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What have you hit or ran over on your bike?

5K views 32 replies 21 participants last post by  HOG SLYR 
#1 ·
Went on a lil night ride tonight with a buddy on some back roads. Buddy was in front and to the right. We have headsets... lol all I hear is F* F* F* F*!! and he hits his brake and then I see it... A pretty fat Opossum came out from the right and I was so heavy on the brake I had to squish his insides outside. Luckily the bike skipped both tires gracefully over the little J-walker and continued the ride.

What have you hit or ran over on a bike?
 
#13 ·
Holy crap! Glad you're ok! Good thing it wasn't rebar....
 
#6 ·
On my R1200RT I got a chunk of angle iron bounced into the front wheel at speed, luckily it was a chunk of Bed rail someone had lost while moving, so it was just soft pig iron and folded around in the front wheel. Claimed it on insurance as there was front fork, wheel, and brake caliper damage.
 
#8 ·
Squished a bunny once. Couple of prairie dogs at the old track in Calgary where they would play chicken with the race bikes. And a big fat Grouse plowed into my chest when I was dirt biking. The guys heard me scream and saw a huge puff of feathers spray out from me and for the remainder of the trip they affectionally referred to me as "feathers."

Nearly hit a large deer. Friend of mine cut a small deer completely in half...the smell was repulsive and the guy behind him was covered in deer guts and ****. The police came to the hospital and gave him a speeding ticket siting measurements of the two halves of the deer and the distance between where they both landed as a calculation of how fast he had to be going :surprise:. Thankfully everyone was ok, except the deer of course. :wink2:
 
#12 ·
In one single riding session that was only about 100 miles, I had a 5-6 foot snake crossing the rode in a hard lean, a chipmunk stopped right in front of me, a cow for some reason thought it would be a good idea to run right next to me, and finally a ridiculously large bird, maybe vulture? (my friend called it a pterodactyl lol) was in the middle of the road and rose up almost hitting me in the face at around 60 mph. Nature was against me that day, but I survived...... My buddy had a great laugh once we were done.
 
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#14 ·
I've been pretty lucky NOT to hit anything substantial, but I like to also think I'm very good at scanning for things, and being lucky as well. In the West here, there are ALL kinds of big critters to avoid, and I've had a couple semi-close encounters, luckily after slowing down considerably. The scariest NON-collision was me and a buddy doing 75+ southbound on the 101 near the Hollywood bowl back in about '87-ish in basically bumper-to-bumper traffic. We came around the blind left turn (blind because of the concrete barriers) in the fast lane and there was an 8' aluminum ladder in our lane! Mikey sweved left, and I swerved right, and we both missed it. Good thing because if either or both of us had fallen we'd have been splattered by countless cars that were right behind us......

As far as actually hitting something, a few years back at over 100, SOMETHING hit me hard on the right pectoral muscle. It was like getting punched hard, but I had my leathers on so it didn't hurt too bad. I thought it was a bird, but I didn't see any feathers like I did when I hit a dove with my truck. I should have stopped, and looked around to see if maybe it wasn't a couple kids throwing rocks, but I didn't.

Many years before that in the mid-'90's, I remember ripping my KX500 down a fire road up North of Peterborough Ontario when I was at a friends cottage for a week, and hitting some sort of pheasant or something. I was tail out going around a right-hander and suddenly out of the bushes this big bird flies out.....into my left fork leg. Biff! Feathers everywhere. I stopped, and went back. The poor thing had it's neck broken or something and was squawking and flopping around. I wanted to put it out of it's misery and not suffer anymore so I stomped on it's head with my big motocross boot. There was a sickening crunch, but it died pretty quickly after that. I was still bummed though. I went back to my buddy's place and told him what happened, and he jumped up to go get it in his truck. Said it was good eating and he was going to cook it up! Well, we got there, and found the spot (blood and splatter from me stomping the poor thing) and it was already gone. He was bummed, and I was kind of relieved. We figured maybe the reason the thing had ran suicidally in front of me in the first place was that a predator was chasing it, and when I left, came and got it's fresh dinner. Either that or another local had found it and took it home to eat. Ah well.
 
