What is the MOST Awesome Act of Nature Seen in FW

[lunkertaker]

Inspired by Wilson's post w/the shark, here goes

What is your personal best, most awesome act of nature seen on a stream, pond, lake etc. excluding the salt.

MINE: While fishing Farrington lake several years ago, along the lilly pads throwing a super fluke into the pads, I saw a mother duck trailed by several new hatchlings. All of a sudden, there was the most explosive swirl of water and a large pike surfacing nearly out of the water to engulf the small baby bird. The mother and remaining chicks headed to shore and I launched too many casts in that direction in an effort to get a similar strike. But, seeing this was way too cool.

My second: finding a snake with a bluegill in the mouth at a local pond here in NJ, both nearly expired. Caught them both, released the snakes grip, and both swam away

[crustyangler17]

reeling in a bass last friday a huge snapping turtle followed it almost to my feet, snapped at it, missed and turned away. could let him have it but those things are greedy enough

[Polelock]

Flyfishing on American Creek in Alaska...this guy was about 10 yds away...The video tells the story...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VS2_U...e_gdata_player

[Wilson]

I was fishing and camping in the Brooks Reserve in Katmai Alaska.
The Bears there are like the Deer around here. The Federal park Rangers have a full time job
keeping humans away from the Bears so they do not get accustomed being around humans and so they don't look for food from them.
Because of this they are always patrolling the rivers banks with their walkie talkies herding the few fishermen around the bears.
So I'm fishing in the river next to another guy, we are looking at Salmon so thick you could of walked across the river on their backs and not get wet. Unfortunately that does not mean they are easy to catch!
Well the guy next to me finally hooks one and the fight is on. Just then a Ranger comes around the corner and says that there are Bears coming our way and we need to move. The Rangers do this because the Bears know if they see a guy fighting a fish it will soon be lunch time. Well the guy with the fish on doesn't want to move. The Ranger asks him again to break off the fish and move down stream. The guy says I'll have this fish landed in a minute just wait. The Ranger puts one hand on his large nickel plated pistol and with the other pulls out a switchblade and cuts the guys line.
Then he says you just lost that fish...anything else you want to loose?
I was having a hard time believing the fisherman was giving one of these giant of a man Ranger guy a hard time. They all had the personalty of a fire hydrant
and where twice as tough. This reserve is like 200,000 square miles in size. It would be easy to off someone and nobody but the Bears would know

Ok I know this is not exactly a nature thing, but I was fishing at the time.

[buzzbaiter]

Hands down the most awesome act of nature I've seen when I was 11 years old and watched a wasp battle a spider. It only lasted a few minutes but it has stuck in memory forever. I LOVE spiders and in the end the wasp won(which they usually do) which pissed me off but the little wolf spider gave it a good fight.

Second would involve a cicada hatch at Merrill Creek a few years back. The 17 yr locusts were everywhere and landing in the water. The bass were just loving it showing no mercy exploding on them nearly every minute. I had my best day ever there just using a small, gray popper. I lost track of the bass i caught but it was easily over 35-40 with many in the 3-5lb range. Next time it comes around, I'm going back there!

[ScowardNJ]

We were kayak fishing in the St. Regis area of the Adirondacks. We were in a connector stream that leads from Rollins Pond to Floodwood Pond. A few of us were checked up on the bank eating lunch and throwing Cheez-its in the water chumming up blue gills. Some of the Cheez-its that got down stream attracted a family of mallards, a mother followed by a bunch of chicks right up to our boats to where we could hand feed them if we wanted to. The water was about 2' deep and you could see clear to the rocky bottom. So we are watching the chicks nibbling up crushed cheez-its and all of a sudden one the rocks at the bottom came alive rising to the surface. This snapping turtles mouth opened up inches from the side of my yak and just barley missed a chick. The chicks took off so fast they were running across the top of the water. That turtle must of been right under us for at least 10 minutes and we never knew it was there until we chummed in the ducks. That thing scares the sh*t out of me....Would of been cool to see a confirmed predatory kill but this time the ducks got away.

[bigfishy]

Late nineties, confluence pool where the big D starts....Was in the beginning
stages of one of the best sulphur hatches and to this date, quantity and quality catches i've evr had on the deleware....I looke behind me in the three foot tall grasses and saw a deer standing in a small opening...Not a huge deal but it was cool cause she was only about 30' behind me, when very naturally a bamby strolls up to mom and starts suckeling...Super cool,will NEVER forget it...

Second was on a small PA creek while fishing a blizzard trico spinner fall...
My fly was caught in the bushes behind me and after retrieving it i look up in the taller trees only about 10' over my head and see the biggest spider i've ever seen in the wild to this very date... its thorax was the diameter of a plum and its legs stretched as wide or wider than my fingers....Holy WOW, gave me some serious heebies

Third was only about five years ago at a local nj pond ...An average sized snapper(maybe 16" in diameter) engulfed my spinnerbait while on a fast surface burning retrieve close to shore...Doubt that will EVER happen again, at least not to me

If i was only an amatuer photographer in my super serious fly fishing days..
I guess the old memory bank will have to do

Oh also had an unforgetable trout strike from a boat this spring...Will speak more on that in the future

[Fishon1982]

I was fishing a Merrill creek this year and saw a osprey come down and grab a fish and in the Coner of my eye I see another bird coming towards the osprey the two birds flared up and the osprey dropped the fish but the other bird was the resident bald eagle that was really cool and so are the rest of the stories you guys are telling

[Eskimo]

I already posted this in another thread, but I'll post it again since it's relevant in this thread, too.

I was fishing on the Delaware River earlier this summer. The beaver population in the Gap is exploding so I didn't think anything of the little furry thing in the water. Eventually, the 'thing' came close enough for me to focus on it. I realized it wasn't a beaver, but a large Black Bear swimming past my kayak!

I pulled up my anchor so fast I almost hit myself in the head with it and put some distance between us. Then I dug out my camera and shot a few pictures. Very cool!

[Mark B.]

At RVR, hiking in to fish the eastern shore,…………………….a couple of Homo sapiens mating (Female: bent over, skirt hiked up, hands braced against tree. Male: standing,……behind).

Yes,…….A MOST Awesome Act of Nature Seen in (near) FW