A warning for Michigan drivers: It’s peak season for deer-car collisions
- During mating season, deer are less focused on their surroundings and more on feeding and mating, making collisions more likely
- It also gets dark earlier with the recent switch back to standard time.
- Motorists who hit a deer should leave it alone and instead call the police
It’s mating season for deer, and the likelihood of catching a deer in headlights — and crashing into it — is the highest it’s been all year.
October and November is peak breeding, or rut, time for the animals.
“We've got a lot of deer that are moving around a lot more than they normally would at hours of the day and night that they typically aren't moving around,” said Chad Stewart, deer, elk and moose management specialist for the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.
The chance of hitting an animal while driving is higher in Michigan than in most other states. Michigan was behind only West Virginia and Montana last year, according to insurance company State Farm.
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In 2023, there were 58,806 deer-involved crashes in the state, slightly less than it was the year prior, according to the Michigan State Police’s Traffic Crash Report. People died in 19 of the crashes. The most crashes occurred in October and November, when there were 9,107 and 11,145, respectively.
Deer are most active at dawn and dusk but because it gets darker earlier due to the return to standard time, deer will start to become active in the evening rather than at night like they would in the spring and summer.
“All that extra area that they're covering and moving, they're focused on other deer instead of other things around them, so they become a little bit more distracted,” Stewart said.
The most accidents occurred between 6 a.m. and 8:59 a.m., when there were 14,750 crashes, and 6 p.m. and 8:59 p.m., when 13,962 collisions occurred.
What happens to the deer
If you can stop in time to avoid hitting the deer, that’s always the best option. But in any scenario, experts say drivers should not swerve into another lane to avoid the hit because that can actually make the accident worse.
“If you see one deer make sure you're braking sufficiently because even if that deer crosses the road … there could be one or multiple deer following closely behind,” Stewart said.
He also recommends that drivers be extra vigilant especially when driving while it’s dark and to make sure that the headlights are on and as bright as they can be.
“Don't approach a deer that you just struck unless you're certain that it's absolutely dead, but even then, there's a lot of safety concerns with just being out of your car on a busy highway,” Stewart said.
If you happen to hit a deer it’s best to stay in your vehicle and not inspect it because the deer may not actually be dead. Instead, call the local police to report the incident.
However, if you hit a deer and want to salvage it, you can do so by obtaining a salvage permit from the DNR.
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