Your stories: Wildlife-vehicle encounters

[CBC News]

Motorists in New Brunswick are being told to keep any eye out for moose wandering onto roadways because their mating season has begun.
That warning follows on the heels of three accidents involving the animals last weekend on Highway 15 that runs from Moncton to Port Elgin. There was also one crash on Highway 16 between Aulac and Port Elgin last weekend. One person suffered head injuries.
Every year more than 300 New Brunswick motorists are involved in collisions with a moose. This of course is not just a problem in New Brunswick. Wildlife and vehicle encounters are common in Canada.
Full story
Tell us your stories of accidents or near misses involving wildlife and vehicles. Do you have any tips to prevent these encounters?


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[earth_as_one]

you mean like these shots I caught this sumer:

Moose runs across road

Momma bear with cubs

 

[lone wolf]

I have seen many critters skitter across my path. Most were lucky. Some weren't. I can tell you from first-hand experience that even a long-nose Peterbilt knows when it's been in a battle with Bullwinkle. The one experience I will always remember is chipmunk vs Pontiac.

We were headed to my parents' farm. My youngest daughter sooo looked forward to those visits. No ... it wasn't Grandma's cookies or rides on Grandpa's tractor. It was the animals. She is my Elly-May Clampett. At three years old, critters went out of their ways to get Saby's attention.

In the good old days before child seats, the adventure never would have happened, The chipmunk would have been just as dead ... but only the Angels (and I) would know. Saby saw its charge. Chipmunks never look both ways until it's too late. The sound was deafening ... well, not really, but when you're three and love all animals, you don't miss things like that. She saw Chip's tail (well, we hadda name him something didn't we)flagging in the breeze ... but Chip ran no more.

What I heard was an ear-piercing squeal. My Saby would do most fire trucks proud. She begged and plead that we should stop and render first aid or take it to the vets or anything to ease poor Chip's suffering. In a scrape between chipmunk and PR225 75R15, Chip was a guaranteed loser. In a scrape between Daddy the driver and Chip's lawyer, I was the guilty party.

It took a few minutes to get back to the scene. Kawartha Lakes summer traffic is heartless. Fortuantely, Chip's tail was an acceptable carry handle to hoist the little road pizza and carry its lifeless body (out of sight from Saby) to the car. Once I assured my very concerned three-year-old that Chip was beyond all help and caring, she decided we should hold a funeral and bury the little creature near his home.

For two months after, I was still finding homeless wood matches.

 

[talloola]

We have lots and lots of deer in this area, many of them are car 'wise, but many of them
aren't. I slammed my brakes on a few years back, thought for sure I was going to hit the
deer, but he managed to leap right over my hood, a sureal sight right in front of us, and
we continued on, no harm done.

My daughter slowed down one day for a deer, but the deer stopped, and so did she, then
he rammed her fender, and turned back the other way. Wierd.

We see dead deer on our roads and highways regularly throughout the year. We have deer
all over our golf course, they have to thin them out every couple of years, quite sad,
and it's mostly the bucks. Some of them will eat out of your hand, and they are quite car wise, as the little ones grow up on
the course, and get very used to the vehicles coming and going.

 

[darkbeaver]

That reminds me it's almost hunting season . I have to keep my eyes open for road kill.

 

[#juan]

Anybody who lived in the Burns Lake, Smithers area has a moose story. In the fifties my dad had a lodge on Tsinket Lake...........About twelve miles from Burns Lake. We had a few cabins, a store, a gas station, and boats for rent.
I those days my mom hung clothes on the line Winter or Summer. There was a moose that we called "Mac", who showed up after the moose season ended, and he would upset my mom by chewing on the clothes on the clothes line. Mom, who was 5'-2" used to chase the moose, who was about seven feet high at the shoulder and weighed maybe 1400 lbs., out of the yard with a broom stick.
Mac was a regular visitor for eight or nine seasons, and one year he just didn't show up. He must have been getting on in years, and either a hunter got him or the wolves did.. Who knows, but we missed him.

 

[darkbeaver]

Nice moose story Juan. A distant relative of mine wrote a story about a moose from Gysborough county. Broad Antlers was the title I think.