Besides the chip's, the only other thing that I came very close to hitting was a pack of Turkey Vultures. I was on a rolling stretch and came up over a small hill and the SOB's were right there. Dam near crashed trying to avoid them, and then they started running at me. Pissy bunch if you ask me.

The other strange thing that I noticed last year was the number of dead chips. Ton's around my part of the world.

I'm sorry, but I'm laughing my butt off with this one.....

A couple of notes.....when I'm driving my girls (6 & 12yrs) in my truck we all sit in the front. In the fall the squirrels go bananas, I don't know if it's mating season or what but they do that crazy run to the middle of the street, stop, swish their tails a couple of times at me like a little bullfighter then either run back to the side they come from, or to the other side, or under my tires.......
So here's what usually happens. I'm driving, the squirrel runs to the middle of the road and swishes a challange at me, I yell "squirrel" which gets the girls both looking out the window and pleading "Daddy don't hit it !!!". I don't alter my path, well almost never, then we all go silent. We either proceed on with the girls cheering the squirrel's apparent victory over "daddy's bad truck", or we get the "thump, thump" to which the girls howl & moan the rest of the way home about their "mean ole daddy"......

The deer scare me though....I haven't hit any with my bike but I have had many near misses in my truck. It's not the one crossing the road that will get you. It's the 3 or 4 more on the side that you can't see. They wait til the last minute and then suddenly collectively decide they must cross now to rejoin their friends on the other side.....

This isn't bike related, but oh well....

One day after my brother had just gotten his license he was driving me home from school and we saw a cat in a ditch close to the road. The cat gave us this scared, "don't run over me" look and just stood there frozen. My brother, being a young idiot, jokingly swerved towards the cat to scare it some more. The cat, being a dumb cat, ran into the road right in front of the car and got hit.

Well last year was my first full year in cycling and I ve already got a few stories. I live in Iowa (Deer capital over the known universe) and our group ride takes a paved country highway. First 3 rides of the year guy on the front hits a deer BLAM couldnt get out of the way. In the Fall I had one come at me while i was riding solo, I think it was rutting must have liked the way i smelled. Was far enough away I could actualy U turn and speed off the other way I hadnt planned on tangled with a deer that day. Only kill i ve gotten was a wild turkey in a State park (oops). Was decending down a hill with a friend at about 25 and came to a blind corner sweeping from L to R. As we took the corner sweeping out wide to take the apex and cutting it to the inside 3 wild turkeys were standing there, I guess waiting for the Butter Ball truck to pick them up. Couldnt swerve with my buddy behind me, just rode my line....straight into the biggest one. Luckily didnt throw me off the bike but I did get dark meat everywhere.
Deastin

I was on a long ride out in the country with one other guy. We go by this house and a dog comes out, running along side us but up in the yard. We pick up speed but so does the dog. Then, it runs down from the yard into the road and I nail it dead center. I do a front/side endo and land on my hip and elbow. Dog yelps....runs around in a circle for a a bit then takes off. My shorts are ripped, I have a nice road rash on my hip and elbow and my bike's fork is bent. I go up to the house and a hick comes out. I demand his home owner's insurance policy or I am calling the cops. He gives up the policy number. I ride home slowly as bike will not steer right with a bent fork.

Later, I call the insurance co. and make a claim and they send me a check for $600. I get the bike straitened, buy some new shorts and pocket the change.

<snip>
I've hit a human being once.

It was around 1984, I was headed back from cross country practice on my Schwinn World 10 speed. I was haulin' *** and keeping up with traffic (35 mph) when a boy around 10-12 years jumped out in front of me with less than 10 feet to spare. I hit him dead on and went down with the bike ("clipped" in). I slid on my left side on the asphalt for probably 20 or so feet. I was fortunate that I was not run over, and I was skinned up pretty good. No helmet, and the skin of my earlobe separated and I had an interesting air bubble there.

Needless to say when I was able to get up and looked back the boy was holding one of his arms (it didn't look right at all), when his buddies grabbed him and took off running across the street never to be seen again.

What was amazing was that my front wheel took the entire impact, but my rear wheel was totally tweaked.

I was kayaking last summer and a giant (I MEAN GIANT) swan attacked me. Swans sound like nice birds, but this was serious stuff, an attack by a huge mean wild territorial animal.

I'm sure it weighed 100 pounds and had very, very, very wide wingspan. It came thundering out of the water, whumping its wings on the water - sounded like a monster coming to kill me.

As it was making contact with me, I hit it in the head with my paddle like Babe Ruth must have hit baseballs (I can still imagine the feeling of hitting an animal with a full swing of a kayak paddle). I don't think the swan was really hurt, but the blow took the power out of its attack and it backed off. It charged twice more (whump! whump!) but never attacked again.

You'll see a sign warning about this swan (named Fred) off Highway 27 in East Hampton, NY.

One of a group before me was going downhill with a car coming uphill. The car struck a deer which went flying through the air and hit the biker! Other than the fact that the frame snapped into two, he walked away with a number of scrapes.
As for me, I've got a bunch of bugs in my face, and in my eyes--I always wear glasses now; I'm protected from the bugs and the wind.

I had a feeling there'd be some wild stories out there. Some of these are absolutely hysterical (where human life was not seriously threatened)! The stories involing deer are astounding!

I just recalled another of my own. I was riding behind my wife, when a chipmunk ran into her front wheel and did a somersault off of her spokes. He seemed to escape unharmed - possibly a skinned nose or swollen chippy lip (chipped tooth?).

Cheers