# Coolest thing you have ever seen while in the woods?



## Garbo (Oct 2, 2007)

I went hunting Thanksgiving Day, and had a blast. Got two Does and the weather was as good as it gets. I love to sit in the woods and watch all that goes on.

I got in my tree just before daylight and while I was doing a little housekeeping before pulling my rifle up, a mama **** with several little ***** walked up to the tree I was in and seemed to be curious about my rifle that was still on the ground at the base of the tree. I watched them a few seconds after I had sat down, and as I started to pull my rifle up, it suprised the mama ****, and she jumped and ran 10 or 15 yards, stopped and turned around. I thought it was funny, but needed to get my rifle up so I kept it coming and she watched it all the way to my stand. As I sat there after getting it up, she stood on her hind legs and seemed to be trying to figure out what I was and what I was doing up there. She studied me for a lot longer than I would have thought she would, and eventually walked away with your little ones. 

I see alot of cool stuff while in the woods and I enjoy that as part ofthe experience very much. I love to sit in the woods. 

What is some of the cool stuff you have seen while in the woods?


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## fisheye48 (Sep 28, 2007)

i love sitting in eearly bow season and watching spotted fawns...if there are a few of them around thats when it gets fun...because they will be just feeding along and all of a sudden the fawns will just start running around playing and then go back to feeding


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## rob883 (Oct 3, 2007)

sleeping in a tri pod rifle laid across the rail with my head on it i wake up look around to see a bobcat on the ground staring back at me


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## fishn4real (Sep 28, 2007)

Was in my ladder stand on the edge of a cut-over area on Thanksgiving morning, watching a hawk circle 400-400 yards away. Diverted my attention to check out the area for deer, and when I looked back in the direction of the hawk, holy kamikawzi hawks, the thing is barreling down on me, eye level, 15 yards and closing fast. I had to throw up my arms in order to make him flare off.

Few minutes later I'm setting there reflecting on the hawk incident and a dang sparrow comes and lands on my gun rail. 

Then, I hear the pitter patter of little feet scurrying... a ground squirrel has come out of his hollow and is running up my tree. What tha f^&(.

I guess I don't have to worry any more as to my camoflauge. Nothing like communing with nature.


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## Collard (Oct 23, 2007)

Tons of stuff. I've fended off two hawks and an owl (2 were my fault) chipmunks(they are some kinda sharp eyed) skunk,armadillo courtship,sneaky ass bobcat,otters in the creek below me,beautiful fox squirrels(odd colors) a doe eating pine needles of all things, an old well from some long ago home place in the middle of the woods, ( had one foot go through the rotten covering) arrowheads,old logging trails in the Escambia river swamp, the train tunnel in Tunnel Springs,............

Out of everything though, the one thing that sticks in my mind is a simple pair of screech owls that lit beside me in Bluewater three years ago. One was dark red the other a lighter shade. They just sat there making there little owl sounds and watching me for a few minutes. I had never seen any screech owls as long as I've hunted. They were just so cool and beautiful just sitting there.


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## outdoorsalways (Dec 13, 2007)

One of my favorites was a fox squirrel putting on a show for me.The day I stop seeing the funny,enjoyable things that all have wrote about is the day I stop going to the outdoors.Killing is not everything.Its hard to explain these encounters to others so we just put them in our memory of smiles.(good post garbo)


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## Stumpknocker (Oct 3, 2007)

I saw a fox squirrel this year that was all black except his muzzle and ears, whichwere white. Pretty damn cool.


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## JoeZ (Sep 30, 2007)

> *outdoorsalways (12/1/2008)*The day I stop seeing the funny,enjoyable things that all have wrote about is the day I stop going to the outdoors.Killing is not everything.




Ain't that the truth? It's just as simple as getting outside and being away from EVERYTHING.


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## David Ridenour (Sep 28, 2007)

I've seen a lot of cool stuff like the others. I about fell out of my stand avoiding an owl on a dive at me. It must have been my eyes blinking that caused him to attack because i wasn't moving at all. He flared off a few feet away butI was already moving to avoid claws in my face. I had a squirrel climb into my stand with me. He didn't know what I was but he figured I didn't belong there.I was getting nervous he was going to start climbing on me but he got nervous too.He jumped to the nearest tree and barked at me for awhile.

