Ever hit a bird while cycling?

blim

I was wondering, while cycling through the Meadows in Edinburgh at lunchtime, and watching a pair of chaffinches getting frisky with little regard to anything about them, if anyone had ever been hit by a bird while cycling?

Obviously birds get hit by cars all the time (saddest was seeing a rare Black Grouse as roadkill in the Borders last summer) but surely they must have got snarled up in a drivetrain once or twice?

shmo

I ran over a sparrow on my old knackered MTB while careering down a hill. No way I could have stopped in time even if the brakes did work properly and it was his own fault really as he chose to fly across the road under my wheel instead of staying still or going the other way.

Have regular near misses with ditzy pigeons but no confirmed kills yet.

drewfromrisca

My mate decapitated a thrush a few years back on a rather steep descent on his old Raleigh M-Trax mountain bike!!! Strange thing was there was not a lot of blood and the poor things head was no where to be found at the time...till we got home and begun cleaning our bikes to find it wedged up underneath the forks and the headtube!!!

blim

As we say up here in Scotland, that gives me the dry boak.

iainment

Squashed a pigeon on the Regents Canal towpath, it landed into a group that were taking off as I approached.
Not cycling related but I mishit a drive playing golf once and knocked out a squirrel.
Felt bad about both.

tomgth

Personally no birds, but gave a squirrel both barrels (wheels) once! Does that count?
I have a friend who neatly despatched a Japanese seagull into his chain ring on his Tokyo commute.

redvee

Nearly rn over a duck when out on my bike near Bridport one summer. Shpouted and screamed at it to get out of the way but it didn't understand :roll: When in Holland a heron took off beside me and I had to duck just cause of the sheer size of the thing, seeing pictures don't give its size justice till you see one up close.

robbie the roadie

a lot of my training loops go through areas where they breed pheasants for shooting. It never ceases to amaze me that to a pheasant the best cause of evasive action is to ignore the perfectly good hedge they are stood next to, then wait until the last second before scooting across the road infront of me then diving through another hedge

No accidents yet but it's only a matter fo time before there's a brace hung up in the garage :P

Mark Alexander

iainment wrote:

Squashed a pigeon on the Regents Canal towpath, it landed into a group that were taking off as I approached.
Not cycling related but I mishit a drive playing golf once and knocked out a squirrel.
Felt bad about both.

Fore Class!! As I'm sooo good, I never take air shots :? then again, neither, it would seem, do you

andyp

I was riding a 25 mile TT once when a pigeon came out of the hedge and straight into my front wheel. It was decapitated by a spoke and I had blood and feathers all over my legs. :shock:

Obviously I used it as the excuse for my time ("if I'd not hit the pigeon I was on for a ride!").

popette

blim wrote:

As we say up here in Scotland, that gives me the dry boak.

I know what you mean

ellieb

Once ran over a pigeon which took off away from the cycle path then doubled back under my front wheel. There was a rather nasty crunch. About a month later a squirrel tried to do the same thing- reversing its course even though it was in the clear. I just missed it, screeched to a halt: turned and yelled MORON! at it.... then started to consider whether I might be allowing my ex-couriering road rage to get the better of me :roll:

gkerr4

i hit a small bird on my motorbike once - I was doing about 50-60mph on an B-class road local to me - it flew out of the hedgerow and hit me in the chest / shoulder area.

it really really really hurt!!

and for days afterwards...

there was no blood but there were some feathers and a scuff on my leathers where (I assume) it's beak had hit - I didn't see it in the mirrors but i would imagine it didn't come off to well from the incident...

peanut

yes My ex was bombing along just in front of me when suddenly 2 tiny birds shot out of the hedgerow making a hell of a racket and flew straight into her . We stopped and went back and found two tiny finches on the road. The female was dead and the male was almost . Apparently one of the birds had hit her hand and the other had hit the bike.

It so upset both of us that we hardly spoke for the rest of the ride .

I put them both together under the hedge. Tragic really

geoff_ss

Nope, but I and my wife have hit cats on 2 separate occasions. I nearly broke my neck and my wife has a very funny shaped collar bone.

A mate once hit a pigeon with a RC model aeroplane. The plane survived - the pigeon didn't. Normally (ie always) birds easily out manoeuvre models and no-one would ever actually try to hit one anyway - it was a complete accident.

Geoff

markos1963

Your are all amatuers! As a train driver I hit about 10 birds a shift! Pheasants mostly and a whole flock of partridge once. Never hit a crow yet, they are far too crafty/nervous, I have hit a few dear but they are more of a summer sport for me :twisted:

geoff_ss

markos1963 wrote:

Your are all amatuers! As a train driver I hit about 10 birds a shift! Pheasants mostly and a whole flock of partridge once. Never hit a crow yet, they are far too crafty/nervous, I have hit a few dear but they are more of a summer sport for me :twisted:

I must admit pheasants do seem particularly suicidal in our lanes and apparently on railway lines too. Just remembered that a trikie I know had one put its head into one of his rear wheels. He popped it in his saddlebag for dinner

Geoff

stevekosky

Hit a bat one evening.

