MattTheHat 

There's been a huge population explosion of rabbits in my area for the past few years. Fuzzy, indecisive rabbits. The RPK (rabbits per km) numbers here can be significant. One trail I ride from time to time has a RPK as high as 6.6.

I've long wondered when I was going to hit one. I've been so close that I can hear their little claws scratching at the concrete as they try to avoid my front wheel of doom. This morning my wondering came to an end as I hit one while it was still dark at about 6:30 AM. Poor little guy never stood a chance. I never even saw him.

What shocked me is that the event wasn't nearly such a big deal as I'd always thought it would be. I was doing about 25 MPH at the time and it wasn't even as bad as hitting a pot hole. It started me wondering if there might be some rabbit horror stories from others here on the forumz.

WhyFi

There's a good number of rabbits in my area, but squirrels still concern me more. Running over either isn't as much of a problem as one getting in to the spokes, and squirrels seem to have a better form for that.

MattTheHat 

Yeah, I sent a poor squirrel to the big oak tree in the sky last year. At the time I was quite worried about it ending up stuffed in the fork somewhere.

Speedway2

I found a gutted baby rabbit on the lawn this am. The neighbours 2 cats are fierce hunters. Next the rabbit were feathers and the head of a canary.
I give the cats treats often. Many say the cats are bringing me gifts for my kindness, but I digress......

sayn3ver

No rabbits or squirrels yet for me. I will say I live and ride in suburban NJ and take routes out to our last remaining farm land and back.

On the way back tonight about 30-40minutes before dusk i was startled as I must have spooked a group of deer in a wooded backyard as I went by (backyard backs up to road) and all i heard were breaking sticks and branches like thunder and was deathly afraid one was going to zag instead of zig right out in front of me. They were only maybe 5-10 feet in from the road's shoulder where I was traveling.

They and wild turkey are becoming more prolific in our suburbia which typically I don't mind, but if you think deer are scary when at speed in a car, the thought of hitting one while riding down the backside of a hill is doubly so.

Same thing happened not more than a 1/2 mile later down the road and scared the ish out of me again. The sound of them stampeding through the wooded landscape is loud.

PeteHski

I doubt the rabbit would agree!

Gyro

I believe this. We have a feral cat that lives on our back deck. A few year ago my wife got her to come in buy leaving dry food out and moving it closer to the house. We feed her twice a day at the door, has a house and heated pads to lay on in the winter. We find these same type of gifts from time to time on the deck. It took my wife well over a year to get her trust to pet and brush her. She's a long hair.

What was strange, we believe we saw her as a kitten sitting together with we presumed, with her mother some time before that. Looking at us sitting side by side in the backyard. My wife came to believe the mother wanted her watched over. Never saw the mother again.

_ForceD_

Back in the early 80s when I first began cycling…in the very first event I ever rode in…I was riding along and talking with a guy about the route. At one point he said to me “Last year, right along this section, a squirrel an out of the woods and right into my front wheel. It got caught in the spokes and caused me to flip over the handlebars.” He said that fortunately he landed in the grass, but spent the next several minutes sitting there picking squirrel meat out of his spokes.

Dan

msalvetti

Rabbits are all over the MUP I ride. Always need to have my hands on the brakes and keep an eye on the edges of the road, especially at night. Last night I had one run through the gap between my wheels. Happened once last year as well. Haven’t hit one yet.

In August I twice had to slow and dodge a skunk. Don’t want to hit one of those!

Mark

indyfabz

Rabbits are delicious.

MattTheHat 

On further reflection, I don’t think this was a fatal event for the rabbit. I’ve realized that I didn’t actually run over him…he ran into my front wheel. He either bounced of or kind of betwixt my two wheels as my back wheel never impacted it. At least that’s why I hope happened.

But yeah, the rabbit’s point of view was nonetheless quite different.

Iride01 

Just a few weeks ago I had a squirrel in front of me do something I've never seen before. It ran straight across the trail.

