I know people have been killed trying to help turtles cross the road - but I don't know what kind of low life that would aim at a turtle.





http://www.heraldonline.com/2012/12/27/4507782/clemson-students-turtle-project.html





"Weaver put realistic-looking rubber turtles, no bigger than a saucer, in
the middle of a lane on a busy road near campus. Then he got out of the
way and watched as over the next hour, seven drivers intentionally ran
over the turtle, and several more appeared to try to hit the defenseless
animal, but missed."



ETA -  just noticed search is broken, so this could very well be a dupe.





 

Funny comments to the story.

I ran over one with my lawnmower because I didn't see him, but he was burrowed down so I did not hurt him.

He is a 3 toed box turtle and he is now in a big fish tank in my house. He drinks water from a water bottle

I avoid turtles crossing the road like the Plague!!  No only because it's cruel, but because I hit one by accident (it was either run off road or go into incoming taffic) several years ago.  It shot out from under the tire and hit undercariage of truck.  I crawled under truck when I got home, it dented my damn transmisson pan.

I'm one of the morons that stops and puts them in the woods.

I find it hard to believe the ratio of turtle killers is as high as this "study" suggests.



I know there are some sick people out there, but I didn't think there would be that many.  If it is true, than it really is telling about our society.  If you'd swerve to hit a turtle, you'd probably kick a dog or cat - if you kick small animals you'd probably smack around a girlfriend.  So forth and so on - until one day you're wondering why your kids never call you, except for money.

There aren't any turtles around here, but I will try to run over crows in the road.

Me too, and I'd say half of our members here would too, if the road were safe enough.





 

bravo!

Same here.

well... maybe so, but sea turtle eggs make the best damn omlet you've ever tasted. nom nom nom.



or maybe people are taking it out on the trutles because of the pesky laws protecting those damn cyclists.  

I do it all the time and so does the wife.  I dont care what anyone else says or thinks about it either.

OK....story time. I've hardly ever told this to anyone. Worth the read.........

I had this buddy back when we were pre-teens to very early teens. He moved away suddenly(mom couldn't deal with him) and maybe that's a good thing.

His mom was the local "party girl" and wasn't around at all to supervise her kids. He was very mechanical and was always building/experimenting with things. He stole paint cans of grey spraypaint in his socks a few times (he shoplifted everything) and stole some sheet styrofoam. He made fake cinderblocks with some glue and would put them scattered in the road around a sharp curve as we would hide in the woods and watch. He did this a few times as cars screeched out of control, only to find that they hit some with no damage and would go berserk screaming out into the 43000 acres of woods surrounding this section of road after almost wrecking their cars to avoid hitting these "cinderblocks"

He did this a few times and it was starting to lose it's appeal, especially when two of the cars that had been duped before purposely swerved to hit them and bust them up.

One day weeks later, he says he wants to go hide and put out the blocks again (little fucker had a way of sucking you into any plan he concocted) We tell him no, as it was always quite scary hanging out with him, but he was the only neighbor in 1.5 miles. Well.....tonight, he told us it would be worth it.

He was all set up by the time we walked through the woods to meet him. We're waiting around the curve, in the woods and being very rural, we'd sometimes have to wait a half an hour for any car to come by. Most would see the blocks, do a little swerve and drive on.

Well tonight just happened to be the one instance where it was someone who had been duped before. We actually heard him speed up and aim right for the real cinderblocks just before he hit them.
We ran, where we would have hunkered down and watched before. I never looked back. The guy ran into the woods about 50 yards or so but we were all ready up over the knoll and split up to regroup at one of our many sites we always had pre-planned.

Crazy shit this guy was. Sad thing is, it wasn't nearly his finest moment.
last I heard, he had done time for a fight where he stabbed someone(confirmed) Since then, he's been a hardworking family man from others I know who have stayed in contact with him.

How do you know which side is the right side??

I do not run over turtles, thats plain mean.

Someone got a 25-30 pound snapper last spring around here. Damn thing was huge. Hope it fucked the guys car up

funny... the little shits around here play those games but hide the blocks in empty beer cartons.

