Came here to say this. Scariest encounter I had was earlier this year with a stag. He was standing on a footpath, it was dusk and he was shadow so I didn’t see him until I was 5m away. I’m 1.9m and he was looking down at me. Had another 1m of antlers. Then my dog started barking and he just turned and walked away into the trees.

Same dog once tried to fight a pair of geese, she’s similar size to them, they didn’t back down.