I worked for almost 40 years as a Land Use Planner and Land Development Manager before I retired 7 years ago. I spent a lot of time on trails, in forests and fields and along and in watercourses. Most of it was on foot but I was able to do a lot of data collection, photography, etc. in off road in vehicles too … my Jeep. Much of it was with specialists which was always interesting … Biologists, Arborists, Archaeologists, vibration and blasting experts, etc. as well as other Engineers and Planners.
We saw a lot of interesting things over the years, not always pleasant. Way more dead animals than I wanted to see. I've stumbled across many skeletal remains and some pretty close to it. Many dismembered animals; the severed heads of 3 coyotes sitting consecutive fence posts for example. One of the worst was a 30m x 30m dumping of animal waste (cows) that had been butchered and the remains left on our land. We saw lots of wildlife too which was always good … deer, beaver, turkey, moose … no bears … and more birds than I could possibly remember. Once I rescued a lamb that had its head stuck in a fence; not easy as I'm sure it thought I was there to finish it off.
I came across several marijuana operations, none booby trapped, or at least I don't think so! Many buildings that were supposed to be vacant but weren't. I had to evict several of them which was never fun. Lots of abandoned vehicles that I had to get rid of. One of the strangest was, after doing all of our background work and getting all of our approvals for a project, we finally got to the earthworks. Within an hour we dug up human remains.
