Not Ota Pavel (film character, translator´s note), but scientists from FLD and FŽP ČZU focused on when and under what conditions game crosses the road. The subject of the research was to find out the regularities of the incidence of accidents involving motor vehicles with wildlife.
The fragmentation of the landscape is relatively high in the Czech Republic. Due to the overall rate of urbanization and the average population density, it is difficult to find regions in our country without the negative impact of road traffic. That is, localities where game could migrate without any risk of collision with vehicles.
So, when is it safest for animals to crossroads?
The winter months in the forest belong to a period of calm, the roads are empty, so there are logically fewer fatal accidents. However, with spring comes the release of young individuals, and thus the search for new territories. To this is added increased tourist pressure in the countryside. All this results in the "bloodiest" months on the Czech roads. There are also big differences depending on the time of day. On ordinary roads, the largest number of accidents occurs at dawn and dusk, which is not only the least clear time for drivers, but also the period of the greatest game activity. The situation on motorways is different. Continuous columns of humming cars appear to the animals as a barrier, so they hardly go through them during the day. That is why there are most accidents at night, when the intensity of traffic decreases a little. For the sake of completeness, let us add that mammalian populations are exposed to higher pressure due to the fragmentation of their areas by roads more than due to the deaths under the wheels of killing machines.
The results of similarly focused studies can be used to identify the riskiest places and environments in general, which should lead to the design of effective preventive measures, such as road signs, speed limits, odour repellents or crossings for game with follow-up fences as collectors.
Unfortunately, we cannot explain all this to roe deer, but we can be surprised whether evolution will teach game to migrate mostly at noon and preferably in February.
Ing. Tomáš Kušta, Ph.D.
In 2007, he graduated in Forest Engineering at the Faculty of Forestry and the Environment. In 2011, he completed postgraduate studies at the Department of Forest Protection and Game Management, Faculty of Forestry and Wood Sciences, where he currently works as a researcher focusing on ecology, ethology and game management.
Prepared by: Jiří Lehejček