Reprinted from a Jan 14, 2007 column in the Morgantown Dominion Post
You are driving down the Fairchance Road heading for Cheat Lake. It’s 7:00 PM, and your mind starts to wonder about the outcome of the Gator Bowl, when all of a sudden you feel a loud crunch on the back door and the car swerves a bit. You slam on the brakes and pull off the road near the Cheat Lake Fire hall, Getting out you carefully walk back, and there in the ditch is a dead deer. You feel bad as you walk back to your car. Inspecting the damage your sorrow turns to anger. So much for that $1000 deductible policy.
We’ve all seen the dead deer along our highways, especially the past two months. As we have discussed in the past, the reason so many deer die on roads in November and early December is because of the rut. Deer are breeding, and this means they move a lot more. Both the bucks and does move during this time and crossing roads can lead to disaster.
Of course the fact that we have housing developments in deer habitat doesn’t help. The deer living in those areas still rut, still move a lot, and with more vehicle traffic in such areas deer get killed, and car insurance companies cringe.
The question then becomes, are there things we can do, other than driving slower, that will reduce deer/ auto collisions? Years ago a company came out with a product that was mounted on the front bumper of cars. It made a high-pitched sound, not audible to the human ear, supposedly to scare deer away from the car. It was to be the salvation of deer/auto collisions. There was one small problem. They didn’t work.
Most auto/deer collisions occur at night. In more recent years, a new product has come out to take advantage of that factor. Warning reflectors of several different colors are mounted on posts along roads where deer cross. The theory is that when a car’s headlights hit the reflectors the light will deter deer from crossing the road. The manufacturer states that this will "provide an optical warning fence to deer." But do they work?
A research project conducted at the University of Georgia was just published in the Wildlife Society Bulletin. They evaluated the effectiveness of these reflectors in that study. They conducted the study along roads on a small college campus where there were good numbers of deer and no hunting. Beginning on November 18, they conducted road side observations for 15 nights, then waited another week before putting out reflectors. First, they put out red reflectors for 15 nights, followed by white reflectors.
At another location they used blue-green reflectors, followed by amber reflectors. At all locations they recorded whether deer seen were passive (did not move), whether they moved toward the road or away from the road. During the study they got data from 221 that were walking or running toward the road when the car entered the test area where the reflectors were located. Before the reflectors were in place, 64% of the moving deer stopped when the car approached. When the red reflectors were out only 13% of the deer stopped moving toward the road. When the white reflectors were out 55% of the deer stopped moving toward the road, with 14% with blue-green reflectors, and 50% with amber reflectors.
Based on their study, the researchers concluded that the reflectors do not deter deer from crossing the road. In fact, more deer continued toward the road when the reflectors were out than when there were no reflectors. In some states there are wildlife underpasses, but obviously the expense involved limits their use. In some states they use electric fencing, but again all this costs a lot of money.
Just when I thought this story was over, I found that Arizona Game and Fish has taken technology one step further. They’ve placed infrared image detection devices near roads in high auto/animal collision areas. When an animal gets close to the road, it triggers warning lights along the highway, telling motorists to be on guard for animals crossing the highway. Again, don’t look for this system to be widespread because of the expense.
Some day someone may come up with a cost effective way to deter deer from crossing roads, but right now there is nothing that states can afford to use on a broad basis. The solution for now is to simply be careful when driving in deer country, especially in November and December. And, if you are placing feed out there for deer, and you are doing so near roads, then you are part of the problem. Meanwhile, drive carefully and keep yourself, your family and our West Virginia deer safe.
