Dead Pigs on Kentucky Highway Could Be Sign of a Bigger Problem

We've all heard the joke why did the chicken cross the road, but never has anyone attempted to answer why animals end up as roadkill along the highway. It's normal to see a mole, deer, cat ,dog, opossum, squirrel, skunk or raccoon become road kill, but only recently have I dug deep inside myself to reflect on why do animals jump in front of high speed vehicles. They must have some concept of speed in order to be able to run from predators, but are oblivious to the threat of speeding vehicles? It doesn't add up. I have come up with a new explanation. The animals who end up as road kill are suffering from severe depression. You may laugh, but I witnessed a deer make eye contact with me before it walked directly into the path of my vehicle. Fortunately my deer chickened out and chose to live by crossing before impact. It's my hope that the deer will live on to seek assistance form other deer in the woods to help it to overcome the cycle of depression.

It's not logical to assume that all roadkill is suffering from depression, some may be suffering from sight problems like opossums, headlights can be a bit bright and may daze and confuse the animals. Or maybe like moths are drawn to the flame they are drawn to the light of headlights. Another possiblilty is animals could be in the process of following behind fellow herd or family members who successfully cross the road and the unlucky victims lag behind and are too slow to make it across the road.

This also leads me to another reason the for high rate of roadkill, peer pressure. I recently saw a dog stand in the road in broad daylight. He was well aware there was a car approaching and waited till the last second to dart from the road. I am sure if I wasn't too busy driving I could have seen fellow dogs cheering on the dog who was standing in the road. It was obvious they must have been playing a game of chicken. Luckily he also survived.