It's beginning to be a recurring theme when the temperatures become cooler. Watch out for the deer.
As Shannon Davis of Winona traveled along Interstate 55 this weekend, a doe collided with her vehicle, something she never expected to happen on the interstate.
"I saw it coming at me," Davis said. "I was going 70 miles per hour, and I knew I would hit it."
Although Davis' vehicle only received minor damages, she is a part of a growing number of people that will collide with the animals over the next several months.
Officials with the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks say the number of deer is increasing, and the recent weather conditions drive deer into the roadways.
"Everything they usually eat is under water with the recent rains and floods we've had," William McKinley, a deer program biologist with MDWFP said. "They are moving to higher ground and finding food on the road side."
McKinley said the numbers of deer in Mississippi may range from 1.7 to two million.
MDWFP's road kill observations, where every department employee keeps up with the number of the dead animals along the roads, gives them a ballpark figure of exactly how many deer were hit from October to December. McKinley said this process began in 1997.
"We record every road kill we see," McKinley said. "And have already started observing several."
McKinley said with the deer on the move for search of food, the number of collisions could rise.
"In some areas, the Big Black River is a mile wide," McKinley said.
McKinley said the cooler weather will increase the activity of the deer as breeding for the white-tailed deer, the most common in this region, is at its peak along with the combination of searching for food.
"The white-tailed deer will begin to move in the northwest part of the state around November," McKinley said. "This is known as the rut by some of the hunters."
The rut is the sexual excitement in male deer or bucks.
"This begins to move south and eastward later in the year and the bucks and female deer get crazy," McKinley said. "Drivers will begin to see bucks when they normally wouldn't due to the excitement of breeding."
The Carroll County Sheriff's Department covers a lot of ground throughout the county, and deputies tend to see many of the animals while patrolling the highways and rural roads especially.
"They are definitely out there," Carroll County deputy sheriff Brad Carver said. "We've had a couple of cars to collide with them, and I've almost hit some myself."
Carver said with the deer numbers so large, he recommends people obey the speed limit and pay attention to their surroundings on the road. Even McKinley, who is not a stranger to deer collisions, said drivers should constantly scan the road side and obey the speed limit.
"The speed limit is designed for people to stop in a timely manner when something like that occurs," McKinley said, "Deer seldom travel alone, and there are usually two of them when the driver only sees one."
Statistics show that over 14,000 collisions were reported in Mississippi last year and enough to keep local law enforcement busy during the upcoming winter months.
"We work a lot of these accidents," Carver said. "Drivers need to be careful on the road and pay close attention. A lot of the time you can see their eyes."
Deer are everywhere. They pose a tremendous hazard to all that travel our highways, day or night. They are causing millions of dollars in property damage to our vehicles. I ventute that some of the crosses placed along our roads to honor a person killed in an auto accident are the result of losing control of a vehicle trying to avoid a deer.
The Class would be easily to identify; anyone that had hit a deer and suffered damage. Insurance claim & accident reports would as proof.
So who do you sue? The Mississippi Game and Fish Commission for starters. This Ole Honky has been around long enough to remember when these Game & Fish folks started hauling deer into a deerless State of Mississippi and turning 'um lose back in the 1960's.
After the lawyers representing those with automotive damages get through with Game & Fish, a whole new Class Action could be filed by farmers that have suffered deer damage.