Effects of Roads and Highways Trapping Wildlife in Islands of Nature
Synopsis:
There is a serious lack of wildlife corridors and overall connectivity, especially around roads and highways. Those roads and highways can have dramatic effects on wildlife movement and landscape connectivity. Some species may have complete aversion to roads, which would limit their movement through naturally available landscapes for food, mates, and home territories. Many other species try to cross roads even with traffic present resulting in wildlife mortality and risks to drivers. Animals who have been hit by cars are not the only ones whose lives are also affected. Parents leave behind orphans who are sometimes relatively fortunate enough to make it into rescue centers. Un-ignorable numbers show that vehicles kill over a million animals every day in North America alone, leading to another separate group of injured wildlife, billions of dollars in damages, and major human injury every year.
All of these images were made ethically and with the permission of local authorities, private land owners, and a rescue center.
As explicit as some of these images are, I hope they inspire people to support under and overpass constructions as
wildlife corridors through main roads and highways. The suffering is preventable and we know the cure.
There is a serious lack of wildlife corridors and overall connectivity, especially around roads and highways. Those roads and highways can have dramatic effects on wildlife movement and landscape connectivity. Some species may have complete aversion to roads, which would limit their movement through naturally available landscapes for food, mates, and home territories. Many other species try to cross roads even with traffic present resulting in wildlife mortality and risks to drivers. Animals who have been hit by cars are not the only ones whose lives are also affected. Parents leave behind orphans who are sometimes relatively fortunate enough to make it into rescue centers. Un-ignorable numbers show that vehicles kill over a million animals every day in North America alone, leading to another separate group of injured wildlife, billions of dollars in damages, and major human injury every year.
All of these images were made ethically and with the permission of local authorities, private land owners, and a rescue center.
As explicit as some of these images are, I hope they inspire people to support under and overpass constructions as
wildlife corridors through main roads and highways. The suffering is preventable and we know the cure.
Side Story
I stopped on the side of the road to see if this poor guy was OK after seeing feathers stuck in his windshield. He said a turkey took off from a ledge and didn't have a split second to make a move and this is what happened. The windshield exploded inward and you can see tiny shards of glass covering everything inside the truck. He had to wash out the shards of glass stuck inside his eyes, like some horrific movie sequence. Also sorry for the poor photography, all I had was my massive telephoto lens and my bad camera on my phone. He invited me to take all the images I wanted, and thankfully he ended up getting the help he needed.
