roach
Original: roach on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Title: "DEER X'ING"
Subtitle: Adapted from Mary Roach's amazing new book, FUZZ: WHEN NATURE BREAKS THE LAW!
Credit: by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith with Mary Roach
Mary Roach: P.S. This is not a plug. No, we've been Mary Roach fans for about 20 years and her new book has too. Wonderful. Not to share, if you want to buy. Please just click the comic.
Panel: A woman (Mary Roach) speaking. On July 26, 2003, the space shuttle Discovery hit a turkey vulture.
Woman: To prevent damage, NASA literally tried to clear the launch site of dead vultures.
Panel: A NASA sign/screen reads "Roadkill Monitoring Station" / "Vulture Carcass Removal Status."
Woman: Sounds funny, but it was a ding to shuttle Columbia's exterior on the same day that led to the tragic explosion on the way down.
Panel: Woman gesturing.
Woman: This brings up a lot of important questions. One of which is: how does an animal best notice a space shuttle? Why is removing the vulture safety so important along the way?
Panel: An animal (a bird/vulture) replies.
Animal: An animal not getting out of the way is dangerous for two reasons. One is, when you hit something larger, you're more likely to die. Two is, when you try to get out of the way... it could be the wrong way.
Panel: A car on a road.
Woman: The U.S. estimates that 13,000 people per year are injured when they hit large animals like deer. Annually, that's only two thousand fewer than the number injured when the vehicle actually hits the animal.
Panel: A kangaroo/deer-like animal stands.
Woman: But seriously, the animal is big enough, the impact can kill too. In 2005, the insurance institute for highway safety analyzed 187 fatal-to-human vehicle-animal crashes. Fully 77 percent of which involved deer.
Caption box: The initial impact rarely killed or even hurt those in the vehicle. Rather, fatalities occurred when instances in which large deer (and in one case a moose) crashed through the windshield.
[Label: Technical drawing]
Panel: The deer, so far as we know, didn't want us dead. But a road that crosses a forest is an attractive place to a deer.
Panel: Deer crossing a road.
Woman: Food grows close by and it's a clearing of sorts. So predators can't easily ambush the deer.
Panel: The hunted maintain what's called a spatial margin of safety. There are rules to follow. The distance between themselves and a predator, and they have an uncanny sense of exactly how close they can let that predator come before they need to take off.
Panel: Closest intuition distance, or FID, is the closest point a chased human and lengthens according to circumstance.
Sign: "There's no difference when humans cross roads, except things take a little farther. So move it, sweetheart."
Panel: A deer in a field.
Woman: They almost always judge the safe getaway distance correctly.
Panel: A deer says "FWUMP!"
Woman: Unless the thing coming at them and an engine.
Panel: Woman gesturing.
Woman: Mammals and birds generally produce changing dives as predators.
Panel: A bird flies.
Bird: It's like running and hiding when you're not sure which way to go.
Panel: A truck on the road.
Woman: First cars were only been around for a hundred years. In terms of evolution, that's nothing.
Woman: Clearly some kind of coyote, but what kind?
Panel: Judging speed requires an ability to perceive and interpret "looming" — how quickly an object approaches.
Panel: Looming is hard to detect and visually process when the object is travelling fast. The defect in travelling could be commonplace.
Panel: Judging speed requires an ability to perceive and interpret "looming" — how quickly an object approaches. Or, an animal is bad at detecting how quickly something comes at you.
Panel: Looming is hard to detect and visually process when the object is travelling fast. The deer (tail, and visually process) doesn't always notice oncoming traffic.
Woman: It's probably fine.
Panel: Another problem facing animals facing down a predator: fleeing is but one option.
Panel: A skunk says "STINK!" and a porcupine bristles "SPRRR."
Woman: These tactics have buggered the odds of survival over the millennia. But against speeding automobiles they prove ineffective to tragically miscalculated.
Panel: A turtle/lizard on the road.
Woman: Maybe we should work on humans instead?
Woman: Maybe.
Panel: A racing trail / tire marks with a hill.
