What 'Creature' Is This And What Was It Doing?

  • Hey Guest, Early bird pricing on the Summer Moot (29th July - 10th August) available until April 6th, we'd love you to come. PLEASE CLICK HERE to early bird price and get more information.

bearbait

Full Member
Quiet rural unclassified road in Powys, Wales (that's near England). It did appear to be rubber-ish scuffs as from tyres on the roadway. No farm gates immediately adjacent to this site so probably not a farm vehicle manoeuvring for the field entrance. As well as the usual farm machinery, quad bikes and those small 4wd things with a roof and small pickup bed are used nearby. Two cars can pass along this part of the road, carefully. (My size 12 boot added for scale.)

IMG_20200307_143138.jpg

IMG_20200307_143048.jpg

IMG_20200307_143034.jpg
 

JonathanD

Ophiological Genius
Sep 3, 2004
12,809
1,479
Stourton,UK
Looks similar to the black marks left behind after fly tippers have unloaded heavy black plastic containers of stuff to drag and dump the contents. Or two vehicles have met up and those same heavy containers have been transferred. Or something along those lines.
 

Broch

Life Member
Jan 18, 2009
7,976
7,755
Mid Wales
www.mont-hmg.co.uk
Quiet rural unclassified road in Powys, Wales (that's near England). It did appear to be rubber-ish scuffs as from tyres on the roadway. No farm gates immediately adjacent to this site so probably not a farm vehicle manoeuvring for the field entrance. As well as the usual farm machinery, quad bikes and those small 4wd things with a roof and small pickup bed are used nearby. Two cars can pass along this part of the road, carefully. (My size 12 boot added for scale.)

The creature is definitely Man (Homo sapiens); however, we just haven't done enough research to understand what or why these creatures do half of what they do - it's beyond comprehension most of the time.
 

Erbswurst

Bushcrafter (boy, I've got a lot to say!)
Mar 5, 2018
4,079
1,766
Berlin
I think that are traces of Tyrannosaurus Rex. If they where running, sometimes they try to stop by pressing the tail to the ground.
 

Nice65

Brilliant!
Apr 16, 2009
6,438
2,859
W.Sussex
Electric scooter burnout? Hard to see how the parallel lines were made unless there are versions with twin drive wheels.
 

bearbait

Full Member
I don't know what actual 'creature' itself made some / all of the tracks but I would hazard a strong guess that it, as Broch says, was under the command of a member of the species homo sapiens.

Re Robbi and bike skids, I feel the marks are too wide for a regular pushbike, but maybe they could be from a mountain bike with those big chunky off-road tyres?

Re JonathanD and fly tippers: there was no rubbish tipped there but a) the road has decent viz for a distance both ways (for detecting approaching vehicles), and b) where I found the marks is out of sight of nearby farms / buildings (according to how tall the 'fly-tipper' vehicles were). So swapping loads between vehicles, as you suggest, could be a possibility.

My feeling is that it could be a couple of dirt-bikes fooling around pulling wheelies and skidding the rear wheel round as they accelerate hard at an angle from the start. There are certainly several repeated patterns that would suggest that to me.

In the skid marks the longer parallel lines are not showing the remainder of the tyre tread? Why? Is the tyre not up to working pressure so the sidewalls are taking more load than designed? (It's not the only track like that on the road; there is an occasional one elsewhere on the road, within a KM or two.) The parallel lines of some of the skids don't always remain parallel in some cases. Is this where the bike / vehicle was leaning over causing uneven loading on the tyre / tyre wall?

Could it be more than one event? A 4-wheeled vehicle with uneven brakes skidding one wheel as it stopped quickly, or perhaps even by a two-wheeled trailer leaving the skid? Followed by (hours or a small number of days later) by the aforementioned dirt-bikes, or vice versa?

I'd been meaning to post the above pix (in the original post and taken early March this year) as bit of fun when I came across the following a few days ago a KM or two away, so it prompted me to do so.

I think I know what these following tracks are but seeing them caused me to go back and review the above pix to see if it was the same 'creature'. I don't believe it is. (Size 12 boot again for scale.)

IMG_20200606_132219.jpgIMG_20200606_132225.jpg


IMG_20200610_132141.jpg

I think that this is a horse doing an emergency stop. (Some riders shoe their beasties with plastic or rubber shoes rather than ye olde ffashioned metal shoes.) The longest skid (top right in the first image) shown I feel is the right forefoot, and the termination is quite clearly horseshoe-shaped. Other regular horse-like walking gait scuffs, shaped like a horseshoe, can be seen very faintly on the road surface elsewhere nearby (not illustrated).
 

Broch

Life Member
Jan 18, 2009
7,976
7,755
Mid Wales
www.mont-hmg.co.uk
On a tracking exercise in France a couple of years ago the large 'foot print' below had most people scratching their heads - it was a horse with special shoes sliding on the woodland floor :)

2018-05-13 12.19.12.jpg
 

bearbait

Full Member
On a tracking exercise in France a couple of years ago the large 'foot print' below had most people scratching their heads - it was a horse with special shoes sliding on the woodland floor :)

View attachment 59595
Many years ago I competed in Le Trec a couple of times (like orienteering but on horseback) and we were obliged to carry a 'spare tyre', i.e. a hoof boot, for the horse in case it lost a shoe. Your track may have been one of these hoof boots, as some riders use them anyway if the horse has a problem with one or more feet.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Broch and Robbi

BCUK Shop

We have a a number of knives, T-Shirts and other items for sale.

SHOP HERE