Wildlife Encounters

[ethanb]

We went diving at a mine last week and had some interesting interactions with the local "wildlife".  The mine is in the middle of a farmer's field and we sometimes see donkeys and horses walking around in the field.  This time they came over and wanted to play. 

It was rather frightening at first, but the donkeys responded well to being scratched on the head.  They also seemed very interested in eating our clothing.  I was nervous about what would happen when we had to walk across the field in our doubles (since we couldn't outrun them then), but they didn't bother us. 

As we were gearing up in the small entrance pond, the horses and donkeys came down next to the water and watched us.  I was very nervous about having a large horse standing over my head and another three animals standing behind us, but they didn't bother us and eventually wandered away. 

Unfortunately we only got photos of the donkeys while walking around prior to our dive - we couldn't get any photos of us next to them in doubles.  I would've really liked to have an image like that.  It's a good thing we didn't try to do that though.  Just before we started our dive, the owner came by and asked us if the animals had been bothering us - he wanted to make sure that we weren't leaving any equipment topside, as the donkeys would eat it.  I wonder what Christa's camera insurance company would've said if her camera had been eaten by donkeys.

Has anyone else had interesting wildlife encounters while diving?  Aside from the muskrat I mentioned earlier, so far I've dealt with bees (ouch), ticks (yuck), sheep (baa!), and bulls (run!). I've always hoped to see alligators when diving in FL, but none yet.

[photo credits go to Christa Loustalot - my apologies for not crediting you initially]
Ethan