I thought they had radar!

cycologist

A pheasant took last second evasive action by flying up into the air as I came whanging towards it in the middle of the road. This resulted in it catching a wing in my spokes before rising up and hittng me in the chest, tumbling over my shoulder into the ditch at the side of the road. I thought I'd caught dinnner but never did find it when I stopped.

Alex_Simmons/RST

Only once, a small bird, don't know what it was.

However, here is Australia we have a bird called the Magpie.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_magpie

In spring it is extraordinarily territorial and it will swoop and attack people with quite some vigour and will typically come from an angle where you can't see it and hit the side or back of your head in a surprise attack. They are intelligent, intrepid and relentless and will readily draw blood.

Many a cyclist here has come to grief as a result of magpie attacks. Usually losing control of their bikes and crashing as a result.

I had one little bugger sit on the mailboxes outside the apartments I used to live in many years back. He would wait for me to come out in the mornings and we'd stare each other down. Then I'd work up the courage to get on the bike and go, knowing the inevitable attacks would come.

I snuck out the back way one morning thinking I'd outwitted him. Next morning, all confident, I did the same only to cop a pasting as the maggie had worked out what I was up to.

Anyone else out there who's been swooped by a maggie knows what I mean.

Zendog1

No but a flying chicken hit my front wheel last year (you get these things in Norfolk). I ended up in a ditch. Tthe chicken ran for it minus a few feathers - must have done a quick flip and gone in arse first..

hisoka

I had the worst thing happen once, going along a cycle path behind one of the Nottingham hospitals a bird just rocketted out of some shrubbery to my side as I was going past. Didn't get time to brake before it somehow managed to go between my front spokes. I braked but the wheel made a few more revolutions before I stopped (alot of weight behind my cycle going, I'm on the hefty side) and the sound was horrendous.
Lots of feathers, no surviving bird. I felt horrible for days about the poor thing but I couldn't have done anything to stop it happening.

OffTheBackAdam

I've slapped a couple on the ass as I rode by, does that count?

jezwold

I encounter a lot of suicidal cats rather than birds, I nearly hit one this morning. the strange thing is cats have this way of making you think its your fault even though they wait until you are too close to stop before they decide to run across the road directly in front of you. :roll:

whyamihere

Clipped a bird once on an MTB ride, it had gone off into the bushes before I could check if it was alright though.

I also nearly hit a badger. Once section of my commute to college runs right next to a hedgerow with fields on either side. Coming along early morning, when I assume the badger was returning to its' set, it came out of the hedge a few metres ahead of me, requiring somewhat drastic action to avoid it. I was probably more scared than it was, having heard the stories about them being vicious little buggers.

Porgy

I've never hit a bird - I usually slow down when a stubborn pigeon just refuses to move - its funny I just kind of assumed birds would always get out of your way.

I once frightened a pigeon enough that it flew off straight into the radiator grill of a Hackney Carriage. There was a huge cloud of feathers, I assume the bird died but I never saw its body.

And I once hit a cat. It was a black cat, at night. I felt it before I saw it. straight under my front wheel, but it didn;t stick around. It squealed and sped off into someone's garden. I couldn;t find it - so I've no idea whether it was injured or not. I'm guessing that it wasn;t judging by the speed it managed getting away.

ricadus

I clipped a stupid Aussie bird once in Southwark, when she stepped out to cross the road between two vans in a queue of momentarily stationary rush-hour traffic. Damned tourists.


Another time I was doing a fair speed down a longish straight near Lamberhurst in Kent after a descent ,when I had a duck fly out over a hedge (from a pond I guess) that then proceeded to fly along in front of me for what seemed like ages yet was probably only 30 seconds if that. I was so close I could almost reach forward and touch its tail feathers. It was like watching some scene form one of those BBC wildlife documentaries where they attach a mini-camera to one of a flock of wild birds.

At some point I couldn't resist laughing at the situation of me drafting the thing, at which point it must have suddenly realized I was right behind it, as it did an abrupt turn up & right and flew off.

UncleFred

There are a huge amount of Feral Chickens in the BVI and I regularly make contact, the bladed spokes on my Kyseriums made short work of a large chick that tried to fly through them, but the saddest was a Hen with 6 chicks that decided to cross my path, she went, the chicks all followed blindly and my nice fat tires got one on the front and one on the back.

Cows & Sheep also free roam here and although I haven't hit one yet, I've come close a couple of times, you have to look out for the lead sheep and watch where he's going as the other sheep will blindly follow.

gkerr4

OffTheBackAdam wrote:

I've slapped a couple on the ass as I rode by, does that count?

he he - thats good...

redvee

Geoff_SS wrote:

He popped it in his saddlebag for dinner

Geoff

Not 100% about this but I think that if you hit a pheasant/deer etc you cannot stop and pick it up, however sombody following you can.

One of the drivers in our place done the badger thing, but this was already departed and soon there was a smell of roast badger coming from the engine bay :shock:

davelakers

Not hit a bird, but a pheasant shat in my face last week!!

It was running along the verge by a hedgrow as I cycled past and it took off and shit. Thanks to the strong headwind it landed right on my cheek!!