Ostrich bites 9-year-old Ashtabula boy

By SHELLEY TERRY - Staff Writer - sterry@starbeacon.com
Star Beacon

April 05, 2008 08:23 am

— ASHTABULA TOWNSHIP — A turkey and ostrich have put a Partridge on TV.
Nine-year-old Aaron Partridge will make his national TV debut at 7 p.m. Sunday night on “America’s Funniest Videos,” thanks to an overly aggressive ostrich.
While on vacation last July, the Partridge family stopped at a drive-through safari attraction in Virginia. Tom and Christie Partridge and their son, Aaron, sat in the front seat of their pickup, while their 11-year-old daughter, Melanie, sat in the back.
Aaron held a bucket of food for the ostriches out the passenger-side window. One particularly large ostrich wouldn’t leave Aaron alone.
“It would peck and peck, banging its head in the bucket,” Aaron said. “I ran out of food, but it kept pecking for food and pecking the truck.
Then it bit Aaron’s finger.
“I started screaming and crying,” Aaron said.
Christie Partridge filmed the entire safari with the family’s camcorder. She couldn’t get over the big bird’s aggression.
“Every time (it pecked for food) the ostrich banged its head in the bucket and Aaron would go, ‘Oh! Oh! Oh!’” she said. “Then he yelled, ‘It bit me!’ There was a long pause and then he started a really, really long cry.”
Needless to say, the experience made Aaron a little leery of feeding any of the other animals, his mother said.
After the trip, the family watched video and they thought it was hilarious. So, Christie Partridge sent it to “America’s Funniest Video’s” in December.
“They called this week and said it will be on Sunday,” she said. “We are excited.”
The Partridges believe just the clip will be aired and they will not be eligible to win any money because they weren’t invited to the show. But they are thrilled just the same, Christie Partridge said.
Five years ago, Aaron appeared on Channel 5 TV in Cleveland when a wild turkey appeared Thanksgiving Day at their Ashtabula Township home.
“They did a ‘Blair Witch’ thing,” Christie Partridge said. “It was hilarious.”