Been running with a headlamp at night out on the trail for 2 years now and it’s generally great - you can see all the ruts, rocks, etc., bikers can see you and when the time comes, so can the snowmobilers. Tonight, I discovered the unpleasant side effect of being able to illuminate the night. Took the dogs out for an EZ 6 miler tonight. Once we were comfortably away from the road (and hadn’t seen a soul), I let them off leash so they could check things out at their leisure. They both had their illuminated collars on - my boy stayed about 20’ out front, and the female (who’s lost a step in her age) was lagging a bit behind as usual. We’d run for about a half mile, and then stop to wait for the female to catch up, rest and sniff around for a sec, and then get back to work. About 2.5 miles out, we stopped to wait up and as I turned toward her to give her some pettin’, the light from my headlamp caught a pair of glowing critter eyes out in the woods, about 150 meters away. I kept my light pointed in that direction, figuring it would run off if it got too much attention. Meanwhile, the little angel voice in my head was calmly listing all the possible identities of the owner of those glowing eyes: possum, raccoon, deer, skunk, coyote. The little devil voice was whispering “rabid, hunger-crazed coyote, and probably not alone”. Eventually, the critter ran off and I could hear leaves rustling back in the woods - probably just a deer, so on we went. Figured we’d continue north to the 7 mile marker and turn around. About 200 m shy of the appointed turn-around, we stopped again to wait up and just to be sure, I swept the woods with my lamp. This time, I detected 2 sets of eyes glowing in the night - and closer than before. Oh shit - this ain’t no coincidence. Now, there was no sign of the little angel voice, but the devil voice was practically screaming “growing pack of rabid, hunger-crazed coyotes - and they’re marking you”. We turned around immediately and headed for home. I put my boy back on his leash so that we’d stick close together and made sure we ran at a pace the female could handle. All the while, my head was on a swivel checking out the woods on both sides of the trail as we ran, and occasionally behind us to make sure the ever-growing pack wasn’t closing in. I did catch a flash of a glowing eye off in the woods, but nothing more. Once we made it to the bridge over the highway, I felt loads better but I gotta tell ya’, it was most unsettling until we got there. Maybe we’ll stick to the roads tomorrow.
Mind playing tricks on you.
I can PR just about any trail at night due to the ‘fear’ of being chased. At any given point night riding, I can be 100% sure that either a vampire or wherewolf is behind me. And chasing fast too!
Ya, trail running at night with headlamps is fun, but full of glowing eyes staring right back at you. Here, it’s mostly deer (I think). I have my dog on a 14’ retractable leash, so he gets plenty of space, but never to far ahead or off trail. It gets spooky when he stops and stares into the bushes but I can’t see anything past my light.
Coyotes here are always a concern, but so is the mountain lions. I try to make a lot of noise when trail running at night with my dog. I was thinking of getting bells for my dog’s collar. Don’t know if that’ll help, but it can’t hurt?
One night at the start of the run, I see about 10 set of eyes. Damn, I though it was a pack of coyotes. Then, apparently, one of the coyotes flips open his cell phone. Actually, it was a bunch of teens hanging out a clearing.
If you’re not in cat country, then don’t worry about it. If you are in cat country, then damn…good thing you had the dogs along.
When I lived in SD, I heard stories from guys who went out train running and kept hearing rustling in the brush behind them but never caught sight of anything. Then they get back to the trail head and catch a glimpse of the cat that had been stalking them the past hour or so.
Northern IL - not much chance of mountain lions around here, but a couple years ago there were some reported ‘sightings’ of one (although no actual proof was ever produced). It did occur to me last night that I might end up being that ‘proof’. Fortunately, the dogs are quite reliable as far as staying on the trail. My guess is that it was a couple of coyotes who were eyeing the lagging female and planning for a dinner of Weimaraner. There have been some reports of coyotes taking pets out of backyards around here. Nothing like running with 175 lbs of live bait!
Man, I’d be spooked good if I was stalked by a mountain lion - might have to start packin’ on trail runs.
For the poster who asked about headlamps - I’ve got a Black Diamond, and the Mrs. has a Petzl. Both are good, and have decent battery life (3xAAA’s). Mine has 2 settings - a higher-power single spot, and 3 LED’s for a broader beam. Had the spot on last night. The Petzl has more settings.
Which headlamp do you folks recommend for running?
If you really want to see where you are going, try a Brunton L3 - 3W LED, it’s regulated, so it holds a steady level of brightness rather than fading as the batteries fade (until the batteries are really toast). It’s spendier than the previous generation of LED headlamps but much, much better in terms of light output and runtime. If you don’t like having the 4 AA’s on the headband there’s an extender kit to put them on your belt, also comes with a case to use C cells if you’re going spelunking for a few days or whatever. It doesn’t have a strap over the center of your head but I usually wear it over a hat and even with the batteries up there it’s fine. I’ve got various Petzls, an Essential Gear 7 led etc - they all seemed cutting edge at the time but are much less bright than the L3 and I just use them for utility use now. I think BD, Petzl, Princeton Tec and others now have competitors to the Brunton (as far as the regulated power and higher wattage luxeon LED) so those are probably great too, they’re all likely in the $70-100 range though. For a less expensive handheld as a backup or for a shorter run and/or less technical terrain I have a Princeton Tec Impact II - easy to hold, light and pretty bright for being unregulated and using AAA’s. (I’ve also got a Gerber handheld (LX 3.0, ie luxeon 3 watt) that I considered awesome and used for running before getting the Brunton and Princeton combo, it’s very well made and quite bright, long life as with all the LEDs but unfortunately unregulated so prone to fading if you let the batteries run down (many hours). It’s very sturdy, solid aluminum (but therefore a bit heavy) - will probably last forever but I doubt I’ll use it for running any more - great for the car or a power outage, kind of like a full C maglite in a AA form factor plus longer life.)
Just wait until a flock of roosting turkeys decide to take flight from the very tree you are running under, I about crapped myself the first time that happened to me.
