# Oh, you animal! **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 1, 2004, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998 "2004-02-01T04:39:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![dopetalker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecccb3/32.png) [@dopetalker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dopetalker)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2004, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/1 "2004-02-01T04:39:02Z")
Why do squirrels, coyotes, deer, etc. (all of which I’ve seen do this) wait (especially at night) until the last minute before I drive by to decided to run across the road at breakneck speed in a desperate attempt to get across the road, so close to the front of my car that by the time my headlights illuminate the body there’s no time to avoid hitting it/swerving? Why do they do that? It’s very annoying. I wish they would say, “oh, gosh. I need to get across this road. I hear a car coming. I’d better start across now, in a nice, leisurely pace, so I be across in time so as not to cause any consternation to the unsuspecting driver now very close.” But they don’t! Every week I’ll be driving and an animal will dart right in front of me, like he/she is trying to see how long it can wait to cross without getting wiped out! I know there’s nothing anybody can do about it (hence the entry of this question into this forum) but just out of idle curiosity why do they do that? ---
**Author:** ![dopetalker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecccb3/32.png) [@dopetalker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dopetalker)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2004, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/2 "2004-02-01T04:41:20Z")
and please excuse the grammatical and spelling errors above. I wasn’t concentrating so…sorry! ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2004, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/3 "2004-02-01T04:46:13Z")
Animals don’t have the capacity to reason that way. Instead, they rely on instinct which has been honed over millions of years to serve them well in their natural environment. Unfortunately, cars are too recent for them to deal with properly. An animal won’t generally react to something as threat until it gets within a certain distance, called its circle of fear. Once something enters this circle, and if it is percieved as a possible threat, the fight or flight instinct takes over. Unfortunately for the animals, cars move much faster than other things they are likely to encounter, so the time from the car entering the animal’s circle of fear and it tries to run off, the car is already on it. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2004, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/4 "2004-02-01T05:32:57Z")
> [@Q.E.D.](#): > > Animals don’t have the capacity to reason that way. Instead, they rely on instinct which has been honed over millions of years to serve them well in their natural environment. Unfortunately, cars are too recent for them to deal with properly. An animal won’t generally react to something as threat until it gets within a certain distance, called its circle of fear. Once something enters this circle, and if it is percieved as a possible threat, the fight or flight instinct takes over. Unfortunately for the animals, cars move much faster than other things they are likely to encounter, so the time from the car entering the animal’s circle of fear and it tries to run off, the car is already on it. I’m wondering, though, why so often they run in front of the car rather than away from it? ---
**Author:** ![boofy\_bloke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9e8a1a/32.png) [@boofy\_bloke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boofy_bloke)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2004, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/5 "2004-02-01T05:34:55Z")
Or they’re playing chicken. I wonder what chickens call playing chicken? ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2004, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/6 "2004-02-01T05:35:28Z")
> [@Starving Artist](#): > > I’m wondering, though, why so often they run in front of the car rather than away from it? My WAG here is that they tend to run in the direction in which they were originally planning to go anyway. Or in the direction they happen to be facing at the time. ---
**Author:** ![Phage](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a4c791/32.png) [@Phage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Phage)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2004, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/7 "2004-02-01T05:53:13Z")
> [@Starving Artist](#): > > I’m wondering, though, why so often they run in front of the car rather than away from it? You don’t see the ones that go the other way. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![vasyachkin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/c5a1d2/32.png) [@vasyachkin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vasyachkin)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2004, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/8 "2004-02-01T06:20:42Z")
maybe they don’t understand that the car is going in a straight line on the pavement. maybe they think the car is just as likely to run them over in the middle of the sidewalk ? ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2004, 6:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/9 "2004-02-01T06:45:41Z")
> [@Phage](#): > > You don’t see the ones that go the other way. 😉 I knew someone was gonna say that. It crossed my mind just as I hit the enter key. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![ltfire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ea924/32.png) [@ltfire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ltfire)\ **Post date:** [February 2, 2004, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/oh-you-animal/226998/10 "2004-02-02T01:14:12Z")
From a cartoon. Mama squirrel and baby squirrel at the side of the road. Holding baby squirrels hand, mama says ‘get ready, here comes one!’