Bumper Hunting: My Year In Review (long) (139 hits)
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Submitted by RAYG (View user info) at 2007-11-30 22:24:05 EST
I have been driving for 10 years now, and I had only ever hit 1 squirrel (on a dirt road when I was 17... I hit the brakes and slid over it), and the occasional rainy day frog hopping cross the road.
All of a sudden I became some kind of "rolling beacon of wildlife doom" or some shit. I'm constantly seeing deer and moose and bear and foxes and turkey and stuff. But never have I hit anything that wasn't a rodent or amphibian
Until 2007
I don't know what it is, but I hope to hell its out of my system.... I think I filled my lifetime quota.
April 2007
After moving my mother into her new condo; Frank, Renee (4 months pregnant), and myself, were coming on home in the Volvo XC90... 2 deer sprang out of the woods in a 50mph zone on RT 103..about 10pm. If I went right or left, I'd plaster one or the other, so I attempted to go between them in order to miss them both (fucking anti-lock brakes). Well the first deer stopped dead in its tracks (literally) right in front of the passenger side headlights. "BLAM" right over the hood and roof of the passenger side (if it had kept going id've missed it... fucking deer). The second deer however did not stop like it should have; it had enough momentum to slam right into the side of the car into the back door of the drivers' side. In addition to making a crater in the door, he spun around and tore the back bumper off with his hind end. Both ended up into the woods... kinda. After a few minutes the rustling we heard in the woods stopped. The cop confirmed the kill.
The result:
Broken headlights, grill, radiator, radiator support, ac condenser, hood, fender, rear drivers side door and bumpers front & rear ($5500 in damages)
2 dead deer.
May 2007
Driving home from a night out, I noticed something small in the road like a squirrel or something, near a horse farm about 4 miles from my house. I tried to position my van to go over it without hitting it. Unfortunately, going over it was not without a wet sandbag sounding "THUMP"...
..."well, that wasn't good". I Deciding that since I at least attempted to not kill it (neglecting to realize that the ground clearance of a Toyota Previa is like 5 inches...) I basically dismissed it as a flat squirrel and would not lose sleep over it. I continued on my way home to never think of it again....
The next day we brought the dog to the vet. While sitting in the vet's office I look out the window and notice something particularly odd. I couldn't contain myself and started chuckling Renee was wondering what was up so I pointed at the van. "What is that" she asked in an amazed yet terrified tone...
... She was referring to the pair of little yellow bird feet dangling out of the grill of my lower bumper in an almost cartoonish fashion (like a kid dangles its legs off a chair). You couldn't see what the feet were attached to, just that they must've been flapping through the wind the entire day. I suggested I should get it out, she told me to wait till we got home. Well after being surprised that it went the distance to and from the vet office (35 miles each way) I grabbed a broom stick and pried the little bugger out of the grill "what the fuck?" expecting a Duck or something from the look of the feet but getting what looked like some kind of Kiwi looking bird.... Kiwi? In NH? No way.... After a little bit of discussion and a second opinion from frank and a neighbor, they decided it was a grouse.... Brown pear shaped bird with a long thin beak... I still think it was a kiwi... it was near a farm after all..... I wish I got a damn picture.
The result:
A cracked lower bumper (didn't bother to replace or fix)
1 dead "bird"
July 2007
Coming home from the pizza place I noticed a skunk in the road
...Now when there is a skunk in the road you have only a few options -
- Swerve around the fucker and hope to maintain control and not hit oncoming traffic hopefully it won't spray
- Aim the car so it's in the middle between the wheels and try to clear the fucker, hopefully it won't spray
- Hit the fucker resulting in perpetual stink and possible skunk bits in the fender wells... It WILL spray
...Well not learning a damn thing from the last time (I figured the Montana had better clearance than the Previa) I attempted to clear over it, it must've been halfway under before I heard the "THUNK". It probably looked up and got decapitated by my muffler or something.
Fortunately there were no skunk bits under the van, but there was a slightly faded odor of skunk smell emitting from under the van
The result:
No damage, faint skunk smell that lasted about a week
1 dead skunk (unconfirmed)
October 2007
Driving from one job to another, in a 50 zone on state route 11 at about 9pm, a deer decided to dart out in front of my black SVX as if the fucker was waiting just off the side for the perfect opportunity to commit vehicular suicide. I hit it with the front passenger corner of the car and it staggered off into the woods with its ass end practically dragging behind it... Several minutes later the cop came, and after a few minutes, confirmed the kill. It apparently bled to death internally or something....
The result:
A broken turn signal, shifted headlight and a dented hood and fender.(my insurance
company cut a check for $1500 after a 15 minute walk around of the car...SCORE!
The headlight was a 5 minute fix, the fender needed some touch up and the hood I
didnt even notice till he pointed it out)
1 dead deer
November 2007 (2 days ago)
On the way home from the grocery store (ironically to get some buns for some venison burger my brother in law gave me) yet another deer dove in front of my red SVX (I got this one about a week and a half after the deer hit in my other one). As I slammed the breaks I said out loud to myself in disbelief "No fucking way!" the poor bastard got hit square off the center of my car, over the hood and "helicoptered" through the air counter-clockwise....
...Into an oncoming work van which took it square off its bumper/grill and helicoptered it now clockwise onto the side of the road...
Well I climbed out and met the guys in the work van and we walked over to the deer
Looked like a year or so old (had little nubs getting ready to grow out) 85lbs-ish and his back leg was just dangling with the bones sticking out, he just kicked and kibbied while blood flowed out its nose. Considering he just ping-ponged through the air off of 2 cars clearing the entire state route (I don't even think he touched the pavement at all) he was more intact than I expected. The driver of the van (an obvious hunter) grabbed his box cutter and slit its throat to put it out of its misery quick. His passenger couldn't really stomach it and we kinda laughed at him for a moment.
When the cop came the first words that came out of his mouth "didn't you hit one on the other side of town 3 weeks ago?" he then said that hunting licenses were cheaper than the body work and to just use a gun like a normal person. He asked me about damage. I really didn't want to see what happened to my 2 week old car. We got to the front and....
...nothing
Not a single scratch. Just some deer fur and piss and a piece of apple (I guess it was having a snack...or had poor digestion)... holy shit, I was almost going to cry if I had to replace ANOTHER set of headlights (they only made 640 of these cars in 97, and BOTH of mine are 97's). The cop was impressed and said my 2 accidents were the least amount of damage he's seen on a car in the past 9 or 10 of these he'd been to
The van, having a steel bumper also sustained no damage.
The van driver asked the cop if he could keep it and if it would be against his hunting quota if he did, the cop offered him a trash bag and if it would count to hold the guts so he could clean it there. Cop said that was fine, but as the first one to strike it, I had dibs, but I was happy to give it to the van driver in exchange for a few steaks.
...I got the steaks this morning... ill be cooking them tomorrow.
The result:
No damage, freebie steaks
1 dead deer
What I Have learned
- Don't try to aim your car OVER the animals; it doesn't seem to ever work
- We might have Kiwi's in NH... or at least used to have 1
- I need to get some of them deer whistle thingys that go on the bumper
- Volvos can't take a hit like a Subaru
- Deer are fucking retarded
- The hunters that come into the hotel and do nothing but complain that they haven't killed any deer are fucking retarded
- Venison burgers rock out loud
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