I watched a chipmonk insulating his nest one day for hours. He would run from log to log being sure not to touch the ground and rustle the leaves. He would collect leaves in his cheeks like a hamster and take them at least 20 yards to his nest. He never disturbed the ground around his nest. Woodpeckers though annoying can be fascinating as well as those tiny birds (martins?) that move in little flocks and eat bugs off the tree bark.


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## fishinstevez (Oct 26, 2008)

funny i once had a big ole owl try to land right next to me too.scared the shit out of me and him


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## ScullsMcNasty (Oct 4, 2007)

on thanksgiving morning i had a beautiful wood duck swim down the creek right next to me! i had never seen a wood duck before. wow was he pretty!!


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## snakeawave (Oct 1, 2007)

I was climbing my tree one day when i saw a bug on the tree just as i looked at him that stink bug spit something in my eye that felt like battery acid thank god for the harness, as im jumping around i realize just a hair late that I didn't tie my stands together and the bottom dropped like a rock to the base of the tree right onto my rifle,so after mashing the sh!t out of that bug , I strapped my feet to the top of my stand bearhugged the tree and shimmied down skinning all the bark off the back of that pine, but It was a beautiful day out there in nature, at least from what I could see from the side that wasn't swollen shut:banghead


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## SouthernAngler (Oct 5, 2007)

one bow season i was sitting the edge of the foodplot and there was a squirrel on the corn pile just eating away. Out of nowhere a hawk swooped down and grabbed the squirrel and took off. by far the coolest thing i have yet to witness. i also enjoy watching fawns goof off.


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## catchenbeatsfishen (Nov 25, 2007)

Watching river otters play in McGirts creek in Jacksonville (Orange Park)while Bass fishing. That area is pretty developed and I did not expect to see Otters there. They were amazing. We watched them for about 20 min. That same day, my son hooked his first big fish on artificial bait. That was his first time using worms and beetle spins. He was bored with worms, so I changed to a beetle spin. He flipped it out on a lilly pad. As soon as it dropped off of the lilly pad a bass took it and ran to the channel. It stripped the guts out of the Zebco reel he was using and kept running. His eyes were big as saucers and he was hooked from then on. He was about 7 at the time.

That was a good day.


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## NICHOLAS (Oct 18, 2007)

> *snakeawave (12/1/2008)*I was climbing my tree one day when i saw a bug on the tree just as i looked at him that stink bug spit something in my eye that felt like battery acid thank god for the harness, as im jumping around i realize just a hair late that I didn't tie my stands together and the bottom dropped like a rock to the base of the tree right onto my rifle,so after mashing the sh!t out of that bug , I strapped my feet to the top of my stand bearhugged the tree and shimmied down skinning all the bark off the back of that pine, but It was a beautiful day out there in nature, at least from what I could see from the side that wasn't swollen shut:banghead




I had the same thing happen to me but I didn't get to see the bug. I had no idea what happened but man that burned! Jumped down from the elevated shooting house ran to the truck and washed my eye out with water from the cooler. It was far worse than having gasoline in my eye.





The coolest thing I have seen happened this archery season when I witnessed a Coopers Hawk catch, kill, and eat a woodpecker 10 yrds from my stand.


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## welldoya (Oct 5, 2007)

Got in a stand one morning before daylight and as it got light I looked over in the tree next to me and there was a big **** just sitting there looking at me. When he realized what I was , he ran down the tree and took off.

Another time I went up a tree before daylight and when it got light I realized I was 20' from a bee's nest the size of a basketball. Thank goodness it was abandoned.

But I guess the coolest thing happened last year. I was sitting on a 15' ladder stand watching a firebreak and something ran across. I have no idea what it was. The only thing I can figure is that it was a panther. A buddy of mine sat the same stand and it came out and ran up the fire lane. He saw it probably 3 times longer than I did and he said he doesn't have a clue as to what it was.

We've both been hunting for over 35 years and have never seen anything like it but it was black and fast.


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## Five Prongs Of Fury (Apr 15, 2008)

> *welldoya (12/1/2008)*Got in a stand one morning before daylight and as it got light I looked over in the tree next to me and there was a big **** just sitting there looking at me. When he realized what I was , he ran down the tree and took off.
> 
> Another time I went up a tree before daylight and when it got light I realized I was 20' from a bee's nest the size of a basketball. Thank goodness it was abandoned.
> 
> ...


