chased by many a dog, but a goose is a better story. I think my funniest is a mistake I made by having ice cream and milk about an hour before a 7 mile run. Lets just say that 5 miles in I had to run off into the bush. What made it particularly bad was it was only about 20F outside and the wind was howling. My clothes got a bit of it too and my "man parts" suffered a bit from the wind exposure It was an uncomfortable final two miles.

UK is more of a dog infested country. I was once tripped up by a Schnauzer and wrecked my Withings Pulse when landing on it as I kept it in my backpocket for rain protection. Lovely little old ladies though who owned the beast. Once I got up it came at me again.

I will look out for them low flying geese when running in our bird reservation. Hope it'll be a pink footed one and I can start a big year with it.

I've had a few close calls with wild turkeys. You don't realize how big and fast these guys are until one comes charging at you.

Never geese. And the dogs I've encountered on my runs are usually restrained by good fences (thanks, good neighbors!). Only two things have stopped me dead in my tracks when running or preparing to run.

First, on a family vacation in Gatlinburg, I decided to hit one of the trails early in the morning, before the wife and kids were awake. Head out the cabin door, lock it behind me, walk around the back of my car... Bear. Sitting at the front of my car, playing with the trash can locker I had parked in front of. Almost needed clean pants. I started taking slow steps backward, he looked at me, sniffed and scampered off into the woods. Still went on the run

When I was living in Florida, there was a long route I liked that ran me past a couple retention ponds and the like. One early morning while I was out and about I came around a bend in the path and there were three sand hill cranes. A mama, a papa and a little one. Mama crane spread her wings out wide and made that stupid squawking noise the cranes make. Stopped dead in my tracks. Cranes with their young tend to be aggressive. And they stand at eye-height to a man. And that beak just looks like it could take my eye if it really wanted to. Let's just say I found another path to get around the pond.

LOL

No geese but I tend to run at night so I had to "swerve" quickly because the cat I thought I saw while running that was close to me turned out to be a raccoon and I thought it best to give him a wide berth..no desire to get rabies

I once came around the corner on a trail in the Santa Cruz Mountains, just north of San Jose, and spooked a small deer that was right next to the trail. It bounded off quickly. And then, when I got near to the spot on the trail where the deer had been, I caught some movement out of the corner of my eye. It unnerved me a bit so I kept running for a bit before I turned around and looked back. But when I did, I saw a mountain lion up on the slope above the trail. I must have passed within 20 feet of her (him).
I think I saved that deer's life!

No wildlife stories (yet) but I do give geese a very wide berth. My worst running story was the time I was training for a marathon while I was in law school, and was so busy during the week before my 17-miler that I lived on very spicy Indian food leftovers for the three days before the run. I bet you can all imagine exactly how well that run went....