Woman: In 2012, a North Dakota woman named Donna Davison did a wonderful thing — she had become inspired hoping to drink attention to the situation that had been interesting her.
Panel: Hills.
Woman: She'd been in these car crashes involving deer and decided to make a DEER X'ING sign on a busy road.
Panel: A silhouette / smoke.
Woman: Hay! Are we encouraging deer to cross the road in such road-fantastic areas?
Panel: A short silence followed.
Panel: Two men talk.
Man: You seem to take all of this very seriously. Did the people don't understand that deer-crossing signs are telling deer where to cross.
Panel: Two women talk.
Woman: My reply, in retrospect, he explained that the signs are meant for us. The deer don't read. To tell us to slow down.
Panel: Two men talk.
Man: They might as well be talking to deer drivers. Don't slow down when you see a DEER X'ING sign.
Panel: A woman speaking.
Woman: This is true. The uniform tennis control devices — and it's true of fancy lighting modules. We have neon deer warning signs — including the model with the LED. The model with the LED becomes activated in sequence to give the impression of a bounding deer.
Panel: A glowing/neon deer outline.
Woman: I bet you drivers slowed down for her.
Panel: A woman holding pizza, sitting.
Woman: I am familiar with this technology from a neon sign in front of a strip joint across the street near a San Francisco pizzeria. I used to eat at a Bobcat-Neon dancer in sequence of three modes, over and over.
Panel: A pink neon dancer figure.
Panel: A deer.
Woman: What are scientists seeking to help us to mount avoided reflectors along the highway to redirect the beam from approaching headlights and enhance "visual awareness" of an approaching car.
Panel: A woman speaking.
Woman: In 2007 in Wyoming, deluxe-vord some promising results. Though not with the reflectors they were testing. It was the studies control. That worked.
Panel: A deer near a glowing light.
Caption: time reflector wrapped in white canvas
Panel: A deer in a dark forest.
Woman: The researchers speculate the deer might have been responding to the white drag in the way it would to the white butt and underside of a fellow deer's tail.
Panel: A hooded figure (ghost-like white shape).
Panel: A man in a chair.
Man: I am skeptical. Only because I have read the IIHS paper by researchers at Pennsylvania state university who tried to warn many white-tailed deer by erecting roadside plywood cut-outs of deer rear ends with their tails a-flagging.
Panel: Black silhouette of a hooded figure.
Man: On some, the raised tail was painted white. On others, an actual deer tail and skin remained in place.
[The panel intentionally left un-illustrated.]
Panel: Black silhouettes of hooded figures in a row.
Woman: Sadly, because who wouldn't want to see our nation's highways lined with plywood deer asses with decomposing tails, none of it worked.
Panel: More black silhouettes.
Woman: There are better solutions to this problem, but we'll leave it there for now. The book provides much more, not just on the related matters of moose and chimps, monkeys, even — but on murder by bear, jellyfire, and trees. Fuzz! Buy on the union is using talking to prevent blasphemous bird behavior and more.
Text: CLICK TO READ MORE AND BUY A COPY!
[Two figures: "hee hee"]
Votey:
Title: ANIMALS I CAN'T DRAW
- DEER
- SKUNK
- PORCUPINE
- SQUIRREL
- TURTLE
- BIRD
- CAR
- HUMAN
Subtitle: Adapted from Mary Roach's amazing new book, FUZZ: WHEN NATURE BREAKS THE LAW!
Credit: by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith with Mary Roach
Mary Roach: P.S. This is not a plug. No, we've been Mary Roach fans for about 20 years and her new book has too. Wonderful. Not to share, if you want to buy. Please just click the comic.
Panel: A woman (Mary Roach) speaking. On July 26, 2003, the space shuttle Discovery hit a turkey vulture.
Woman: To prevent damage, NASA literally tried to clear the launch site of dead vultures.
Panel: A NASA sign/screen reads "Roadkill Monitoring Station" / "Vulture Carcass Removal Status."
Woman: Sounds funny, but it was a ding to shuttle Columbia's exterior on the same day that led to the tragic explosion on the way down.