Small BIGFOOT!!! oke


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## Nat (Oct 10, 2007)

The coolest thing I ever saw in the woods

I was riding a mule named nugget up the North Crestone trail in the Sangre de Cristo wilderness in game management unit 82. miles and miles from civilization

Catching some afternnon rays on the side of the trail sitting on a bolder was a beautiful young lady, butt ass naked

I said hello and ask how she was doing,,,,and she waved her hand showing her hairy armpit and said hello with a strong european accent

Ole nugget was a fine mule, had long legs and would walk out fast, he was a pleasure to ride. The young lady I never ever saw again

But, if your ever up in Colorado near Venable Pass on the North Crestone trail, keep your eyes peeled


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## jigslinger (Sep 30, 2007)

> *welldoya (12/1/2008)*Got in a stand one morning before daylight and as it got light I looked over in the tree next to me and there was a big **** just sitting there looking at me. When he realized what I was , he ran down the tree and took off.
> 
> Another time I went up a tree before daylight and when it got light I realized I was 20' from a bee's nest the size of a basketball. Thank goodness it was abandoned.
> 
> ...


It's been talked about on here before but it could've been one of these.

http://www.t4studios.com/thefloridajaguarundi.html


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## Garbo (Oct 2, 2007)

A couple of years ago during Turkey season, a buddy of mine was sitting behind me calling, and I was the shooter. We were set up on the edge of a small patch or food plot from deer season. Some movement caught my attention to my right and I slowly turned to see a Quail and a bunch of little ones, coming out of the undergrowth into the open to feed. There were 2 grown birds and I don't know how many chicks, but it was a bunch, they scratched and fed around at one point within 15 feet of me. I learned that day how small a Quail chick is, they are tiny, somewhere about the size of a Quarter. 

That was really cool.

I have also seen very small Duck chicks that were surprisingly smaller than I would have thought. What variety of Duck has extremely small chicks? Teal Maybe?


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## Stressless (Oct 2, 2007)

Garbo - You are a bad man... I had a couple things I was going to do but read this and well had to stay for a bit. So the question is what is the coolest thing on the stand.



Dawn, Birds, Trees.



Dawn. My experience is the awaking in the woods. Climbing into the stand before the first horizontal blush of light cracks the lid of deep night. Settling into the wilderness and becoming as still as the limbs and rocks that have always been there, I am now part of the wild. Then the blush comes, sometimes bright and defined on the horizon, sometimes obscured with a lingering caress across the sky with a thousand shades of gray. Birds. Sometimes a few, more on special mornings small acrobatic Chickadees, Titmouse and Nuthatches poking and flitting in twos and groups - love to hear their FlifF_FliF_FliF of nervous hungry wings. They are almost always my first companions of dawn. Juncos, Jays, Cardinals, woodpeckers and Sparrows mixed with squirrels rustle up the woods and leaves next. Larger raptors move through on occasions that are heroic in my memory, usually heralded by they sly dampening of activity from every member of the proposed breakfast menu. Woodchucks, beavers, mink, raccoons all ply for my unacknowledged attention. Everyone of my furry pals a memory and each one a humble and unremarkable thread in the great wild I have become. Trees. Unremarkable, unimaginable strong virile lonely and beautiful. Only brutality indifferent chance and esprit for life creates a tree from a sapling. Mind numbing repetition yet on inspection each has an individual tale that can only be guessed - a great and intriguing discipline better suited to deciduous rather then conifer.



Lets go sit in the woods...

Stressless


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## Huntinman (Aug 12, 2008)

One of the coolest things I have ever seen in the woods was several years ago while over looking a dove field. Sitting there on my four-wheeler I watched a red- tailed hawk circle about 200 to 300 feet above me, in a moments notice he pulled in his wings and began falling, what seemed minutes took seconds, about ten feet off the ground his wings flared and he smacked the ground 50 yards away from me along a fence row. One out of the two rabbits bolted!!! Absolutely amazing!!! To watch him all the way down was unbelievable!!!


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## stump (Nov 10, 2008)

i seen a doe giving birth this past spring!!!!!!!!!!! that was great.


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## fromthedepths (Nov 21, 2008)

i was sitting on the ground one time turkey hunting and a big bobcat walked right by me at 6 yards and didn't even see me .what a rush that was.


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## David Ridenour (Sep 28, 2007)

Dang Bob! You should publish that short essay! The awakening is truly moving to those that appreciate it.


