Deer vs vehicle thread.

[diamond hitch]

I've never hit a deer but have had several hit me. They appear to be extremely poor estimaters of speed - theirs and mine. They just run into the side of my truck.

My best was a five point bull that jumped onto the hood of my truck while I was traveling west on I-90 pulling a 4-horse trailer. The irony was I was going west to put in hunting camp. Anyway the bull raked his antlers across my windshield like windshield wipers and then slid off the hood and went under the truck and trailer as I slowed down. When it exited the trailer 4 boys from Helena hit it with Dad's stationwagon so hard that it tore the undercarriage out from under the car. I Don't think those boys will ever be the same.

After the smoke and dust cleared as well as the cops I loaded up the family and continued west to set up my camp. The passenger door didn't open and the grill was a little malformed but we functioned OK. It took a couple of days for the ponies to get used to their ordeal when the trailer went up on two wheels. The most noticable was that no matter how that bull lay - he was always on the flat sidel. The biggest antler chunk was 4 inches. Not much blood.

 

[antlerradar]

Instead rust undercoating you need a hood coating for rumen content.

I hit two black angus at 75mph just outside of Whitehall once.

A black angus vs a Chevy Tahoe at 55 mph. My son walked away with out a scratch.

 

[Ridgerunner6901]

Hit a bunch over the years some were terrible, one was actually funny.. big old rutting whitetail just standing next to his love interest around a blind curve, I locked it up and stopped just in time to lightly tap lover boy on the butt. He just stood there flicking his tail on my car hood and and looking at me like I was an alien. Another very memorable one in a not so happy way was a doe that came from nowhere and dove under the back tire of The truck at 65 mph, promptly cutting her in two and spraying blood and guts all over my damn beautiful bass boat. It really was terrible. I hate to kill anything I can’t use, especially in such a destructive and disgusting manner. What always hurt my feelings the worst was hitting fawns while mowing hay and bush hogging. You never know they are there till it’s too late.

 

[Hem]

I knew there would be some humdinger stories.
I hate to laugh but the bass boat incident is pretty classic....

 

[LuketheDog]

My brother-in-law t-boned a deer while riding his road bike. He was coasting down hill at close to 40mph and as he went by a house with a bunch of bird feeders in the yard a doe jumped from the shoulder and ended up right across his lap. He wiped out, road rash all over, and as he was laying in the road, stunned, the old bird-feeder lady ran out of the house and said "OhMyGawd, is the poor deer ok???"

 

[Fullquiver]

I've had 2 different times where deer ran into me while I was sitting at stop signs. One was a fatality. The small spike was spooked and ran so hard into my 1989 F-150 he broke his neck.. I also had a huge dent in the side of my box where he had hit it just behind the cab of the truck.. Totally stopped waiting for another vehicle to pass right after it was dark..

 

[kwyeewyk]

Best (or worst) vehicle victory: In late March, doing 65-70, whitetail doe shot across, almost made it, I just caught her tail end and it tore her in half. As I was clearing the parts off the highway I realized there was a pair of fawn fetuses laying in the road.

Deer victory: had a small buck come up on the left side of the road and start to cross, I hit the brakes and swerved to the right shoulder as he got close, he jumped up on my hood, launched off and kicked my windshield and cracked it and left a big dent in the hood, and ran off unhurt.

 

[JaegerRex]

I had a buck run into the side of my car while I was driving to the grocery store October of 2018. $5,000.00 damage. This was along the South West edge of Quantico Marine Base.

 

[zpooch]

Cut a fawn in half with a motorcycle between Stanley and Lowman, Id. That'll get your attention. Smashed a moose with my pickup south of Jackson. That one ruined our weekend but somehow instance didn't total the truck, that's another testament to those Nissan's I guess.

 

[Hem]

Best (or worst) vehicle victory: In late March, doing 65-70, whitetail doe shot across, almost made it, I just caught her tail end and it tore her in half. As I was clearing the parts off the highway I realized there was a pair of fawn fetuses laying in the road.

Deer victory: had a small buck come up on the left side of the road and start to cross, I hit the brakes and swerved to the right shoulder as he got close, he jumped up on my hood, launched off and kicked my windshield and cracked it and left a big dent in the hood, and ran off unhurt.

