Your Worst Road ?

[Gene]

There are a lot of deer and we have friends who have been hit by deer or ran into ones who wander into the road a couple of times (some people seem to have multiple deer encounters). Worst times seem to be dawn and dusk, but rutting season seems to be bad too because just like humans, when the need is there, other things seem to be forgotten. And, deer can run across the road at any time of day and any day.

I think deer just don't realize what a car or truck is. A road means nothing to them. It's beyond their comprehension. These are not smart animals and are not truly suicidal, just freaked out. What keeps them alive is being fear based and running from any movement or sound—it may be something with big teeth or guns—and they run across roads because to run is to live. It is not well thought out. Many times we have seen deer or their relatives stand in the middle of a road oblivious to 3 tons of truck coming at them or slowly stroll onto the road into the path of a truck. They probably would react quicker to a large predator (bear, human, wolf) walking down the road because they understand that.

Any road in an area where deer live is dangerous. Living where we do—lots of mule deer—we develop a deer sense as we and our passengers automatically scan the roadside for deer and their unpredictable behavior. In some places deer's relative, elk, act the same way. Being bigger, they do even more damage. I've seen caribou and moose act pretty much the same way.

Gene

[eubank]

Yeah, elk are the same, except that elk are a lot bigger animals, and they run in herds. If you hit one, you stand a reasonable chance of hitting more. Their size guarantees much more damage.

Lynn

[tpi]

Originally Posted by CrawfordGene

I've seen a lot of confirmation on this thread of what I've noticed—concrete roads can be really bad when I'm towing the trailer. It doesn't have to be an old road—I-70 east of Denver has long sections of newer concrete out towards Limon that are like a subdued roller coaster. Any road can feel worse with a trailer and some resonate really badly with the rig and concrete seems to be particularly bad.

Gene

I get that here in so. CA. on the concrete roads. Some are butter smooth because they've been repaired. Others set up the resonance where it pivots at the hitch. Mine smooths out a lot at about 62+ MPH but that starts to approach ticket territory. Or below about 50 where I feel like an impediment.

No form of adjustment on the hitch or replacement shocks has completely solved the problem.

I try to keep it at 62 and hope for the best.