A series of birding accidents
I had a series of disturbing bird incidents last week. I was driving along through the Adelaide Hills near the small town of Macclesfield on my courier run to Strathalbyn. In this locality the road is steep in parts and with many sharp turns. In some spots one needs to slow down to about 25kph to negotiate sharp bends.
As I came around one corner, an Australian Magpie flew off from the side of the road and collided with the side of my car. I was only going quite slowly and had no opportunity to slow down. Looking in the mirror as I drive on I could see a magpie on the side of the road, so I am assuming it was only stunned. I hope it survived. The road at that point was not safe to stop to investigate.
Around the next corner I had to brake suddenly (after checking the mirror for traffic behind) to avoid a dozen or so Australian Wood Ducks standing in the middle of the road. I slowed down enough to avoid hitting any. They obligingly waddled off the road into the nearby paddock and safety.
Around the next corner an Adelaide Rosella parrot flew low and rapidly across the road in front of the car. This time there was no way I avoid it or brake. I didn’t hear any impact, but checking the mirror again I saw a cloud of feathers behind me and no body. I am assuming I hit it somehow.
All of these incidents happened within a sixty second time frame. Most distressing.
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Adelaide Rosella
If you were only going slowly, the Magpie was probably just stunned, as you say. Birds are tough, especially ones like Magpies. I did a post the other say about an attack on a few-days-old duckling which I thought for sure broke the duckling’s neck,until I saw it swim away with no apparent signs of injury! (Although it sure would have been in pain)
Bird accidents sometimes just can’t be avoided, but it’s really unfortunate that so many of them happened in such a short amount of time! I hope you feel better soon.
Thanks for visiting Cloudfish. I sometimes get a little distressed when I see road kill, whether that be birds, kangaroos or any other forms of wildlife. On a recent trip interstate we even saw dead wombats and echidnas on the side of the road.