Damn birds!!

[M_Six]

The birds out here are suicidal, or maybe just plain stupid. Before I moved out here to corn country, I'd killed exactly one bird in nearly 30 years of driving. Since moving out here 7 years ago, I've killed nearly 40. They swoop down right in front of the car or fly up from the side of the road or, like today, wait until you're nearly on top of them and then fly off down the road in the same direction of travel. Needless to say, they ain't fast enough. I knew I hit a pair today, but I only saw one carcass fly off to the side. The other went through the ribs of the kidney grill and is now sitting on the inside of the lower bumper just below the radiator.

I take it the best way to get it out is to remove the kidney grill? Or is there an easier way?

[M_Six]

Got it, or most of it anyway. Bloody mess, literally. Surprising how easy the grills come out, though.

[Rick Hunter]

We're all going to call you the Bird Hunter now.

If you think the grills come off easy, try removing your hockey puck side indicators.

[mimsterzx7r]

Woh that's pretty gross, yeah the grills come out easily. I just switched mine out.

Maybe you should invest in a leather or clear bra. All those birds may cause havoc on your front end.

[M_Six]

Originally Posted by mimsterzx7r

Woh that's pretty gross, yeah the grills come out easily. I just switched mine out.

Maybe you should invest in a leather or clear bra. All those birds may cause havoc on your front end.

The leather ones for the Z look like crap. I looked into a clear bra, but most of the rock damage is way up the hood and fenders, so it wouldn't do much good. Can't afford to coat the whole hood. Rock chips are a fact of life here. Virtually every road has raw gravel on it.

[Hawkeye]

True that. The worst bird I ever hit was an owl.

[M_Six]

I nailed a large pheasant mid-windshield (in my X5) at 90MPH. Thought sure the windshield would shatter, but it didn't. Huge feather cloud in my wake, though.

[Rick Hunter]

Holy $h!t... I guess I better count my blessings. The times I've encountered birds that I wanted to kill were when they went to town on my car:



This one while in motion:

[Dammmittt]

Rick, who takes pictures of their bird bomb defaced car? That's pretty nasty.

I've only killed one bird that I know of. Hit my driver side headlight and left a nasty little spooge layer on the lamp. The other possible kill happened when a bird flew in front of the car and never came out the other side. I never found any marks on the car though so I'm not sure what happened to him.

[mimsterzx7r]

Rick that's pretty gross. Makes me want to drive with the top up..

[schwank]

I hit a goose in the coupe one day. fortunately it hit at the top of the windshield and was more of a glancing blow. no damage to the car

[em2b96p]

squat down in front of your car, next grab the grill with both hands, then fall backwards. ( pretend you're scuba diving and exiting the boat.)

This is by far the most efficient way to remover the grills without damaging it.

[Rick Hunter]

Originally Posted by Dammmittt

Rick, who takes pictures of their bird bomb defaced car? That's pretty nasty.

I do. It's not just about owning a car... but the journey, however deranged, you have with it.

Yes, it was totally gross, and it was very upsetting to me at the time. But there was no long term damage done, and so I can chuckle at being the victim at that time.

Fucking birds.

[rc'Z]

Originally Posted by Rick Hunter

I do. It's not just about owning a car... but the journey, however deranged, you have with it.

Yes, it was totally gross, and it was very upsetting to me at the time. But there was no long term damage done, and so I can chuckle at being the victim at that time.

Fucking birds.

?like some kind of messagE

[sig_int]

I hit a pheasant that flew straight out of the woods into the passenger side just above the headlight. All I saw was a large dark shape flash across in my peripheral vision. Talk about an instant adrenalin rush! It left a long smear of yellow goo down the side above the wheel. I think it must have been a hen and the goo must have been scrambled eggs? There was no damage to the paint.

Two rabbits made it through the lower grill and landed against the oil cooler. I luckily noticed that a rabbit didn't come out from under the car after it darted out in front of me. After puzzling about it for a few seconds I stopped to take a look at where it might be hanging on. A little foot was sticking out of the plastic mesh so I was able to grab it and ease it out. The plastic mesh had popped along a vertical mold line and had folded inward just like a lobster trap and had sprung almost completely back. Once I gingerly got the guy out of the grill I noticed more fur wedged up against the oil cooler. I was able to push my newly modified lobster-trap grill inward enough to let me pull another rabbit out!

I'm glad I found them when I did so they didn't turn into a nasty mess later. That particular road trip was in the desert South West with temps around 100 F so it wouldn't have taken long to have a real bad surprise later. The funny thing is I thought I only hit ONE rabbit. I don't know if I completely missed hitting one or did I get two at once?

[jragan]

Originally Posted by Hawkeye

True that. The worst bird I ever hit was an owl.

+1. Same for me. Geico cancelled me after my owl hit.

[M_Six]

Originally Posted by jragan

+1. Same for me. Geico cancelled me after my owl hit.

Don't you love that crap? My insurance company (State Farce) raised my deductible through the roof after I got hit with a retread. Like it was my fault.

Then I went to AAA and now I'm paying about half of what I was with State Farce for the same coverage.

[Hawkeye]

I had 2 accidents when I was with Allied and they never even raised my deductible (then again it was super high to begin with I found out). I hit a possum and a deer (in my mustang). The owl was not enough damage to make a claim, just a windshield.

Now I am paying almost nothing with State Farm compared to what I used to pay, although I have not had to make any claims yet so who knows what that will do.

[M_Six]

Nailed another one today. Big fat dove flew up from the side of the road to smack the middle of the windshield at 80MPH. If the stupid thing had just stayed in the grass on the side of the road it would still be alive. I guess Darwinism never sleeps.

[WhoU4]

Originally Posted by M_Six

Nailed another one today. Big fat dove flew up from the side of the road to smack the middle of the windshield at 80MPH. If the stupid thing had just stayed in the grass on the side of the road it would still be alive. I guess Darwinism never sleeps.

Mark, what luck you have... how is the windshield? (Hit at 80MPH?) You could get little bird stickers to line up on the fender like a fighter pilot scorecard.

I've only hit one bird with the Z4 and that was during my first weekend drive with the car, same story damn thing swooped down and I knew I was going to hit it. Looked in the review mirror and saw it land in the road behind me, I was only crawling at 65 though.

Dave

[M_Six]

Originally Posted by WhoU4

Mark, what luck you have... how is the windshield? (Hit at 80MPH?) You could get little bird stickers to line up on the fender like a fighter pilot scorecard.

I've only hit one bird with the Z4 and that was during my first weekend drive with the car, same story damn thing swooped down and I knew I was going to hit it. Looked in the review mirror and saw it land in the road behind me, I was only crawling at 65 though.

Dave

Just a smear on the windshield. I've seen bugs make a bigger mess. There are just so many birds along the sides of the backroads here. If I see a flock, I'll hit the horn before I get to them and they usually clear out. But these two today flew up out of the grass and one flew right on front of me. I hit a similar dove with the driver's side mirror in my E39 and it popped the glass clean out of the frame. I stopped and backed up to the pile of feathers and found the glass. I attached the heating wire and popped it right back into the frame. The bird wasn't so lucky.