I had to kill a vulture yesterday...
 

Here in Costa Rica, was driving up in the San Carlos area and a truck hits a vulture in mid air, poor thing lands right in front of my car. I go to check on him and he's basically a goner, basically no movement, no struggle, just kinda gasping for air, literally dying right there. It was an area where I couldnt take it to a vet (way too rural) and basically left with one of two things...leave him there to die (which could take hours and hours if not more) or whack him on the head and kill him instantly. I love animals like you have no idea so this was a very tough thing to do but I went back to my car, took out a hard metallic handle and just whacked him as hard as I could on the head. Just in case, I whacked him a few more times just to make sure he was dead. Very very saddening experience but I hope I did the right thing. Lord knows how long he would have suffered for if just left there.

Has anything similar happened to any of you?

Ive had to do similar things. Sometimes you just have no choice.

I had to shoot a rabbit that was my grandmothers for her once. Poor thing was suffering really bad. She asked me to do it. Lives on a farm, so its not completly uncommon.

Gives you a new respect for life.

Dont worry about it, those things happens. Last time we hit a deer with our car, we had to do the same thing. It was alive on the side of the road and in pain, so we had to shoot it. It would have died anyways, dont worry about it. Had it been some rare bird, that may have been something to worry about, but you did nothing wrong.

Not really -- held my sick, old cat while they put him to sleep. Owed him that.

Yeah, you did the right thing. I've been down in CR, and I've seen the vultures working over a dead carcass by the side of the road. Everybody's heard the word "feeding frenzy," but you don't really know what that means until you've seen a couple of dozen vultures working over a (hopefully) dead dog. If you hadn't put that bird out of its misery, it might have still been alive when its former buddies showed up to chow down.

Anyone read the Kafka story involving the vulture? lol

You did the right thing, no matter how hard it was to do. You saved it from a painful death, and I know I would want you to do that for me if mine and the vultures positions were swapped.

I remember one time I was out in the woods with my cousins and we had our B.B. Guns with us. Well, my cousin decided to aim up into a tree and try to shoot a humingbird. Well, amazingly enough he actually hit the bird from over 30 feet and it fell to the ground. It kept flapping it's wings trying to get up, but it would have ended up dying a slow death on the ground, if not eatin by a predator. I took my b.b gun and put a couple round in it. Hopefully he appreciated the gesture, but I felt like shit.

Yeah, a bird flew in front of my car once and I hit him. Looked in the rear view mirror and saw him flopping around on the road. I went back and could see that his wing was broken and he was pretty messed up. I could see no hope so I ran him over. The wife took it pretty hard but I know I did the right thing.

my g/f shows horses, so I spend a ton of time around the barn there, and I used to live on one. Theres been more than one time Ive seen an animal put down, and a few when Ive had to do it myself.

Its not easy, but it is the right thing.

It's sad, but you did the right thing. Accidents happen, and sometimes compassion looks cruel.

You did the right thing, and no I havnt had to bear such a horrible feeling before.

I hope I never have to either.

We see this as the right thing, but would you do the same thing for another human being? I guess the difference is that a human can understands what he/she is going through at the time. I would find myself having a tough time justifying a mercy kill though.

You did the right thing. I've done similar before and I know I did the right thing. Still sucks to do it however.

for a human being? i would if i knew without doubt there was no hope. the person can most likely give you an idea. but, for instance, if someone were shot in the stomach and 2 days later he is almost dead and there is NOBODY to help i'd put him out of his misery.


the buzzard had probably zero chance of getting back in the air. no vet and it sounds like he was bleeding into his lungs. i'd hate to, but i would help if i could.

i've killed to ease. i fucking hate it. but i think they hate misery even more.

The difference is that we cannot judge human quality of life on physical disability alone. An animal with a significant physical disability could not survive in the wild. A human with significant physical disabilities can still be a productive member of society. It is much harder to judge the quality of life in the setting of severe brain damage(Terry Schiavo)

Given no chance of improvement, severely brain damaged individuals are not very different from severe physically damaged animals in that thier ability to survive independantly is gone. Would mercy killing in this setting be much different than the original poster's treatment of the vulture?

Re: I had to kill a vulture yesterday...
 

Where can I get one of these crazy flying Costa Rican vulture killing trucks?

the vulture was in midair, not the truck :p

I had to do this to a Golden Retriever hit on a major Highway. There were two of them, they must have jumped from a vehicle or something, the highway is fenced. The dog was crying and everything from his ribcage back was crushed. The other dog wouldnt leave him, and several of us were stopped. We were scared of being hit, speed limit was 70.
I used an old floor mat to cover his head, then used the tire tool. It took weeks to get over. It is just part of being at the top of the food chain.

Can you eat vulture?
You did the right thing.

Something similar happened to me once. I was with some friends and I picked up a persimmon, I think thats what it was, and I said I threw it at a squirrel that was sitting on a tree branch. From about 30 feet I nailed it in its side and it went down. It was ok though, so I didn't feel too bad.

You did save it in a manner of speaking. Saved from suffereing. Another vote for the right thing but hard thing getting done.

Good job. Did what you should have done. I saw something like that. Was out fishing with my dad, and some other dads and sons. I was with a guy a couple years younger than me (about 12), and he had a pike they were gonna eat. He brought it up to the table, and shocked me when he brought out the bat a viciously, it seemed, ended its life. Good eatin, though :)

I have a funny story similar to yours.

One time my parents came home from their nightly walk at dusk and they said that there was a deer that had just got hit down the road. So, we went to go check it out. It was laying on the side of the road alone, just looking at us, pretty obviously it couldn't run away or else it would have. The car that had hit it was nowhere in sight. We were actually petting it, it was the first time I had seen a deer so close. My dad calls his brother to see what he can do (since he is a hunter and has guns - we don't). Anyway, while he is on his way there, one of the neighbors down the street calls 911 to tell them about the deer. We tell her its just best to put it out of its misery - that because it isnt running away its pretty much gone. She comes up with some line about it will shit right before it dies, and it hasn't done that yet. This ambulance arrives, along with a police car. The neighbor lady tells the paramedics that she wants to reabilitate the deer at the little stable she has up the road. She is going on and on about how thy have to do something.. so they start to give this deer oxygen - this is the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen. At this point, it had caused quite a commotion and there were all these cars and ambulances and crap, and we were pissed off, so we just left. We heard that they had called animal control and they put it down. It was quite a sight.

Goes to show the weird crap that can happen in suburbia :)

When I was about 10 I shot an arrow into the air up to a flock of cockatoos (really nice native Australian birds, yet a pest to farmers) and put an arrow through the birds wing. It came down and I had to kill it. I felt bad about that for months, but it was the right thing to do (though obviously following the wrong thing to do). I just realised I don't think I have a point here. Sorry.

Not sure if being at the top of the food chain grants us the right to mercy kill -- or innate compassion for life and the symbols of friendship and life probably do compell us.

I had to do precisely the same thing to a cat that I struck inadvertantly. It ran out from underneath a parked car as I was approaching and with oncoming traffic and a passenger beside me, there was nothing I could do but grip the wheel tightly. I turned around about a block ahead and came back to finish the job. I just couldn't leave it there to suffer or be scared of oncoming traffic. Poor thing. I'd never killed anything before that.

Make sure you never tell that story on first dates... ** sniff **