First story gets a thumbs up for nasty.
Heck...no biggie though...kinda like shooting and gutting a cow elk during the late season shoulder hunt in Montana.
Three for the price of one

 

[JDH]

I've been lucky to only have hit one deer in 20 years. Her head bounced off of my front driver's rim and butt swung around and caved in my door. That back ham was a little bruised but I was able to salvage 95% of the meat. A couple of months ago I watched a guy in front of me take out a small buck right in the grill with an F150. It was close to a curve so I turned around to pull it out of the road. I could see about a quarter mile down the road and never saw the guy stop. Also couldn't find one of the antlers, thinking it got stuck in his grill. Heck, just this morning in the same spot there was an SUV with front end damage and a sheriff deputy, assuming he got one also.

 

[BigHornRam]

I've only hit 2 deer over the years. Both times were early morning while heading out to hunt.
Had 2 fawns run into the side of my truck. One I thought was dead until I started to drag it off the road and it regained its senses, and started to kick. I let go of its leg and it ran off with no sign of injury.

 

[Doublecluck]

I drive about 100,000 miles a year in Montana, Hit by 3 so far, a doe will ruin your bumper, big Muley buck in the rut will smash your truck up pretty good at 80. One time I was just outside of Townsend and a oncoming big rig clipped one sending it airborne in to my lane, best I can tell what was left of it caught my bumper and front wheel at the same time because the back of my utility trailer looked like someone ran a deer thru a wood chipper at it.

 

[Mallardsx2]

I have driven 685,000 miles in my life.

I have hit one deer and never been in an accident.

I have almost hit 685 deer...and I almost hit an elk on my bicycle one time...lol

 

[Dave N]

I have driven 685,000 miles in my life.

I have hit one deer and never been in an accident.

I have almost hit 685 deer...and I almost hit an elk on my bicycle one time...lol

Pretty good record, but I've driven way more miles just going to work! You need to get out more! Unless you're 30...

 

[jt13]

Ahh, the night my fiance and I involuntarily spent in Sundance, WY... On the way to hunt some muley and pronghorn does in western Wyoming back in 2017 we were leaving Rapid City. We switched driver and passenger and it was my turn to take a nap.

Just as I was drifting off to sleep..... SCREEEEEECH, BOOOOOOM, flashing lights, smoke, airbags, and shooting pain down my legs. She hit a muley doe that leaped onto the highway at about 75 MPH before she even had the chance to touch the brakes.

Resulted in $13,000 in damage and the car being towed back 1,700 miles back to us a month later.

 

[ChrisS]

I've hit two, both doe yearlings. Once with a honda civic and the deer wrapped around the drivers side and wrecked the headlight, bumper, front quarter panel, and driver's side door. All told it was $5k in body work. Pretty impressive for a <90lb critter. I saw it coming and just couldn't brake enough in time. The second one I hit was a millisecond. I was driving along a road with a brushy side, at the last second I saw deer pop its head out of the brush leaping into the road. My bumper caught the head and that was it. I wasn't going much more than 35-40mph, but not a scratch on my truck and an instantly dead deer.

A few years ago, my town was holding a public meeting on a possible deer cull within town limits. People claimed that there was no deer problem and they didn't believe the increased collision statistics. The next morning I was driving to work and just before I left the village limits, a doe jumped out in front of the car in front of me - but with plenty of distance that the car didn't have to really slow down. I thought to myself, there are always two just as the the 2nd one popped out and was starched by the car.

My buddy witnessed a collision with a pretty nice buck and people got out and were trying to "help" the deer. He pulled over to check it out and as he got closer he warned them against it because the deer might not be dead. Two second later, the buck popped up and went balliistic running off into the woods.

 

[Ridgerunner6901]

I knew there would be some humdinger stories.
I hate to laugh but the bass boat incident is pretty classic....

I’m just now starting to be a to crack a grin about it 3 years later.. in time I will laugh too

 

[NEWHunter]

Several years ago my wife (fiancée at the time), was driving my old two door Sentra home from Green Bay to Madison. I was peacefully dozing in the passenger seat. It was late at night and quite foggy out. Right around Beaver Dam I was snapped out of my nap by my wife screaming and us hitting something large in the middle of the highway. We were going about 65 mph and the car, to my surprise, was still driving fine.

She blurts out immediately after running this thing over and a second after me waking up, “there was a dead deer in the middle of the highway and I couldn’t avoid it.”

I responded matter of factly, “was it a buck?”

 

[mtmiller]

Hit a couple deer, but no real damage.....of course it was in a Tundra, so that is expected.