Oddest animals you've found at work?

[Rosakala]

I'm curious, what are some of the strangest animals you've ever seen at your workplace? I'm sure we're all familier with the occasioanl dog or bird and what not, but what about some others? We had a 4 ft snake sneak in through our Garden Center yesterday and terrify a few customers before it was caught.

And while not actually in the store I discovered that we have a gator that lives in the retention pond thats not 30 feet away from the side of our store.

[Irving Patrick Freleigh]

I'm told that one night we had a raccoon going through the garbage cans in front of the store.

The raccoon then walked in front of the exit doors, and paused at every window to look inside.

It might have been cool to watch, but raccoons are nasty nasty animals.

[RecoveringKinkoid]

[QUOTE=

And while not actually in the store I discovered that we have a gator that lives in the retention pond thats not 30 feet away from the side of our store. [/QUOTE]

So I'm reading this and thinking "Florida." Then I look up and see I'm right.

I'm a freaking psychic.

[LostMyMind]

Raccoons are actually very clean, unless rabid. Just never corner one, that's all.

I guess, I'm weird, because I don't consider any animal unless it's a exotic type to be out of place. But skunks would be up on the top of my list of "weird".

[protege]

Raccoons are actually very clean, unless rabid. Just never corner one, that's all.

I second that. They get nasty and *will* attack you if cornered. Usually though, they'll run away first, unless they have rabies. Groundhogs are another critter that gets nasty if cornered--I've had to chase a few of each from my grandmother's porch...after I'd found them raiding my cat's food dish. Again, usually they'll run away if I yell at them. However, I did have an encounter with a rabid groundhog--he wouldn't leave, even after I'd hit him with the broom. The only way to chase him away, was to get the pitchfork and jab him with it. He took off across the field, and disappeared. Good thing too, as I'm sure one of the neighbors would have shot him.

Getting back on topic, we haven't had any exotic animals at the office...unless you count the mouse behind the 'fridge some years ago.

[Jpurple]

Geckos- lots and lots of geckos and various other lizards. Of course, they're native to Thailand, so you get used to it.
I've never seen it, but apparently there's a very large (5 foot!) lizard that likes to swim in the pool at school.

[Becks]

Last year, we supposedly had some a possum (or was it a hedgehog? I didn't see it, just heard about it) wander into the store.

I'm still waiting for our breeding pair of ducks to wander into the store sometime next late winter/early spring...

[Bella_Vixen]

Raccoons, ducks, chipmunks, deer.

A couple months ago, my boss saw a wild turkey crossing our parking lot.

[Horsetuna]

In the casino not so much - its in a mall in the middle of the city so not really any wildlife.

At the Zoo though there's plenty of critters. I saw an exotic looking cockroach crawl out of the jungle area and sit near the food areas of the cafe (The cafe is now closed.). Not to mention the starlings and other jungle birds in the conservatory who try to steal our salads.

Then there's the free ranging peacocks. Of course, these peacocks lay eggs and have babies. Very cute babies I must say.

Of course, EVERYONE feeds the cute babies fries and stuff, and they become very tame... we tell them not to but they dont listen. Even workers feed them.

And of course, Little Baby Peacocks become Really Big Peacocks.

And what do they do? They still want fries!

They figured out how to jump into the serving window at the burger shack... and all the girls (and a few of the guys) are terrified of these birds when they do that. I've had to chase and catch-release peacocks who get into the burger shack all the time cause nobody else wanted to go near them!

Then there's the fact that these very bold peacocks will actually CHASE little kids and steal their fries and hot dogs. I saw one walk right up to a kid, who stood there staring stupidly at the bird holding a hot dog, then reach out and snatch the dog up, swallowing it whole!

Poor kid was so upset, but it was hilariously funny.


One time, after I had left, there was an 'escaped animal' alarm at the zoo - a tiger was missing!

This was the first time in Zoo history (Thirty or more years) that this alarm had gone out - but everyone knew what to do.

Fortunately. They had only miscounted the tigers. Everyone was where they should be. *phew*


Oh, one more... At the Calgary Stampede Grounds, there's events year round. Pony auctions, rodeos, bull riding, racing...

Well, one time one of the Riding Bulls got loose. And we're not talking meat cattle but those huge things you see on Television ripping Cowboys apart and stuff. I didnt have a radio that morning, my supervisor drove by in the van and said "There's a bull on the loose! If you see it, get into the booth and dont come out!"

Said booth is about as structurally sound as a Particle Wood outhouse, only larger.

I never did see the bull But I did see three horse trailers and two front end loaders drive to the far end of my (large) lot... where the bull apparently was.

I'm told these bulls dont like reflective traffic vests though... friend said one got loose during the Stampede itself one year, and ripped through two fences into a Parking lot... took one look at him in the vest and howled, turned, and ran the other way.

That's all I can think of for now, save the occasional escaping lizard and fish in a reptile shop.

[April]

Nothing interesting. A couple birds from the pet store every now and again

[Broomjockey]

We had a pigeon die on our loading dock. We opened the door, and there it was, sitting on the ledge, dead. Coworker was creeped, I grabbed a broom and dustpan, swept it up and threw it in our garbage compactor.

The funny one was one summer there was an insane number of grasshoppers around, and at least one got in. It was sitting on the counter, and I didn't wanna kill it, so I try to brush it so it'll jump on to the floor. Instead it decided to jump the otherway, on to a lady I was helping. On to her, um, chest. I winced, expecting a freak out, instead she just brushed it off on to the floor I was aiming at in the first place.

[digilight]

When I worked at the summer camp we had bears try and go thru the dumpsters (thank goodness for bear bars on them). We also had deer, mice, racoons, scorpions, tarrantulas, rattle snakes, and various other critters (beings as it was a camp in the mountians though I don't think it really counts. The tarrantula highway was pretty cool though, for about a week we had a migration of tarrantulas where they all followed the same path down the mountian and thru part of the camp near the cabins. We all learned very quickly to watch where we stepped.

[PuckishOne]

We had a dead duck at the side entrance to our building not long ago. Just looked like he died right there of natural causes. Last week we had a bald eagle land in the trees directly across from our windows, so we had a little nature interlude during the day, which was very cool. There are also supposedly beavers living in the canal that runs through our office park, but I've not seen them.

Generally speaking the only animals I deal with while on the clock are the ones on the other end of the phone line.

[Spiffy McMoron]

Back while working at Crappy Tire, just a week or two after I started, there was a tiny kitten that found its way into the outer warehouse, and made it a home. It lived on the mice that were there, and even managed to bring down a small pidgeon.

But it kept on triggering alarms, so it had to go. We baited it with cat food, and finally trapped it one night. Not wanted to see it go to the pound, my roommate volenteered to take it home. At first it hid in the basement, and barely made a peep. Finally, she started to come out of her shell, and now it's the biggest suck-up love whore in the world.

Don't you just love a happy story?

[Ringtail Z28]

The Target dump I used to work at was really close to some creeks and runoffs from the ocean, so there were all kinds of animals in the area. Various seabirds were the most common, gulls (aka shithawks) and pelicans were always around the parking lot. Ducks from the pond at a nearby retirement community would show up once in a while.

Skunks would always show up at night, no employees ever got sprayed that I know of, skunks do a pretty good job of letting you know they don't want to be messed with long before they start spraying. Opossums tend to pop up too, along with the odd fox. You wouldn't think that a tiny little fox could stink worse than a regular size dog, funky things.

Rats were the real problem though. The damn things were everywhere in the stockroom. No matter how many we killed they just kept right on coming.