The truth about animals is they are territorial and each animal has a barrier and tolerance level of anything within this barrier. Barriers differ from animal to animal take a pet dog for instance its barriers are fairly low until you try and take its food. Other wise its as placid and calm. The same is for other domestic animals. Wild animals have to hunt for food so they have a different way of thinking just like civilians and military personal to a certain extent. Many martial arts are based on the movement of animals and the military while in training, weather they know this or not everything they have to learn is based around animal tactics from survival to attacking.

Wild animals don’t just do random attacks they have a purpose for attacking you, if they are hungry, if they see you as a treat, if you are near their place or residence, if they feel you threaten their young or their food supply. Other than these reasons animals don’t really mind humans. Normally the bigger the animal the bigger the threat. In most cases that is not the truth its the ones that hunt in packs are more dangerous, because there is more to feed the more aggressive they become. The bigger the pack the less chance you have of survival.

Lions for instance if they are sitting with a view of a big open area, they will spot you before you see them. When you do see them from the distance they have let you get close enough to make them out, this is where their barrier starts. They wouldn’t have let you get this close if they were starving in fact you wouldn’t have even seen them. You see camera men and a host filming in the wild up close to lions and tigers but what they don’t tell you is how they got so close. Have you ever wondered how they do it ?

They wait until a pride have eaten and are just relaxing after a hard days hunt. You still cant just walk up to them and give them a kiss. You still have to break through their barriers this could take hours and usually does. As you see them and they see you they reduce their barrier to a sprinting distance. Most animals do this if they haven’t encountered or are curious of you. It could take a while for you to get into this circle and the animal to feel comfortable with you, the best way to do this is meet them down wind meaning let the wind carry your sent towards them. If you want to avoid them you travel across them up wind making sure the wind is blowing in your face, and the lions are in front of you. To avoid lions you have to be out of the sprinting distance, if your not they will think you are hunting them and that is a different story altogether.

As you reach the sprinting distance the fastest or the two fastest lions will stand up, they know who they are and you will too. No more than two lions will pay attention to you at first. Unless of course they are hungry. These lions are the lead hunters if they see you as a treat they will let the others know and maybe another lion or two will stand up to warn you off. If you see more than the first lot stand up and look in your direction, you have to back off, retreat to where you were standing when you saw them first, you will have to do this slowly. Any sudden movement could provoke an attack. If you want the experience of being up close to lions you will have to wait here until the two additional lions that stood up, to sit down.

The lion that saw you first will still be looking at you if the lions keep getting up then you keep doing this. this shows the lions that your not afraid and that your just curious. You wouldn’t want to be afraid either meeting lions in their habitat is not for the feint hearted. Most wild animals use the same method, so do the militaries around the world. I’m just using Lions because mostly people know how lions act in the wild because they are on TV the most, in wildlife programs. Lions and other animals can sense fear in humans and other animals its like a sixth sense they have built into them. Walking towards them with the wind behind you shows them that your not a treat, and you mean them no harm.

As you break through their sprinting barrier they set up another barrier for you to try out the senses barrier the same lion will always be looking at you. Her job will be as lead hunter is to threat access you. She will be the one who will smell you first. it’s a lot more dangerous to get from this barrier back to the sprinting barrier and the lions know this so really you have to thrust the lions before they will thrust you. They are able to smell you from this distance. Bears are different to lions in this regard they can smell you from up to a mile away, the only way you can get close to a bear safely is when its fishing and preoccupied. Bears will kill you if you are wondering around the woods without a gun or a lot of food with you. If you are attacked by a bear you have to play dead and hold your breath, you will suffer from scratches but at least you will be alive bears have a short attention span so if you wait it out you will survive the attack. The more you struggle the more they get excited.

Once the lions smell you and are familiar with you being there you can feel for yourself when your there how close you can get. They will always be weary of you touching them because the chances are they have never been touched before and don’t know what to expect. Your best option is to wait until they touch you first if they are perfectly okay with you being there they will come up to you slowly just like you did coming up to them the lead hunter will stay where they are. One of the other lions will come up and will sniff around you and test you by walking behind you to see if you follow them with your eyes, if you do you have broken their thrust. Its usually one of the younger lions that do this test. How you know if the thrust is broken is if the lion that spotted you first sees you breaking the thrust and signals the young lion to come back. They wont attack you but they don’t want you there anymore so you have to retreat as slowly as you progressed. If this happens you wont get the shot that you wanted and you cant go back for it you have blown your chance.

In the case that you didn’t follow the young lion while it went behind you and keep eye contact with the lead hunter you will be okay. Then the young lion will rub up against you like a domestic cat, and the more you interact with this young lion will determine how much they thrust you. This shows the lions that they have nothing to fear and repay you in kind. Never try and touch the male lion because they are not as placid as the females they are just putting up with you.

Most wild animals act like this from wolves to tigers, monkeys to gorillas, birds to bongos. Bears make an exception as I’ve mentioned earlier. Water animals that can kill will kill such as crocodiles, sharks and snakes plus insects these all don’t have emotions these animals will kill you. They are born to simply kill or avoid there is no in between ground with these creatures.

If you find yourself in the wild surrounded by wild life these steps will help you survive. When you know the nature of a beast its easy to understand your level of danger. Always use the wind as cover and always be aware of your surroundings in the wild.