Traveling Nebraska Highways can be a delight or a disaster. We encountered a disaster recently when our car met a large buck deer. The deer was killed as was the car. I love seeing beautiful deer when at home and they visit our yard or when they are feeding out in a field. Because we live near the Middle Loup River, deer are a constant in our lives. There are deer warning signs along the highways but don't think that that is the only place the deer will appear. They show up unexpectedly almost anywhere. Night time driving can be especially dangerous but especially at dusk and dawn. Sometimes you will see one in the middle of the day! Always be vigilant and look closely at bridges and trees along the highway. Many people have deer whistles attached to their vehicles. I don't know if those work well or not. Horns do work. But slow down, as to which way the deer will bolt is unpredictable. Also, when they hit the pavement of the highway, they sometimes slip, so be prepared.
While traveling through Alberta, Canada, I noticed that along the Trans-Canada Highway, that extremely high fences were on both sides of the highway, preventing the movement of wildlife across the highway. Now we don't have bears or very many moose here in Nebraska, but we do have deer, big-horned sheep, mountain lions and elk as well as racoons, opposums and rabbits. But in Canada as well as a few U.S. states have built "wildlife bridges" for the animals to cross the highway safely. California is building one of these bridges near Los Angeles! And Nebraska is conducting a study on highway 71 in the Nebraska panhandle for the protection of bighorn sheep and vehicles. Could the tall fences work along our Nebraska highways? Farmers usually have an entrance road to their fields for farming vehicles to enter and leave, so gates would be necessary. Is the expense worth it? What could it save in loss of property and lives, both wildlife and human? Thankfully, there were no injuries to our driver.
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