Panel: Woman gesturing.
Woman: This brings up a lot of important questions. One of which is: how does an animal best notice a space shuttle? Why is removing the vulture safety so important along the way?
Panel: An animal (a bird/vulture) replies.
Animal: An animal not getting out of the way is dangerous for two reasons. One is, when you hit something larger, you're more likely to die. Two is, when you try to get out of the way... it could be the wrong way.
Panel: A car on a road.
Woman: The U.S. estimates that 13,000 people per year are injured when they hit large animals like deer. Annually, that's only two thousand fewer than the number injured when the vehicle actually hits the animal.
Panel: A kangaroo/deer-like animal stands.
Woman: But seriously, the animal is big enough, the impact can kill too. In 2005, the insurance institute for highway safety analyzed 187 fatal-to-human vehicle-animal crashes. Fully 77 percent of which involved deer.
Caption box: The initial impact rarely killed or even hurt those in the vehicle. Rather, fatalities occurred when instances in which large deer (and in one case a moose) crashed through the windshield.
[Label: Technical drawing]
Panel: The deer, so far as we know, didn't want us dead. But a road that crosses a forest is an attractive place to a deer.
Panel: Deer crossing a road.
Woman: Food grows close by and it's a clearing of sorts. So predators can't easily ambush the deer.
Panel: The hunted maintain what's called a spatial margin of safety. There are rules to follow. The distance between themselves and a predator, and they have an uncanny sense of exactly how close they can let that predator come before they need to take off.
Panel: Closest intuition distance, or FID, is the closest point a chased human and lengthens according to circumstance.
Sign: "There's no difference when humans cross roads, except things take a little farther. So move it, sweetheart."
Panel: A deer in a field.
Woman: They almost always judge the safe getaway distance correctly.
Panel: A deer says "FWUMP!"
Woman: Unless the thing coming at them and an engine.
Panel: Woman gesturing.
Woman: Mammals and birds generally produce changing dives as predators.
Panel: A bird flies.
Bird: It's like running and hiding when you're not sure which way to go.
Panel: A truck on the road.
Woman: First cars were only been around for a hundred years. In terms of evolution, that's nothing.
Woman: Clearly some kind of coyote, but what kind?
Panel: Judging speed requires an ability to perceive and interpret "looming" — how quickly an object approaches.
Panel: Looming is hard to detect and visually process when the object is travelling fast. The defect in travelling could be commonplace.
Panel: Judging speed requires an ability to perceive and interpret "looming" — how quickly an object approaches. Or, an animal is bad at detecting how quickly something comes at you.
Panel: Looming is hard to detect and visually process when the object is travelling fast. The deer (tail, and visually process) doesn't always notice oncoming traffic.
Woman: It's probably fine.
Panel: Another problem facing animals facing down a predator: fleeing is but one option.
Panel: A skunk says "STINK!" and a porcupine bristles "SPRRR."
Woman: These tactics have buggered the odds of survival over the millennia. But against speeding automobiles they prove ineffective to tragically miscalculated.
Panel: A turtle/lizard on the road.
Woman: Maybe we should work on humans instead?
Woman: Maybe.
Panel: A racing trail / tire marks with a hill.
Woman: In 2012, a North Dakota woman named Donna Davison did a wonderful thing — she had become inspired hoping to drink attention to the situation that had been interesting her.
Panel: Hills.
Woman: She'd been in these car crashes involving deer and decided to make a DEER X'ING sign on a busy road.
Panel: A silhouette / smoke.
Woman: Hay! Are we encouraging deer to cross the road in such road-fantastic areas?
Panel: A short silence followed.
Panel: Two men talk.
Man: You seem to take all of this very seriously. Did the people don't understand that deer-crossing signs are telling deer where to cross.
Panel: Two women talk.
Woman: My reply, in retrospect, he explained that the signs are meant for us. The deer don't read. To tell us to slow down.
Panel: Two men talk.
Man: They might as well be talking to deer drivers. Don't slow down when you see a DEER X'ING sign.
Panel: A woman speaking.
