Ok, I think I know what happened, but it is a bit scary.  Was flying over a man made pond today, maybe 30-40' above, very very bright out, huge reflections and VPS was left ON (dumb?)...anyway, the bird all of a sudden put the landing gear down.   I immediately brought her back to me, tried to raise it over ground and it started and went back down.  I lowered the bird, shut her off, back on again, she was fine flying over ground, back onto the water, same thing happened.  So is this simply because I didn't turn the avoidance stuff off and the reflections tricked the sensors that it was close to the ground?

Newbie wants to know...Thanks all.

What are you flying?

Inspire 2, but truth be told take my mavic to the same spot, no issues.  Then again, different conditions and light.

The VPS does not like reflective surfaces, this if very likely the cause. Whe you went over the water again, did you turn off the VPS before going back?

Hi Jamie, no I didn't.  What was odd though when I came back onto land, I tried to raise them back up, and then it started going down, almost clicked (thought it was stuck like the other issues you hear about)...I landed and took off again and all was well.  

The safest way is to turn off "automatic landing gear" I prefer to control when the gear changes state thats what the switch on the controller is for...

Damn, this is what happens when I'm not familiar with all of the controls.  Thanks Doc.  Still waiting on your 4G thread to figure out how you are flying with 4G.