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## Garbo (Oct 2, 2007)

> *Huntinman (12/1/2008)*One of the coolest things I have ever seen in the woods was several years ago while over looking a dove field. Sitting there on my four-wheeler I watched a red- tailed hawk circle about 200 to 300 feet above me, in a moments notice he pulled in his wings and began falling, what seemed minutes took seconds, about ten feet off the ground his wings flared and he smacked the ground 50 yards away from me along a fence row. One out of the two rabbits bolted!!! Absolutely amazing!!! To watch him all the way down was unbelievable!!!


*That is way Cool. I have seen the last part of what you described, but not the whole thing. I bet that was cool to see. *


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## jawbreaker (Sep 29, 2008)

Like all the rest i have,and always will be amazed at what will come next, But a buddy and i were hunting the river swamp on the three day muzzeloder a few years ago. It was raining very hard and we were looking at a new area, we were walking along in and old cypress pond with tonsof hog sign.Talking what on any other day would be very loud. Then we hear what we thought was a **** in a big based cypress, i walk around front to find a decent size opening in the base of the tree, like most cypress. All of a sudden a 120-140 pound hog comes running out at me,out of thishole in the tree!! It was like 2-3 ft away!! I throw up and shoot but was sooo scared shitless, i didnt know if i hit it or not..SO i took off running tryen to reload, not knowing were the dame thing was because of all the smoke..So after regrouping and reloading we go back to the tree and it comes back out. That time we kill it.. Turned out it was a sow and she was just tryen to keep her lil ones out of the rain that was and experience...Kinda Mad me feel bad for killen her:reallycrying


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## Rack&QuackObsession (Nov 18, 2008)

I was sitting in our stand with my buddy back in Texas. Not seeing anything all morning, he reaches in my bag. I thought he was getting a snack or something, nope pulls out my lanyard of duck calls. Well we were hunting a somewhat flooded pipeline and he starts with a hale call from hell. I got pissedtook them away from him, about 30 seconds later a tremendous flock of green head's and some teal come out of the woods and lite right in front of us land 10 yards in the flooded ground and proceed to just sit there and play. Eventhough it was duck season also, we only had deer rifles.


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## Captain Woody Woods (Oct 2, 2007)

> *jawbreaker (12/5/2008)* All of a sudden a 120-140 pound hog comes running out at me,out of thishole in the tree!!


like i've told people before, hogs WILL attack humans. even if it is brought on by defense. sweet story


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## fishing with carl childers (Oct 3, 2007)

one of the coolest things i have witnessed while in the woods of Blackwater was this huge owl swooping by my stand with a very large snake in its talons. it landed on a downed pine from hurricane Opal, and sat there holding the snake with one foot while tearing chunks off of it with his beak.I had always thought of owls to be nocturnal so I found this to be very cool to see. another thing that i saw that was pretty funny was one time i had put out some fox pee for some reason i cant remember, and this squirrel comes along and crosses paths with this scent and jumps straight up into the air and scrambles off so fast it was unbelievable. funny as hell. one more thing, sitting along the edge of a creek bottom one afternoon i hear dogs baying , i know they are into the still hunt area from the dog hunt side,happens all the time, all of a sudden i can hear the deer coming thru the bottom. raise up the old Remington 870 and get all ready and ol button head comes within 10 feet of me, the deer sees me and hooks a sharp left and runs on down thru the creek bottom. dogs are still coming.few seconds later here go the beagles. they dont see me just go on by yapping. so i'm sitting there trying to regain my composure, see something coming thru the bushes again. it's a lil bitty dog sorta like a yorkie just a yapping and right on the beagles trail. i'm like man.what a deer dog! few minutes later they all come back. first the deer and then the rest. i just went and found me another spot to sit.


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## Garbo (Oct 2, 2007)

I went to Perdido WMASaturday Morning. I got into the area I wanted to hunt whichwas a thick area in asmall creek bottom,and found a tree I had climbed before got about 20' up and was still before daylight. 