Woman: This is true. The uniform tennis control devices — and it's true of fancy lighting modules. We have neon deer warning signs — including the model with the LED. The model with the LED becomes activated in sequence to give the impression of a bounding deer.
Panel: A glowing/neon deer outline.
Woman: I bet you drivers slowed down for her.
Panel: A woman holding pizza, sitting.
Woman: I am familiar with this technology from a neon sign in front of a strip joint across the street near a San Francisco pizzeria. I used to eat at a Bobcat-Neon dancer in sequence of three modes, over and over.
Panel: A pink neon dancer figure.
Panel: A deer.
Woman: What are scientists seeking to help us to mount avoided reflectors along the highway to redirect the beam from approaching headlights and enhance "visual awareness" of an approaching car.
Panel: A woman speaking.
Woman: In 2007 in Wyoming, deluxe-vord some promising results. Though not with the reflectors they were testing. It was the studies control. That worked.
Panel: A deer near a glowing light.
Caption: time reflector wrapped in white canvas
Panel: A deer in a dark forest.
Woman: The researchers speculate the deer might have been responding to the white drag in the way it would to the white butt and underside of a fellow deer's tail.
Panel: A hooded figure (ghost-like white shape).
Panel: A man in a chair.
Man: I am skeptical. Only because I have read the IIHS paper by researchers at Pennsylvania state university who tried to warn many white-tailed deer by erecting roadside plywood cut-outs of deer rear ends with their tails a-flagging.
Panel: Black silhouette of a hooded figure.
Man: On some, the raised tail was painted white. On others, an actual deer tail and skin remained in place.
[The panel intentionally left un-illustrated.]
Panel: Black silhouettes of hooded figures in a row.
Woman: Sadly, because who wouldn't want to see our nation's highways lined with plywood deer asses with decomposing tails, none of it worked.
Panel: More black silhouettes.
Woman: There are better solutions to this problem, but we'll leave it there for now. The book provides much more, not just on the related matters of moose and chimps, monkeys, even — but on murder by bear, jellyfire, and trees. Fuzz! Buy on the union is using talking to prevent blasphemous bird behavior and more.
Text: CLICK TO READ MORE AND BUY A COPY!
[Two figures: "hee hee"]
Votey:
Title: ANIMALS I CAN'T DRAW
- DEER
- SKUNK
- PORCUPINE
- SQUIRREL
- TURTLE
- BIRD
- CAR
- HUMAN
Alt text
A tall SMBC comic titled "DEER X'ING," adapted from Mary Roach's book FUZZ: WHEN NATURE BREAKS THE LAW, by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith with Mary Roach. A woman (Mary Roach) narrates across many small panels, illustrated with simple drawings of deer, birds, cars, trucks, a kangaroo, a skunk, a porcupine, a turtle, glowing neon deer outlines, a pink neon dancer, and hooded ghost-like silhouettes. She recounts true-but-absurd facts about animal-vehicle collisions: the 2003 Space Shuttle hitting a turkey vulture and NASA trying to clear vulture carcasses from the launch site; statistics that around 13,000 people per year are injured hitting large animals like deer, with deer involved in 77% of fatal animal-vehicle crashes (often when a deer crashes through the windshield). She explains animals' 'spatial margin of safety' and 'flight initiation distance,' and why animals misjudge fast-moving cars because 'looming' is hard to perceive at high speed. A running joke: a woman insists on a busy road that deer-crossing signs encourage deer to cross there, until it's explained the signs are for human drivers (who don't slow down anyway). She describes failed experiments with neon bounding-deer signs, roadside reflectors, and plywood deer-butt cutouts with real tails to scare deer off roads, none of which worked. She plugs the book at the end with a 'CLICK TO READ MORE AND BUY A COPY!' button. The votey is a hand-drawn boxed list titled 'ANIMALS I CAN'T DRAW' listing: DEER, SKUNK, PORCUPINE, SQUIRREL, TURTLE, BIRD, CAR, HUMAN — a self-deprecating joke since all of those appear, badly drawn, throughout the comic.
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.