Where do drivers hit the most deer in Minnesota?

It doesn’t happen on northern forest roads, or on long, winding curves where visibility is difficult. It doesn’t happen in pastures or on narrow highways that wind through farms and dense cornfields. The most likely place for a deer to suddenly jump in front of a car and cause an accident in Minnesota is just outside Minneapolis, on one of the state’s busiest roads — Interstate 94 between Maple Grove and St. Cloud.

“When you get outside the real urban metro area and into the Twin Cities suburbs, that’s where you get this confluence of very high deer density and lots and lots of traffic,” said Ron Moen, a wildlife biologist at the Natural Resources Research Institute in Duluth.

Scientists at the institute and the University of Minnesota are working on a project to map where drivers are most likely to hit deer in the state. The map, which has not yet been released, will be available to the public by the end of the summer. The hope is that the data will help road engineers find the most dangerous areas and prioritize wildlife fences or other protections, Moen said.

The study found that about two-thirds of deer-vehicle collisions in Minnesota each year occur outside the Twin Cities, especially in the suburbs leading to St. Cloud.

That’s because there appear to be three main factors in deer collisions, Moen said: vehicle speed, the number of cars on the road, and the amount of deer in the area.

Adding highway speeds, suburban areas can become particularly difficult places for drivers to avoid deer.

Moen said he and other researchers began the study thinking that visibility might play a much bigger role in accidents than the data showed. Large, winding roads in wooded areas were less likely to cause deer collisions than expected.

“Maybe partly that’s because people are paying more attention to the curve and slowing down a little bit,” he said.

The study was paid for by the state’s Environmental Trust Fund as part of efforts to make roads safer for drivers and wildlife.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation recently found that simple wire fences near endangered turtle nesting grounds dramatically reduce the number of animals killed by cars each spring. And for larger animals like deer, elk and moose, Western states have had success building bridges over busy highways.

How many deer are shot each year?

It has been difficult to calculate how many deer are hit by motorists in Minnesota each year.

severely 1200 gazelle accidentsAccording to the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, traffic accidents result in multiple deaths, dozens of hospitalizations, and an estimated $20 million in property damage reported to police each year. But these accidents represent only the worst cases, and they typically involve motorcycles, serious injuries, or wrecked or severely damaged vehicles.

The vast majority — more than 90 percent — of deer collisions are not reported to police, Moen said.

State Farm Insurance Company estimated Minnesotans hit about 35,000 deer each year, causing hundreds of millions of dollars in property damage. But the company’s formula for arriving at that number isn’t publicly available.

As part of studying the new map, Moen patrolled roadsides counting deer carcasses for several months to see which source of the numbers was closest to the truth.

“We haven’t come up with a new statewide estimate, but State Farm’s estimate is closer to the mark. The 35,000 or 36,000 is the right order of magnitude,” he said.

The best solutions in Minnesota may include a combination of fences and driver education, Moen said.

He said wildlife bridges seem most effective in states where large animals travel along predictable migration paths down hills and mountains.

“In the West, deer and other ungulates are already being smuggled into certain areas. In our country, deer are everywhere and cross roads everywhere,” he said.

But driving a little slower, especially on suburban highways, and some major fences may prevent deer from crossing directly in front of your vehicle, he said.