A little over two years ago, in April of 2023, I decided to keep track of how much roadkill I observed while driving. I didn’t include animals I saw on trips out of my normal driving routes and I didn’t include animals I couldn’t see clearly (e.g., I was on a fast road with lots of traffic and could not stop). In those two years I documented a total of 176 animals of all kinds, from coyotes to foxes to squirrels to beavers to tiny warblers — birds that migrate to North America from Central and South America to breed each summer.
There are things we don’t notice when we whiz by roadkill — some of these animals are still alive, some are nursing mothers (when they die, all of their young die), and some are carrying food. These animals have evolved over millions of years to evade predators like hawks, owls, and others. What they have not evolved to do is evade cars. A vehicle approaching along a road does not evoke the defenses these animals have to survive. They are not stupid; they just don’t perceive the vehicles as dangerous. There are times when traffic is moving too fast to safely slow down, but when there is no one behind us, or we are on back roads, it is so easy to slow down and let them cross. Animals face so many threats from humans — let’s try to literally give them a brake.
Mara Silver
Shelburne Falls