on my list of favorites.
And you wouldn’t be too far off to expect that some of my threatening farm experiences like running from a mad bull, coping with pursuing hissing geese, or confronting a snarling opossum in a workbench drawer might provide fodder for a favorite story or two.
And what about riding with my dad when he farmed with horses, shooting a snake on a rock in the dredge ditch with a BB gun, and enjoying my mother’s reaction when I left it on the back door step?
And then there’s chasing a fox out of a chicken house, catching a skunk in a trap, or even Harriet and I trying to get two chipmunks out of our house. All candidates for fun animal stories.
And yet, when I really came down to choosing my favorite animal stories, they surprisingly did not come from the farm, but from experiences Harriet and I had on trips to different parts of the world.
Just for fun, here are five of them.
1. Elephants Galore
On a safari trip we took to Kenya, Africa, in 1995, it was birds vs. elephants, and birds almost won. But not quite.
Another couple on the trip, who were bird experts, and who we called “Birdman” and “Birdie,” had come to Kenya for one reason and one reason only — BIRDS!
Top of our list, of course, was — ELEPHANTS!
We were heading back to camp, having been on our safari in Amboseli, Kenya, for two days. Birdman and Birdie had seen a lot of birds, but we had been skunked in our search for elephants.
“Look!” someone shouted. And this video we took explains the rest.
(Click on the arrow on the photo to start the video. Click the curved arrow at the end to replay. The video goes back to its original starting place when you leave the post.)
Because of El Nino weather patterns, 400+ elephants were migrating en masse to a different area, looking for water — and we got to see them all!
During the amazing “elephant parade,” Birdman generally ignored the elephants, and had his eye on a White-Bellied Go-Away Bird.
And Birdie was emitting exclamations like, “Oh what a sweet little Bee-Eater Two on that elephant’s back!”
So, for Birdman and Birdie, birds were more exciting than 400 elephants. But for us — and this is the understatement of this blog — the elephants carried the day!
2. Cavorting Monkeys
Another favorite animal story comes from when Harriet I were in India in 1989.
We found that our scheduled hotel in Jaipur, India (The Pink City) was full. So, we had to take a room and eat in a third-rate hotel (only a little better than the one shown below), which left a lot to be desired.
After ill-advisedly devouring a large bowl of tomato soup, with gooey cheese, stale crackers, and gobby pudding like it was my last meal, I rubbed my satisfied tummy and tried to go to sleep.
About four hours into this “sleep,” with monkeys banging around outside our window, the action began, as related by the following three-time period narrative.
First Time Period
My perspective: I believe I am as sick as I have ever been. My body is divesting itself of everything possible, from every possible port of exit. Woe is me!
Harriet’s perspective : My husband is, here in the middle of the night, as sick as a dog. As a good wife, I need to help him. Oh brother!
The Cavorting Monkey’s perspective: Hey, there’s a light! Let’s cavort really loudly outside that window!
Second Time Period
My perspective: When this total chaos going to stop? Oh (expletive deleted), we’re out of toilet paper! What am I going to do?
Harriet’s perspective : Oh no! There is no-one at the desk in the middle of the night in this crummy hotel! OK Harriet, Don’t panic. Look for Kleenex, new or used, in the purse. Success!
Monkies Perspective: Let’s keep having a great, loud, hilarious time, just outside this window! Sexy time, coming up!
Third and Last Time Period
My perspective: Emergency over, used kleenex held out just long enough. I really need to get some sleep. Man, those monkeys are noisy!
Harriet’s perspective: Wow! What a mess. How are we going to get enough rest to drive all the way back to New Delhi tomorrow? What in heck are those monkeys doing?!
Monkeys perspective: Wow! Making whoopee is much better than cavorting! If we break that window, that’ll be even more sexy. Oh boy, what fun!
Well, morning came way too soon, and, in my dazed condition, I looked out the window and saw this very relaxed monkey sitting on the edge of the building. Bleary-eyed, I couldn’t see him very clearly, but I would have sworn that he was smoking a cigarette.
3. Yodeling Bear
This tale is about an event that happened on a trip Harriet and I took to Canada in 2003, stopping by Lake Louise, near Banff.
We started to hike the Lake Agnes trail up to the famous Lake Agnes Teahouse at 7:30 a.m. It was a two-hour hike up a pretty steep path, and with a lot of switchbacks.
