January 15, 2018
Roadkill
I'm very sad and disturbed to report that I saw 46 dead animals on South Bay roadways today (2018-01-15). This is twice as many dead animals in one day as I observed in the whole of 2017.

42 (yes, forty-two!!) Pacific Newts
3 raccoons
1 striped skunk

The raccoons were killed on Highway 17 in Los Gatos. The skunk was on Hwy 237 in Sunnyvale.

The 42 newts were killed on Alma Bridge Rd. between the Limekiln and Priest Rock trailheads (~ half a mile). Many were bloody with guts oozing out, which was really quite traumatizing to see. I only photographed 2 of the 42 to post on iNat. I saw 11 dead newts on this same section of road back in November 2017 (that's 53 dead newts within a 3-month period, but more accurately during 2 visits to Sierra Azul) on a very short section of roadway (half a mile):

https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/truthseqr?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=newt%2C+roadkill&search_on=&quality_grade=any&reviewed=&geoprivacy=&identifications=any&captive=&place_id=&swlat=&swlng=&nelat=&nelng=&taxon_name=&taxon_id=&day=&month=&year=2017&order_by=observations.id&order=desc&rank=&hrank=&lrank=&taxon_ids%5B%5D=&d1=&d2=&created_on=&site=&tdate=&list_id=&filters_open=true&view=map

Here are my roadkill sightings for 2017:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/truthseqr?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=roadkill&search_on=&quality_grade=any&reviewed=&geoprivacy=&identifications=any&captive=&place_id=&swlat=&swlng=&nelat=&nelng=&taxon_name=&taxon_id=&day=&month=&year=2017&order_by=observations.id&order=desc&rank=&hrank=&lrank=&taxon_ids%5B%5D=&d1=&d2=&created_on=&site=&tdate=&list_id=&filters_open=true&view=map

Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District is working along with other authorities to create safe corridors for wildlife:

See Midpeninsula Regional Openspace District's website: "HIGHWAY 17 WILDLIFE PASSAGE" project to help protect animals from humans.
https://www.openspace.org/our-work/projects/wildlife-crossing

Posted on January 15, 2018 02:48 PM by truthseqr truthseqr | 2 observations | 0 comments | Leave a comment less ↑