Free Feathers (almost)

[duffy]

This almost made me cry. First off the pheasant population around here is sparse compared to what it was in the 60's & 70's but they'r coming back a little with some help. I was going to town and at the top of the hill I see something in the road in the other lane. Yep, someone had hit a nice rooster and it was laying there and actually looked like it was in pretty fair shape. As I go by I thought HEY Dummy there's some nice feathers there! So as I'm slowing down getting ready to turn around, this semi pulling a pup trailer goes by and I'm thinking, Nah, it's in the middle of the lane, he'll miss it.....Nope! The dirty rotten Bast**d lined right up and I'd swear hit it will every wheel.   Knew it wasn't worth stopping after that.....and at least I wasn't late for my appointment.

 

[slammingjack]

lol to funny.

 

[AtticaFish]

Haha. I can only imagine what the truck driver thought if he saw your look as it happened. Might of thought you were after some roadkill stew.

I had a somewhat similar experience a few years back. After eating breakfast at my in-laws in town one morning i noticed a black squirrel was hit right in front of their house. Wasn't there when we arrived so knew it was a fresh kill. Borrowed a pair of bolt cutters from my FIL and dodged traffic to run out and clip the tail. I received quite a bit of protest from my young daughter at the time. (still hear about it occasionally after many years) So i take the tail home and folded back the skin at the stump and inch or so and salted it down heavily. Laid it flat on a board and put it in my shed outside to cure. Well, it turned out that one of my barn cats slipped into the shed when i wasn't looking and i locked her in as i was leaving. The next day when i went to work i could hear the cat meowing...... the sound coming from the shed. There was nothing left but a few tufts of fur.

 

[hookup]

Bwahaha

When I first started tying, I saw something similar. A dead deer was on the side of the road, and it was a fresh kill. I stopped, grabbed my bag of salt/borox mix and hedge clippers, and started to clip the tail when a lady pulled over and read me the riot act. When she was through I dropped the tail in the bag and said "Lady, the deer's dead and doesn't need its tail anymore". The look on her face was classic and I got into my Jeep and drove off

 

[JUNGLEJIM1]

Truck tenderized the bird for you.

 

[duffy]

AF, your cat must have thought you seasoned that tail up just for her!

Don't know what made me madder, The truck hitting it the second time or who ever killed it first. I had seen him wandering by the highway for quite a while and figured he would get nailed.

 

[Jig Man]

Some of the best fish ketchers I ever tied came from a road kill gray fox tail. Gonna have ta get anothern one of these days...