It looked old. Coat was all mangy and it was a fairly big squirrel. I'm thinking that since there aren't many natural predators for them where I cycle, that the habit of zig zagging didn't serve them well with avoiding vehicles. However this old guy apparently learned to shake the common wisdom of their instinct and must have started running a straight line early in it's life.

rsbob 

I ride through rural farmlands (except when in Seattle) and have had numerous encounters with free range chickens. Had one bounce off my front wheel - ran directly into the front wheel when it could easily gone the other way. The other one ran into my shoe/pedal and then ran off doing that classic chicken squawk. It was hilarious.

jgwilliams

I ran over a dog some years back. I was riding along a path one way and the dog was running towards me. Just as we were about to pass one another he suddenly turned left right under my wheel; I couldn't believe any animal could be so stupid! I'm happy to say that he lived to bark another day.

MattTheHat 

Armadillos are another critter you don't want to hit. I see those occasionally and often think it's a good thing they don't normally move too fast.

Ryno317

Not as big and less chance of damage to the bike, but I almost hit a chipmunk. It just sat on the trail until I was almost feet away from it.

Milton Keynes

We had a cat which was a really good hunter, and seems like the only time he left "presents" at the front door was after we gave him chicken bones or something.

Milton Keynes

We had a feral stay take up residence in a shed a number of years back. She was skinny and apparently very hungry. I'd start giving her food, and she came to trust me enough to eventually pet her, and then to the point where she'd actually let me pick her up and hold her. But she never totally got rid of the feralness, because you could be petting her and everything would be fine, but then she'd take a swipe at you and hiss for no reason. I think she was bipolar.

She did give us a couple of litters, and one of those was a really good cat. Neighbor found him dead behind his garage one day, we couldn't figure out what he died from. I still miss him.

905

(That's my pet rabbit, currently chomping hay a few feet away from where I'm typing.)

rsbob 

Our current cat was abandoned near our neighborhood. It spent months sitting on people’s porches wanting food and to be let in. We would see her going through are gardens but remained standoffish. After 3 months I left it some dog kibble which it ravenishly wolfed down. I got it some more and that disappeared quickly too. Pretty soon we bought it some dry cat food and she moved into our garage - it was winter and raining. She quickly learned how to use our dog door from the garage to the outside, so she came and went as she wanted. After six months we took her to the vet for shots and spaying. At that point we thought she was a kitten because she only weighed 5 lbs. That vet called us from the OR to tell us there were no female parts to remove since they had previously been removed and guessed her age to be 3, She was just living off the land before us and was grossly underweight, After that she moved into the house and uses the dog doors to go outside so no litter box. She has turned out to be a wonderful cat. Someone else’s loss is our gain.

Korina

There's a stray(?) eating her(?) dinner on the porch right now. We'd invite her in, but our two grumpy senior cats would likely attack her then run away. {sigh} Cats.

Warbird21

I see a ton of squirrels on the C&O Canal, they are also pretty indecisive. Hey, Chip and or Dale - you can run left or right - not both. I ran over a big one a few weeks ago, he sort of crawled away afterwards,but I don't think he was going to make it to retirement....I felt bad, for about a mile.

TX_master

I live in the greater Houston area and rabbits are a problem even in the residential neighborhoods. On my morning fitness rides, which I have to start insanely early, it's not uncommon to come across a couple of them just having a conference in the middle of the street. And for them its more of a panic flight so sometimes they will run towards the danger, sometimes away. It's very random and that's what makes it particularly dangerous. I slow, swerve and try to wait for them to make a move but I too feel like it's only a matter of time.

J.Higgins 

I remember the hordes of rabbits when I was a young GI in Texas. Unbelievable. Nightmarish for a kid from Maine. It funny how we think nothing of a thousand mosquitos buzzing around the neighborhood, but turn that into a thousand rabbits and we start to get worried for some reason.

Up here, our issue has been with chipmunks. Those wee sh*ts have been undermining my stone walls and walkways, and there are dozens of them on my property. I've killed 23 so far this year, and it hurts me greatly with every one I take, because they are pretty cute and fuzzy and comical when they are in the wild, but when they damage my property can cause similar troubles, they devolve to vermin status. One of them nested under the hood of my 2020 Ridgeline, and chewed right through the windshield washer supply tube! I tried to use my windshield washer fluid and it ran out onto the driveway!

Daniel4

In olden days, when the rabbit died, we used to say congratulations.

And then there was a period when kids would sing
"The rabbit kicked the bucket."