Pronghorn

As I made my way towards Moab, I took the frontage road out of Green River, Utah to avoid the barreling vehicles and fumes of Interstate 70. I only saw one car on this 12 mile stretch of road. Suddenly, two figures appeared ahead of me on the side of the road. I thought they were human at first but then they began crossing the road and I saw their four legged outline. Deer? I pedaled forward slowly to not scare them off. As you can see from the first photo they were alerted to my presence early on. The larger of the two animals was looking straight at me and listening intently. When I got close enough, I saw that their markings were like no deer I had ever seen- white rump, white stripes on the neck, and large eyes and face. I had to look in my guide book after this encounter to identify these animals. They are pronghorn which are often misidentified as antelope. They usually have horns but the ones I saw did not have any horns.

Pronghorn will stick out the hairs of their rump when startled, like this one is doing here at me. You cannot see it but there is a young pronghorn directly behind this adult. A mother protecting its young?

According to Peterson Field Guides this is the "fastest mammal in the Western Hemisphere" and it can run over 50 MPH!

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