#15 ·
Ran over a Yorkie! Little guy did some doggie break dancing in the road then ran off. I tracked him down and a teen boy answered the door, but didn`t seem concerned at all.

Hit a pigeon at moderate speed. Said bird glanced off my helmet and it was all good. Having a 18 1/2" neck is hell when it`s time to buy dress shirts, but when fending off birds, it`s the bomb.

Have not actually hit or run over any Harleys*, but I have passed my share.

* Disclaimer Not sure if they were genuine Harleys or Japanese clones. Due to the speed differencial, I was unable to verify.
 
#16 ·
I was in between the last two turns at Laguna Seca when two prairie dog looking critters ran across the track together right in front of me. They made it across the track in front of my wheel when the second one panicked and turned back. The mistake was a fatal one. I caught him square, but never really felt a thing. I was expecting drama that I never got. It was certainly quick and hopefully painless for him.

A more interesting experience was riding my bike into work one Saturday. I was rolling along at about 85 mph on an elevated portion of interstate highway when a seagull flew out from a drainage hole and straight into the face shield on my helmet. I was a bit dazed but the bike did its thing and just tracked straight while I gathered myself. When I got to my parking space I quickly pulled off my helmet to see what I was dealing with. The shield was cracked and the vent controls were broken off. I was bummed, but glad it wasn't worse when I walked into the office.

I noticed that everyone was looking at me funny as I walked down the hall. Finally someone asked what happened to me, but I wasn't sure how he knew that something had. He finally pointed down to the black t-shirt that I was wearing and I looked down to see many pieces of bird and feathers enmeshed in it. I was so busy checking out my helmet that I had never looked down. I ended up turning around and heading home to get a clean shirt while giving those who had to come in on a Saturday a good laugh at my, and more so the seagull's, expense.
 
#17 ·
I watched my best mate get airborne on a ZX6R after he hit a full car exhaust system laying on the road late at night at 70kph. Right over the cat box as well! Somehow he came through unscathed :grin2:

About a week later I did the same thing over a new bit of kerb that had just been laid in the exact same spot!

 
#19 ·
Couple squirrels, a rabbit. A Robin to the chest at about 50. That hurt like hell. Like the video I've also glanced a bird off my helmet. Scariest in my area are Buzzards, I've come close to hitting them several times.
 
#23 ·
I had forgotten that I hit a duck that had taken off a few seconds earlier and didn't quite get high enough... My immediate thought was "how much does a new ZX10 front fairing cost" but it hit me square in the left shoulder. I was doing about 100kmh so I felt it... Reckon the duck did too. Couldn't stop on that road to see if he lived though.
 
#31 ·
1 rabbit, a couple of squirrels, a piece of plywood with a least one nail in it that cost me a new rear tire, a patch of nails (4 in the rear) that caused freeway crash and a few (3) very near misses with deer, 1 Bull, a garbage truck and a tanker. Looks like I've exceeded my allotted nine lives so I guess I'm living on borrowed time! :surprise:
 
#32 · (Edited)
This thread reminds me of a guy I know and have ridden with from a Sport Touring forum that I'm on occasionally. His board name is actually "Squirrel Hunter". This guy is long time, high mileage and very competent rider, not a squid or newbie by any stretch of the imagination. Anyway one day on a ride he hit a squirrel and remembers doing so and remembers nothing else until waking up with emergency crews working on him. A quote from him was "The Squirrel died in the accident and he came out of it better than me!" Years had gone by and countless surgeries done on his leg and his foot would still swell up like the Elephant Man. I haven't seen him in a while but he was still riding with a Handicap plate and a cane on his ST. So even the things that seem to be simple aren't always so! Be careful!

Here's one of his replies to a similar thread on the ST Forum
Re: What have you hit with your bike..??

I've hit raccoons and possum, hit by an owl and a buzzard, ran over a dead deer in the middle of the corner that sent me airborne but I recovered control of the bike only to be taken out two weeks later by rocky the flying squirrel!
 
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