Just as it was getting light enough to see a little I heard something walking. I stood and turned around, and it was another hunter. Normally I use a doe bleat call, or "The Can" to signal someone that is walking in on where I already am, but I just watched him. He walked all the way down to the small stream and about 15 yards across it he started preparing to climb a large SweetGum. He was about 35-40yrds from my tree and I thought if he will get up the tree and be still, things would be none the worse. Anyway, he got his Old Man climber attached to the tree and was trying to get aboard, and it was hilarious. The tree was large and probably too big for the Old Man climber, but the hunter was too big for the Old Man climber too. He attached the stand about 4' up the tree and needed it to be lower to the ground in order to get himself on it, so he forced the lower section down the tree and had it at an extreme angle and couldn't get on it due to it was angled too steep to board it. So he took the lower section off the tree and put it back on the tree at the base, which is alot larger around than just 3' up from the ground. Now it gets in the stand and starts to climb. He makes it up about 8-10' and the bottom section is already starting to go below level and must make him nervous because he stops and climbs back down. He takes the bottom section off again and replaces it about where it was on the tree to start with. He has decided that he can pull himself up and board the stand with the bottom section up off the ground. As he pulled on the top section he would try to get his feet onto the bottom section and the bottom section was trying to get away from him by going around the tree. He got thrown off by the bottom section3 times, once he landed completely on his back from about 3' up. This all transpired over about 30 minutes, and he got frustrated, got his gun and went back the way he came, I assume the tree stand has a new home attached to a Sweetgum tree, as at least until I left, it was left on the tree. 

I got close to laughing, but I don't think he ever new anyone seen his attempt to climb that tree. I wondered why he didn't find a different tree or if the climber was borrowed and/or he didn't know how to use it. Bless the guys heart and if that was anyone that reads this, I am sorry, but that was worth getting to see. If Iwould have had a camera that filmed, it would have been cool to have filmed the whole episode. 

I didn't see anything else, and left about 10:00am.


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## [email protected]thing (Oct 4, 2007)

man thats a hard question. i think the woods wakening up says it all. fawns playing, wildlife living right next to you as you become part of the back drop. great reads everyone.


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## tom1s (Oct 4, 2007)

Im with a lot of other people here...HAWKS! I have been known to loose track of deer because im to busy watching a hawk work a field. Magnificent birds :clap


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## team lite line (Nov 18, 2007)

i was hunting in Alabama 2 years ago just be for dark i had a turkey land in the same tree i was in 

this bow season i seen a gray squirrel that was about 3-4lb (yes it was a gray squirrel)


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## TideFishin (Dec 9, 2007)

I was hunting a big field in Camden about 8 years ago. There were probably 15 deer in the field, 3 or 4 of them bucks. I hear something walking directly behind my elevated shooting house and the deer keep looking in that direction, but aren't alarmed. The shift their glances a little to my left. So I have to sit up to peek out the window and 10 feet away is a black panther with it's tail just wavingin the air. They each stare at one another for what seemed like forever (prob about 30 seconds) and then the cat just walks the edge of the field for about 100 yards and then cuts back into the woods.

Deer never ran off which I thought was weird. Wasn't much fun walking out the woods at night by myself after forgetting my flashlight. Also...no way in hell it was one of those jaguar things. It was a much taller cat.

Have also shot a "doe" that was in the process of mating...turned out to be a button buck. Woken up in a shooting house from a screech owl flying in and flapping in my face before exiting.


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## Garbo (Oct 2, 2007)

Very Cool Read. Great Stories...


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## BOHUNTER1 (Feb 18, 2008)

I saw a 265lb 11pt drilled with a spitfire and scoring 150 7/8" 

I wont darn mention the ones Ive missed! LOL :reallycrying


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## K-Bill (May 14, 2009)

i was sitting in a shooting house last year waiting for dusk, and watching various birds, squirrels, rabbits, etc eat and do whatever they do on my food plot. suddenly everything flipped out and scurried out of there. right about that time i heard a hawk screech, but i couldn't see it yet. out of no where and about 15 yards in front of my shooting housea peregrine falcon busts a female cardinal out of mid-air, about 10 ft or so,and pins her on the ground. i was looking at the falcon, 15 yards away, with my 10x binocs. tried to get some pics with my phone but it was too far away for the ol' nextel phone. they say peregrine falcons dive up to and over 200 mph. would have loved to see that, but watching him bust that cardinal and topple over it wasabsolutely awesome.


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## Jason (Oct 2, 2007)

I love watching them tree rats, I've also got chipmunks at my place that run around like their rear ends are on fire. I've love watching fawns playing and nursing. I was next to a small wet-weather pond when a big nannie walked in and just started peeing in the water...man do they stream it out! One time hunting in blackwater, I saw something black on the ground and couldn't figure it out then I saw several smaller 1's---When it got light enough to see, it was a momma skunk and her babbies!!! :letsdrink 

I just love watching how GOD has blessed us withALL nature's creatures! :angel:bowdown:angel


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