I saw that story.  People are stupid.
It must be a southern thing, I don't think I've ever seen a turtle on the road.

The shoot out like bullets if you hit them just right.

Kinda like Mario Kart

Easy research project

Bump.

Me too. I also brake for squirrels.

Some are a big one

Living in PA, I help turtles on the road. We have box, wood and snapping turtles around here.

From what I hear though, it's different in some areas in the south... some of the water turtles down there are devastating to the local fish populations so it would be akin to running over a coyote or wild hog if you could do it without the damage.

So I guess the outrage would be regional and dependent on the species of crawling speed bump.

We have a shitload of turtles at work, have to be particularly mindful of the wee babies during baby wee turtle season.  I've probably helped at least 100 out of the road over the years.   They are so cute.  Some of them are snappers; they're not so cute when they grow up, but we have to help them across the road too.

Same here, help across the slow, brake for the more agile.

I'm just trying to create a lightning fast turtle through natural selection.

what a bunch of asshats.

I've been known to stop and help more than one turtle cross the street.

In my 10 years of working in South Western Texas i must have  tossed about 30 turtles  into the brush off roadways... People that run them over on purpose are weaklings and cowards.. they show it by how they treat the weak when there is no  possible repercussion to their actions.

this, damn near been run over more than once.

Yep, me too.  No justifiable reason to hurt or kill an animal for fun.  

Me too.

I can think of a few members of this forum.





 

I do this too.

I tell you what, no matter how many times you do it, those 30# plus snapping turtles never appreciate the good gesture. The last one that I hit was an accident, there was a car in the oncoming lane, and he was right in the middle of the road. I tried to pass over him with the Neon, but didn't clear him. Got him with the K-member.

I did this once with a 50lbs snapper.





Grabbed him by the back of the shell with welding gloves on and still damn near got bit.





Never knew their necks could do shit like that.



 

I'm not slamming on my brakes or swerving to avoid hitting any animal. It's not worth crashing or losing control of your car.

That being said I wouldn't try and actively run over an animal, that's just messed up.

P.S. Why did the turtle try and cross the road? Guess we will never know.

I have seen a lot of shitbags try like hell to hit cats crossing the road.

One young gentleman swerved entirely into my lane in his quest to kill a kitten.

I keep a pair of work gloves in my trunk for stuff like this. Hell, I stopped traffic on US19 once to let a family of ducks cross from the median.

I keep a pair of  high voltage linesmen's gauntlet style gloves in my car so I can pick up the really big ones and the soft shells without getting bit when I pick them up off the road to move them to safety.

I rescue quite a few and I always wondered about the ones that get run over when they are at the very edge of the raod near the curb; it always seemed to me that folks were actually aiming at them because they were pretty far away from traffic.

Sick bastards.

no surprise, there are a lot of cruel people out there

If reincarnation were real, I'd want to come back as a painted turtle.

And this right here folks is another major cause for the decline in box turtle populations. I challenge you to release this animal assuming it has not been in captivity for long. Otherwise, learn the proper care for the species. I can tell already you have not a clue.

Work gloves?

Wuss.

I do it with my bare hands, just grab their tail, they can't do much while you have them by the tail. The larger ones have a really good reach though, so I hope you like isometric exorcise.

I do that for Box Turtles

I had a neighbor who would stop in the middle of the road and shoot them.  He was a thieving piece of shit, too.  These things often go together.
 

Been doing that my whole life...something about turtles...

The wife and I help turtles and snakes across the road all the time.

I may or may not have beaten the living shit out of a delivery driver who sped up on a residental street to hit a dog., ok who the fuck am I fooling I fucked that scumbag up in front of his boss.  The best part was once I was done whooping this bitch's ass the boss fired him.

Me, too.

Where I used to live in SC, pretty much every community had ponds in them, filled with turtles.  Many times, I would stop and pick one up if it was just sitting in the road, and put it back at the water's edge.  One time, my GF and I had just pulled into a parking spot and there was a tiny (like 2") turtle behind the car that, luckily for him, we missed when we pulled in.  Cute little fucker.

Just a few?



Make it a kitten instead of a turtle and you'd have dozens.