[denerobt]

Ok, I’m living on borrowed time seeing as over the past month i’ve managed to survive 3 squirrel attempts to kill me and a rabbit along with a blackbird in the rear wheel.

i’ve looked all over the place for something like a battery powered mini ultrasonic device or those deer whistles that go on the front of cars etc. Does anyone know of anything thats successful at giving these poor creatures a heads up a cyclist is coming.

presently I’ve taken to shouting ‘ALAN’ ( you’ve gotta watch the Youtube video of a squirrel shouting Alan) every 100 metres or so which is a little tiring on my ride into work.

I live rurally and it’s 6am when i head off on my 14 mile trip, so plenty of wildlife up and about.

Thanks for reading

Topic

[Suffolk Cycling]

Shades wrote:Queue an

Shades wrote:

Queue an emergency stop and rapid removal of helmet. May have to use a bandana under the helmet as a precaution!

I read that as using a banana under the helmet, and wondered how on earth this tasty fruit would solve the situation

[denerobt]

Superb ! Thats the kinda
Superb ! Thats the kinda thing I was looking for 🙂 Funnily enough, one of the local farmers has just bought forth a litter of puppies which also love to go into the road and welcome oncoming cars and cyclists (might not have a litter for long in that case…)

Thankfully, we don’t have deer in this area, biggest problem we have is sheep in the road, but at least you can see them and they naturally go towards the hedges when trying to flee from anyone.

[Bob's Bikes]

Squirrels if grey KILL THEM
Squirrels if grey KILL THEM they’re yankies and not native. :)) No but seriously have you tried a Dog dazer? put it on your handlebars and press when needed.

[Anonymous]

Squirrels can hear
Squirrels can hear high-frequency noises very well. When I see a squirrel near the road as I approach, I hiss loudly at it (“Psst!”). I find this activates their warning systems better than any other verbal noise I can make.

Squirrels are squishable and I have killed a couple of them by just riding straight over them. The squirrels may disagree, but I think it’s preferable to ride over the poor little beasts rather than make a sudden evasive move and possibly crash the bike.

[mattsccm]

The odd rabbit. bug it in the
The odd rabbit. bug it in the pot!
Last night was about normal. Near misses on about a dozen bunnies and stacks of sheep lurking in the gutter. ” different boar, sodding great big ones who decided to play chicken they could have stood still and a heap of the stripy little buggers as well who get everywhere, can take you off and worse have a evil big mum in the buses nearby. I don’t count squirrels as they move too fast. Weds saw a Fallow buck miss me by a few yards.
Nothing beats the near miss on deer a few years ago., Pissed and going like the clappers down hill in the dark. Minimal lighting and to much beer jus showed e a shadow moving very fast across my front, left to right. My befuddle state said owl but why could I hear its feet on the road. The next morning fund deer hair my right elbow.

[Noelieboy]

denerobt wrote:A spoke

denerobt wrote:

A spoke clacker would be ideal, but all but 1 mile of my journey is along country roads with hedges a plenty all the way. The Deer Whistles I read about work at 30kmh (18mph) so I’ll have to pedal harder or keep shouting “ALAN”.

TBH I would have thought that some clever Trevor had designed a small device to emit a high frequency noise to alert said wildlife. I spent a good lunchtime looking at animals hearing frequencies and then trying to find devices that emit that frequency……sad sad sad. Anyway, all to no avail.

Thanks though for the ideas…I’m not giving up yet :-)

CLEVER TREVOR ALERT:
How about a bell? Trrrring it every few metres. its on the handlebars so no need to move your hands & you won’t have to keep shouting.

[Beatnik69]

Can we add pigeons to the
Can we add pigeons to the list. I was cycling to work the other morning, doing 25 -30 mph downhill when one decided to take off in front of me almost wiping me out.

[Shades]

What about bees and wasps?
What about bees and wasps? One got stuck in my helmet and then promptly stung me because it wasn’t happy with it’s situation. Queue an emergency stop and rapid removal of helmet. May have to use a bandana under the helmet as a precaution!

[DanTe]

I’d be careful with the Alan
I’d be careful with the Alan thing, people’ll think you’re a nut job. Quite amusing though.
I don’t think there’s anything you can do about it. Quite an impressive haul you’ve got there.
I do quite a lot of rural riding and have so far only managed to clip a baby Rabbit. Nature nearly got revenge though as in deepest darkest Suffolk as a Red Deer jumped into the road about 5 yards ahead of me and cleared the opposing hedge. It was his mate who nearly got me though, bloody thing jumped clean over my front wheel. Nearly you knowed myself..

You could get yourself a set of Chris King hubs, those things make a right racket..

[denerobt]

Absolutely Crosshouses !
Absolutely Crosshouses ! Pheasants are only there to make sheep look bright =))

We have that pleasure to look forward too in a few weeks time in this area.

[Kapelmuur]

My main wildlife problem is
My main wildlife problem is with pheasants, they are really stupid birds who run around in circles instead of making for the fields.

No wonder the Hoorays use them for ‘sport’, a species thicker than they are.

[denerobt]

A spoke clacker would be
A spoke clacker would be ideal, but all but 1 mile of my journey is along country roads with hedges a plenty all the way. The Deer Whistles I read about work at 30kmh (18mph) so I’ll have to pedal harder or keep shouting “ALAN”.

TBH I would have thought that some clever Trevor had designed a small device to emit a high frequency noise to alert said wildlife. I spent a good lunchtime looking at animals hearing frequencies and then trying to find devices that emit that frequency……sad sad sad. Anyway, all to no avail.

The device doesn’t have to be on the bike, I could put it in my cycle top. Perhaps something that made a noise every 20 seconds or so would be fine.

Thanks though for the ideas…I’m not giving up yet 🙂

[tom_w]

Could you use some sort of
Could you use some sort of spoke clacker, preferably one that can be disabled easily for the non-countryside part of your journey?

[YorkshireMike]

I thought I was the only one
I thought I was the only one – I’ve regretably gone over a rabbit, had a squirrel bolt between my wheels (somehow unscathed) and had a blackbird decapitate itself in my rear wheel. I feel better for getting that off my chest! If I see something coming up, I tend to give a bit of a clap if I can and that usually sends them into the verge, but it’s obviously unwise if you’re descending (as I was in the rabbit and blackbird incidents).

[Author]

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