Wildlife encounters

A while back Left Brain and I ventured into San Antonio to visit the Natural Bridge Wildlife Ranch.  We needed some excitement in our life.  We'd already been to Wal-mart and HEB.

This is exactly what it sounds like - animals in fenced areas that you drive your car through.  Kind of hokey, but still really fun to see the animals up close and personal.  I had no idea.

The staff makes sure hay and food is along the roadside and it's obvious they are used to being hand fed.  We are rule followers...well, Left Brain is, and the rules clearly stated to keep your head and arms inside the vehicle at all times.  It did caution that you may hand feed the animals but at your own risk.  They know we're gonna roll down those windows for a better view.

Even though he prefered I did NOT, I stood up in the car to use the sunroof as a photography station.  He was not amused but I had a blast.

After watching the car ahead of us hand feeding the animals I just had to do it, too!  It looked like so much fun, and it was...for a while.

I mean, how dangerous could it be?

The traffice moved slower than the Endeavor on it's way to its new home, but that was okay with us!  We were enjoying our close encounters of the animal kind.



Some of the animals were more to our liking than others.  Here's Left Brain feeding some kind of beautiful mammal with long twisting horns.  I'd tell you what it was, but we were too cheap to pay for the booklet.

And then there they were!  The zebras!  I've always loved zebras, they are so beautiful.  Or maybe it's just that I like black and white together...anyway, I digress.

By now I'm giggling like a little kid and dipping into my bag of animal food for them and enjoying the velvety soft noses as they come into the car to be fed.  Okay, that one was coming a little TOO far into the car!  Before I knew what was happening he'd entered my vehicle and grabbed the bag of food...with his teeth...that I had held between my legs!  This is the shot I got of him right before I said "bad zebra!" and rolled up the windows.

I need to backtrack a little here to explain my discomfort.  A long time ago I had been bitten by my horse and needed to go into the clinic for a tetnus shot.  The embarrassing part was that she had bitten me on my boob.  It was painful and hard to explain to the doctor.  I could envision myself going into the ER explaining the bite marks on my inner thigh...from a zebra.  But luckily, no harm was done and I was much more cautious after that.

There were some animals we didn't hand feed at all...the long horned steer, the buffalo and the ostrich.  These birds are incredibly tall with huge feet.  When I was standing up in the car shooting my camera out of the sun roof this baby was eye to eye with me.  Until I ducked back in like a prairie dog spotting an eagle!

Long Live the Queen of Zebras