Big Bird

[Escapee]

this title is nothing to do with large women, its something I intended to post and forgot, so here goes.

On Thursday morning I was driving to work around 6:20am along a rural road, there was a motorbike travelling towards me. Just as I was getting within a few hudred yads of the motorbike, a very large bird took off from the grass verge on my side of the road and headed straight for the motorbike. The poor guy couldn't do anything and the bird appeared to be about to attack him, at the last second the bird did an amazing stall/turn acrobatic display and strated heading, you guessed it towards me!

The bird was now lower than the bonnet of my car, it appeared to be as wide as my car. I had already removed my foot from the accelerator and was starting to break gently. (car behind me) the bird gradualy gained height until it struch the top left hand side of the windscreen, there was one hell of a thump and I felt the car shake but the window somehow survived.
I had visions of the thing coming through and ending up on my lap

I looked in the mirror and saw it land on the verge, I slowed and pulled into the layby and turned back to have a look. i got out of my car and crossed the road and looked in the grass whilst walking across at an angle towards where I thought it had landed. Just as I got close to it the bl**dy thing took off and missed me as it flew across the road and skimmed over the fence on the other side and into the woods.

This was one hell of a big bird, and most likely a Buzzard. I did a bit of resaerch on the net and found they sometimes attack cyclists near to the nest and there was a story of one down south attacking people and being killed after divebombing a van!

I will be keeping my eyes out across that road in future

I read the story about the one that got killed dive-bombing a van, Interesting to have a 'first hand' account of such behaviour - I'm surprised the biker didn't fall off

[Escapee]

Originally Posted by homealone

I read the story about the one that got killed dive-bombing a van, Interesting to have a 'first hand' account of such behaviour - I'm surprised the biker didn't fall off

I guess he had to change his underpants

Seriously though, I expect it would of killed him hitting something like that head on at 50MPH

[jtwn]

Ill remember to take an umbrella when im in your area

[Mal]

Originally Posted by Escapee

this title is nothing to do with large women

I do admit, I thought of this when I saw the title...

[greencreeper]

Yeah - most birds will have a go at anything they consider a threat to their chicks, regardless of how big the threat is. It's sort of sweet in a way, but scary when you're on the receiving end. I had a close encounter with a swan. You don't realise just how big they are until one whistles past you

Buzzard: http://www.birdsofbritain.co.uk/bird-guide/buzzard.htm