Me: "Turtle. Turtle!"
He stomped on the brakes before he hit it, and I bailed out and rescued it--a good sized Eastern Painted Turtle with a shell as big as both my hands together.
Being a turtle, it tried to scratch and bite and pee on me while I transported it to the pond, which it was at least a block away from. I suspect the intervention of a juvenile East African Plains Ape, somehow....
Anyway, turtle back in pond, and marsh hiked around. Win/win.
53 miles to Mordor, by the way.