Where do you feel safe?

[rogruth]

Murph,
Really like the woods photos. Remind me of my much younger days.
We never called a forest, always a woods. I don't know why.

[MurphOnMillerAve]

Murph,
Really like the woods photos. Remind me of my much younger days.
We never called a forest, always a woods. I don't know why.

Us, too. Maybe it was a regional vernacular thing.

To me, a woods referred to a large stand of trees and undergrowth we could explore in a day.

You can see our woods in these two photos of my actual childhood neighborhood. Some of that woods, in its valley, visible in the upper left quadrant of the aerial view, is part of the same woods seen around the "Racer" roller coaster in the other photo. We walked through all of it and a good distance beyond on a day's outing (including climbing aboard the coaster's wooden dips and humps!)

Upstate, NY in those photos is a place of trees far beyond any one-day's traversing, stretching as far as I could see in all directions; hence, my calling it a forest .

[rogruth]

Murph,
I think I agree. In the Ohio valley you could go to the top of a hill and look any direction and see woods AND signs of civilization,
In eastern Kentucky you could do the same and look in most directions and see trees in the Daniel Boone National Forest which
was once the Cumberland National Forest. In many areas you wouldn't see anything except trees if you walked into the wood--
oops, forest just as in some of your pictures. That is probably the only thing from the north that I miss in the south, the woods.
The southern woods is NOT the same.

[MurphOnMillerAve]

In what ways is "the southern woods... not the same"?

[rogruth]

In what ways is "the southern woods... not the same"?

More types of evergreen vegetation, thicker underbrush with stickers, more unfriendly animals.
Fort Stewart begins four miles south of town and they burn underbrush almost continuously
because it gets so thick they can't use the woods for maneuvers and training.
(That is what I was told and I'm sticking with that.) No way will I try to list all of the animals
that it is best to avoid except for the FIRE ANTS. Their bites are very painful. When I first
came to this area, 1975, a child, under 6 years old, fell on a fire ant mound and died from
the bites. Besides needing to watch what you might step on that can hurt you, it is necessary
to make sure that you are stepping on firm ground that doesn't let you get wet and dirty.
I'm speaking mostly of the deep south woods sometimes called piney woods.

[MurphOnMillerAve]

Exotic, Thank you, Roger.
But are you seriously going to keep me hanging on the detail of the critter presents? Wild European boar? Coyote? Skunk? Huge snakes? Capybara? Tarantulas?

Remember, available and lurking wildlife are, ostensibly, what can get me into trouble up in the woods in NY (and with Wayne scoffing at me for dubious choices). There's a whole lotta forest out there on them that hills! I can get into lots o' trouble. And alone, no less. So, just in case I decide to get really adventurous and wander through your southern forests and woods, what cha got?

Those Fire Ants were a lovely touch, though, in what you did relate, one I'd never have imagined were there. And a kid killed by them! (MAKES YA WONDER WHATTHEHELLFIRE THEADULTS WERE DOING WHILE A LITTLE KID WAS ROLLING AROUND ON A FIREANT MOUND!) Now, that's some serious wild life around during a fella's simple hike!!!

[rogruth]

Murph,
I do not know every animal present in this area personally and have heard of many only from friends (yes, I do have two) anmd neighbors.
Fox, coyote, wolf, wild boars and pigs, deer(they are larger up north), alligators, armadillos (they were in southwest Georgia in the early 1970s
now seem to be everywhere), sand gnats (they bite), mosquitos,snakes (every type of poisonous), a type of bobcat , I'm sure I have missed some.
Some of the swamp folks say that there lives in some swamps a creature related to big foot. One of the more dangerous denizens of the local
woods are the 'shiners. They should never be approached unarmed and alone. Like you, I would walk alone in the hills of eastern Kentucky. I didn't
tell anybody where I was going because I wasn't always sure. Just let my feet take me. I had found several stills in the hills that were still in working
order, and some that weren't. One time, without a lot of details, I walked into a working still area that I didn't know about and was stopped by a
"guard" and escorted into the site. Fortunately someone that I had made a purchase from just several days earlier was there . Good thing or
I might not be writing this.

[MurphOnMillerAve]

Thanks for so generous a reply, Roger. I think I will not be wandering into any southern forests, not soon, not later.

And if I do go Upstate NY again, next month, with bat and spray on-hand, I'll stay in the car and keep the doors and windows closed. But wouldn't that make the whole experience just like seeing a nature movie on TV?! Maybe, that's where I belong, as an armchair explorer.

P.S. I have spied a few shacks snuggled into the deeper parts of the woods up there and have given them wide berth.

P.P.S. Yet, good ol' Wayne jets out into the unique foliage of Arizona on only a bicycle, and lordknowz what could leap out to menace him there, though I doubt he has any large mammals to defend against, huh.

[v8vega]

This is southern Calif. edge of the desert. At the shooting range we go to I like to shoot clay pigeons as targets propped up against rocks. To get them I go over the skeet and trap range and pick up mostly whole ones. This is rattlesnake country big time and man do I look around my every move out in the brush and tall grass.

[MurphOnMillerAve]

This is southern Calif. edge of the desert. At the shooting range we go to I like to shoot clay pigeons as targets propped up against rocks. To get them I go over the skeet and trap range and pick up mostly whole ones. This is rattlesnake country big time and man do I look around my every move out in the brush and tall grass.

If I may ask, V8,why is it important enough to go on that search for clay pigeons, given that you are well aware of the dangerous snakes? A sense of adventure and the challenge?
I've begun to wonder why I keep entering that forest Upstate, NY. Once inside, it is beguiling, however. For example, during one sojourn into a particularly dense part of the woods, I saw a fawn crouching in its den (ww?). I understood instantly why they are colored and stippled as they are. That was a treat for me.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

This is southern Calif. edge of the desert. At the shooting range we go to I like to shoot clay pigeons as targets propped up against rocks. To get them I go over the skeet and trap range and pick up mostly whole ones. This is rattlesnake country big time and man do I look around my every move out in the brush and tall grass.

If I may ask, V8,why is it important enough to go on that search for clay pigeons, given that you are well aware of the dangerous snakes?

Perhaps he likes their flavor?

[MurphOnMillerAve]

Lame.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Lame.

Subtle.....

[MurphOnMillerAve]