“Shooing” an angry ram…

Yep, the guy riding this motorcycles actually said “shoo” to an angry ram…

Here’s an interesting video of a close encounter in New Zealand…it’s ram versus motorcycle, and I think the ram won…

I’m always a little unnerved when encountering wild animals on a motorcycle…I had a similar experience with a much more benign result several years ago while riding my old Triumph Daytona across British Columbia.   My buddy Marty and I were riding in the 2005 Three Flags Rally, noting the signs to watch out for the mountain sheep, when we spotted this guy way up the road…it was a mountain sheep standing right next to the sign.

I was still shooting film in those days and I had my Nikon N70 in my tank bag.   I had a super wide angle 17-35 Sigma lens on the camera, which was useless for photographing something that far away, and I remember frantically rooting around trying to get my 70-300 lens on the camera.   You know the drill…don’t drop the bike, get the right lens on the camera, and get the shot.  I did, and I grabbed the photo above…while still straddling the Triumph.    I was feeling pretty good about that until…

What happened next was really wild.   I remember thinking that the animal was likely to run off into the woods at any second, which is why I was desperate to get the right lens and take the shot.   Instead of running off into the woods, though, the thing looked right at me and started walking towards us.   Uh oh.   Marty and his BMW were right behind me, and I remembered the joke about the two guys being chased by the bear.  One says to the other “Man, we’ve got to be faster than this bear…” and the other guy says “No, I only need to be faster than you…”

The sheep was getting closer and now I had the opposite problem…I had a telephoto lens on the camera and the sheep was getting closer, and closer, and closer.   Hmmm, I wondered.   Do mountain sheep bite?   Or do they just butt their heads into you?    I could see the headline…Triumph Rider Gored By Sheep.     What a way to go, I remember thinking.  It would be, you know, really baaa-aa-addd (sorry, I couldn’t resist that one).

Still, this would be a fantastic photo.   Another frantic lens change followed…this time back to the original wide angle Sigma lens.  That’s when I grabbed this shot…

Curiously (and unlike the experience that poor dirt bike rider had in the video above), this animal wasn’t hostile at all.   He just kind of circled around, looking at me, and then he (or maybe she) just wandered back into the woods.   Whew!

In thinking about it later, Marty and I decided that they were probably used to being fed, and it most likely approached us looking for a handout.

Interesting times.