Bugged
Well, my nude hikes are done for 6 - 8 weeks. The skeeters mauled me today. By mid-August, they are usually gone, but they seem early this year, so maybe they'll disappear sooner. One other thing happened on my hike that furthered my hypothesis that animals see naked humans differently. I came across a herd of about 14 pronghorn does. I expected them to run away. Instead, they bunched together and started walking toward me. I even talked to them, and it didn't deter them. We were separated by about 100-150 feet. They seemed curious. I had never seen that behavior before. I would have held my ground and seen what they would do, but I had my two Australian Shepherds with me on down stays. If they had gotten too close, the dogs might have broken their stays. It would have been interesting to see how long the dogs would keep up chasing the second-fastest land animal on the planet, but I didn't want that. We walked away perpendicularly, and when we moved, the pronghorns scattered but didn't run off. The dogs did well and stayed close, perhaps because they were so outnumbered.