Oh, wait -- Oz has a different menagerie, hasn't it?

Spiders and vipers and crocs, oh my!

Wow. We haven't had any large felines in this part of the East within living memory.

We have a wolf preserve in a wooded portion of the county. (It appears on the do-it-yourself farm tour listings in the fall and spring, along with the horses, cows, pigs, mushrooms, experimental agricultural station, sheep, chickens, llamas, ostriches, and pheasants, which I guess makes it a wolf farm.) Bears are occasionally reported in the Appalachian ranges, but sightings are quite rare near population centers. I do remember going to a dump in the Adirondacks with my dad and seeing a mother black bear and two cubs waaaay down in the ravine when I was a kid, but I've never seen a large cat in the wild in my life.

Never hope to, either.

They can stay in their range and I will stay in mine.

Do hikers in your part of the world carry starter pistols or anything else that makes a big explosive noise?