I was surprised last Wednesday morning when I looked out and found a heavy fog had descended on the area. It has been so dry in recent weeks I didn’t think there would be enough moisture in the atmosphere to form fog.
Most mornings fog doesn’t inconvenience me greatly other than I may chose to walk rather than ride to work. Only two blocks separate my home from work and generally I make the commute via a bicycle. If I need a vehicle during the day, I have access to a vehicle left in the newspaper’s garage.
But Wednesday mornings are different for that is the day I take mail to the Mankato post office and the route to Mankato is like a trip through a deer preserve. Regardless of the time of day, one must constantly watch for deer crossing the highway without regard for motor vehicles.
A co-worker who commutes from a farm home in northwest Jewell County, says the secret to avoiding a deer accident is to be alert and drive slow.
I try to be alert and watching for deer but that isn’t always easy. As I age, I find it isn’t hard to drive slow but when doing so one risks sparking road. In the fog last Wednesday, a semi-tanker truck used to haul anhydrous ammonia and a pickup pulling a trailer load of hay had passed me before I was two miles outside of Superior. Thankfully, those were the last vehicles which passed me before I reached Mankato.
Before I left on my route, Rita spoke with a Montrose area resident who makes the daily commute to Superior for work. The commuter was rejoicing that after leaving home about 6:30 that morning she had made it in to Superior without hitting a deer. She shared one of her deer avoiding secrets. When descending the hill I used to live on, she lays on the horn hoping that will scare the deer away.
So far it has worked for her.
When deer whistles first came on the market, I fell for the marketer’s sales pitch. Supposedly the whistles emitted a deer scaring whistle that couldn’t be heard by humans. The whistles were supposed to strike fear in the hearts of deer and stop the animals dead in their tracks. I bought and installed the whistles on all my vehicles.
Don’t know how many times they may have worked but it was less than 100 percent. One night, as my automobile descended Blauvelt’s Hill, a deer jumped over the guard rail and struck the vehicle’s front right fender. After the accident, I called the Jewell County Sheriff’s office, expecting I would have to wait for an officer to visit the accident scene.
The dispatcher informed me there were so many deer-motor vehicle accidents, they had quit sending an officer to investigate. Instead, she would just note I had reported the accident.
I no longer bother installing deer whistles. Contrary to the sales pitch, at least one study concluded they don’t make a loud enough noise to stop a running deer.
Deer accidents peak in the fall for more than one reason. Harvesting activity destroys some of their cover and encourages the animals to move about as does the fall hunting seasons. But the biggest reason is rut. Landon Cleveland, a former Jewell County resident, now working for the Kansas Department of Parks and Wildlife explained rut for the Nov. 18 issue of the Beloit Call newspaper.
Cleveland said deer rut is always the first two weeks in November and the peak of the rut is usually Veterans Day.
Deer rut is the name for the breeding season for deer. The does come into season and the bucks throw caution to the wind. The bucks get such tunnel vision they don’t use the precautions they normally would when moving about.
The reason for the increase in accidents is because the bucks are pushing the does and running them trying to breed them. In doing so, the buck chases the does onto the roadway in front of motor vehicles.
As regular drivers in rural areas, we have become conditioned to deer crossing the road in front of our vehicles. Cleveland said rut gets us in trouble because we see the doe cross the road and relax our guard..
Thinking the threat has passed, we keep an eye on the doe. That’s when the buck that was chasing her bolts out of the ditch. We weren’t watching for him and we hit him with our vehicle.
When we combine the rut behavior with deer moving 24 hours a day instead of at dusk and dawn, as they do at other times, we have the recipe for more vehicle accidents.
This rut behavior usually lasts until the week of Thanksgiving. During rut, drivers should always scan the ditches while driving. And where there is one deer there will probably be another.
While we may be less likely to encounter a deer after Thanksgiving, we still need to be cautious for some may not have gotten the message that it is now December and we are looking for a visit from flying reindeer pulling Santa’s sled.
Regardless of the time of year, how slow we drive or how watchful we are, some deer accidents can’t be avoided.
I remember when a deer ran into and damaged the parked car assigned to a highway patrol trooper living at Superior.
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