coming in for a landing at sprindale airport, i hit a buzzard. went through the prop and stuck in my air inlet. made one heck of a mess of my airplane.

 

I take the 5th.

 

I've hit a few in my life...most with a twelve guage though. But seriously I caught an owl in the windshield one dark night that didn't break the glass. I get the usual small birds on my spring/summer MT trips every year. I had one go up under the hood and when I stopped for fuel heard this strange squawking sound under the hood. I opened her up and found a small finch caught between the intercooler and frame support busted up pretty badly and still alive. I did the only 'right' thing and had forgotten about it till now!

 

I was going fishing on the Ohio river real early on day and on the river road, I ended up hitting a rabbit with my windshield. It seems an owl (so I think) had a rabbit in its' talons and had swept down from the bluff. It was a big rabbit and with the bird and rabbit heading straight for me, I actually ducked because I thought it was coming through the windshield. I couldn't do much else since I had the boat behind me and no time to react.

The rabbit hit the top of the windshield and I'm sure ripped it out of the owl's talons. Scared the heck outta me.

One other time, I was on my motorcycle doing about 70 through the corn field and a sparrow or something came out of the field. I really never saw it and it smashed into my wind screen and splattered. It was the biggest "bug" I had ever hit and left feathers and what-not with the mess. How it didn't break the wind screen I'll never know - I'm just glad I had one at the time.

 

I hit a turkey with my '93 a few years ago. I saw it take off from a field along the road, and it flew right in front of me before I could slow down. It hit and broke the top of the grill and the bug deflector and bounced up and over the truck. To top it all off, it didn't even get killed, it ran off into the woods!

 

I never hit anything tell I bought this truck about 3 years ago. Since then: 2-3 different size birds, a porcupine(left quills all over the tire) and a goat! I think this thing is a magnet for the suicidal animals.

 

Your secret is safe with me. Those dang do gooders killed the logging business here. After the owl BS the valley was in a bad way. Still is but now we have the do gooder nature nuts. They think they have brought life back to the area but they have no idea on how it was before.

 

I hit a Bald Eagle coming over a blind hill with the service truck one day. Took out the winshield, marker lights and dented the top of the cab. Made for a long day waiting for the UHP and DWR(national bird and all). Then I was down to the farm and I caught a peacock fighting with his reflection in my stainless rocker panels. He scratched the rocker panels and some paint. He disapeared that night.

 

Okay a couple of bird stories for you....

Story #1

When I was in high school I had a Chevy Luv pickup and man what a sweet ride, 4 cylendars of izusu ground pounding power on 14" steel rims, and the chicks dug it (NOT!). I was driving down the highway and hit a bird with the antenna. Well the bird exploded and the impact caused the antenna to snap back far enough that the little ball on the tip of the antenna hit the edge of the windshield and caused a huge crack.

Story #2

About a year or so ago I was driving home from work down I-44 and there is a place where I-244 and I-44 merge. I-44 dips below the over pass of I-244, anyways, There was a guy in a mercedes convertable in front of me and a semi in front of him. There was a pigeon sitting on the I-Beam on the bottom of the bridge, the semi was going fast enough to suck the pigeon off the beam when he went under the bridge. Well the mercedes convertable, with the top down mind you, hammered the pigeon with his grille and it exploded in a hail of feathers, most of which went over the windshield and into the car. He was trailing feathers for about a mile. I almost drove off the road laughing so hard.


Hub

 

I hit one on my way up I-5 two weeks ago. Scared the hell outta me. Thought it was gonna come thru my windshield. It bounced off my bumper, but put a nice scratch in the plastic cover with it's beak.

 

OK, I have one better than you all. I have a bicyclist to add to the list.

The dang thing came out of no where and bounced off the side of my work truck. Why is it when you are in a tourist town that the law takes the side of the stupid tourist instead of the local guy?


OK, if it's tourist season, why can't we shoot them?

 

Many moons ago I was driving to work jist after 1st light. Came around a curve at 65mph to see a flock of chickens crossing the road. Well 6 out of 8 did not make it. It looked like I hit a truck load of feather pillows. It was a total explosion of white feathers going everywhere and a small gaggle of nude chicken carcasses flopping all over the road. Score: scales 6/chickens 0

Then there was the time that a buck in rut, chasing a doe trail across the road at the same curve as the chickens, decided to hit me broadside and knock me into ditch. Took off the ENTIRE drivers side of truck....8900 bucks worth (pun intended). score: scales 0/buck 8900.00

Gary