To add a bit of intrigue, we noticed a sign at the entrance that asserted something like, “Bears have been sighted on this trail,” and there were no people in sight.
Harriet, worried about a bear, knew that if you make noise, say ring a bell, it is known to scare bears away (except for black bears).
She had also heard but avoided thinking about the joke that the way to tell a black bear from a brown bear is to open the stomachs of the two bears. The one whose stomach has bells in it is the black bear.
About half-way up, I detected that Harriet was getting more and more concerned about bears, so, being the dutiful, protective, macho husband, I asked her if it would help for me to yodel, so we would not surprise a bear.
I don’t know what went through her mind, but she must have weighed the negatives, and decided that me yodeling was maybe a little less threatening than being killed by a bear. So she agreed that yodeling would be okay.
I let forth a yodel (perfected by calling hogs on the farm) that would have either utterly charmed a Swiss lass, or totally destroyed her hearing. A yodel, for sure, intended to put the Fear of the Lord into even the bravest bear.
This video will help you get an idea of what the yodel was like. Sort of.
And, immediately after I yodeled, about two levels up on the switchback trail, came a much higher quality yodel in return. Harriet imagined it like this.
We never saw “the bear,” however, and had a wonderful time at the teahouse.
I guess “bears” like to play around a little too.
4. A Greedy Horse and Camel
On a trip to Egypt in 1989 with Herm and Evelyn Harding, we decided to get off the boat at Aswan and take a horse and carriage to the downtown area.
The Egyptian carriage driver, who had a Ph.D. in Dickering About Price, finally agreed that he would take us there and back for the equivalent of about $15 U.S. dollars, and that would include the tip, which they called “baksheesh.“ So off we went.
Upon return, we hopped out of the carriage, and as we were about to take our leave, the grinning driver held out his hand and said, in an innocent, but mildly demanding voice, “baksheesh?”
Ever diligent in sticking with the idea that “a deal is a deal,” I patiently explained that we had agreed that the baksheesh would be included in the agreed upon price.
“Oh,” he exclaimed benevolently, but in a powerful voice, “No baksheesh for me! Baksheesh for my horse!”
Needless to say, the humor of it all melted me immediately, and I succumbed to tipping the horse, no less. (More about him later)
A related incident happened at the Great Pyramid. Herm had dickered for what Evelyn thought was a lucky camel, and she was riding high.
The rub came in, however, after the ride was over. When it came time for Evelyn to disembark from the camel, the camel would not bend down so Evelyn could get off, and the driver told her she couldn’t get off without paying extra baksheesh.
Herm deliberated about the ramifications of Evelyn having to stay on that camel the whole trip but finally decided extra baksheesh was in order.
As I thought back on the two parts of this tale, I couldn’t help but think that the drivers were complicit, for sure, but that it was the laughing horse and smug camel who were the real culprits. I envisioned them as looking like this as we forked over the extra backsheesh!
5. The World’s Weirdest Bird
We met the world’s weirdest bird, a Blue Footed Booby, on a trip Harriet and I took to the Galapagos Islands in 2008.
First, we saw them dive, and that was weird enough. Keep your eyes on the boobys all through the video, or you’ll miss the dives!
Later, I read that their maximum dive can begin as high as the length of a football field, and they fold their wings into their body, transform themselves into arrows, and hit the water at 60 mph or more — going as far as 82 ft. below the surface.
Then we saw them dance, and that clinched their weirdness. We found out that this dancing
We found out that this dancing around (as if trying to keep their feet out of the mud) was a courting ritual, particularly the male trying to impress the female with his feet.
Maybe you’re like me. Sometimes I look back at a past event and I think, “I shoulda done that.”
And so it was with the Blue-Footed Booby Mating Dance!
I imagined what would have happened if, upon returning to our cabin after seeing the Blue-Footed Boobies do their dance, I had gotten Harriet’s rapt attention and done the dance in her presence!
I think it might have looked something like this:
In retrospect, even if I had pitched it as “renewing our marriage vows,” I can assure you, without a doubt, that the valiant attempt you have just witnessed would have been met with Harriet saying, “How in the world do you expect anybody in their right mind to take that seriously?” Oh well.
Kudos to our Animal Friends
In case these stories have been a little hard on the animals involved, I’d like to give reparation by presenting this quote which affirms them, and which expresses my feelings too.
And so “three cheers” for our animal friends! They enrich our lives.