never forget to bury a dead possum

I went to bury the possum, but it was so late that I couldn't see the poison oak in the animal cemetery, so i gave up until "tomorrow". I promptly forgot, until several 105F days later, the family "mentioned" to me that it might be a good time to bury that opossum. Hmmm, I think they were right. It took me about 10 minutes to dig the hole, then I went out back and got the bagged up possum from the cloud of flies and ignoring the maggots oozing from a tear in the bag, managed to get the thing back to the hole, and in and covered with dirt without puking. I only gagged once. No photos, but I'd say the title of this post spells out todays lesson quite clearly.

nasty looking deer

Today I took the 8 baby possums to Wildlife Images . Opossums aren't actually native to this area, so they weren't going to keep them, rather they had someone who would come get them and rehabilitate them. Wildlife Images is a great place, they rehabilitate and release suitably wild injured or orphaned native animals, and keep and care for animals that are too injured or domesticated to survive in the wild.

On the way home from dropping the babies off, I saw this fawn at the junction of Lower River Rd. & Bastian Road. It looks pretty old and I doubt all the damage is from the car that hit it, but probably from carrion eaters.

dogs like possums (for a snack)

Tonight we went and saw War of the Worlds (tom cruise, 2005) at the theater, and it was a pretty good movie. There was a couple of parts that didn't fit the action speed of the rest of the movie (read boring) but as a whole, the move was good. When we got home, there was a dead, bloody possum in the driveway. I went to get a shovel and a plastic bag, while the teenagers oogled the body. It was then that they discovered the possum was a mama, and there were live babies in her pouch. Latex gloves, a couple towels, and we had a box of baby possums (8 live ones). I then bagged up the mama and her dead baby, and am about to go dig a hole to bury them.

kid gets pulled over

I was in medford today, hanging out with my kids and saw this 10ish year old boy riding back and forth on his mini harley style motorcycle. It was pretty cool looking. He looked like he was having a blast, until he got pulled over for running a stop sign.

just another dead cat

Between Ruch and Jacksonville, about milepost 28 on Route 238, there lies the following poor dead cat. No tags, stiff as a board, he's a dead kitty of unknown origin, and certain destination.

lucky rollerblader

No photos once again, but today I was parked in Grants Pass and saw a rollerblader get hit by a car. He was rolling along down the sidewalk and cut across the road at a stoplight, kind a confusing light, there are 4 light modules (one for each lane) on this one way street. What I guess he didn't notice was that only 2 of the lights were red, the ones nearest him. He swerved to avoid one oncoming car and caught the second one (doing about 35 i'd guess) on the hood with his shoulder. They came to a sliding stop and he hopped up, said something to the driver, and rolled off, none the worse for wear. It all happened so fast I couldn't get a picture of any of it.

On the road kill note, I saw 2 skunks and an unidentifiable furry red spot. I didn't make the trip to Medford today, so I'm sure I missed many photo opportunities on that route.

No time to stop

I've been seeing many deer (one right next to the one pictured in my last post), and other animals in the past few days but have had no time to stop. My current count is 4 new deer, 2 squirrels, a (potentially, couldn't quite tell) dog, a raccoon and a snake, the latter 2 within 10 feet of each other in the middle of the road. If any of these are still there tonight, i'll probably post a picture or 2. The deer are usually gone quickly, and I believe I found out why. There are several wildlife refuges in the area, one known as Wildlife Images keeps several big cats, and other carnivores (wolves, for one). I'm told these refuges often pick up the fresher large kills to use as meat for their carinvores. Cool. I'm glad they're going to a good place. Wildlife Images is a really neat place, with all kinds of animals that are, for various reasons, unable to survive in the wilds anymore. Go there, if you haven't been.

fresh deer

I saw this deer quite soon after its death, the blood is still fresh and a friend confirmed that a man and a woman taking pictures of the deer about 15 minutes before I passed there. My guess is that they were the ones who hit it, and were taking pictures for insurance purposes. This deer died just west of Jacksonville, probably at about 8pm this evening.

I've been thinking more about possible roadkill causes and remembering stories from friends and relatives who have hit animals, and I think my previous post was perhaps a bit harsh, I'm sure there are plenty of "stupid" or "careless" animals that stray onto the roadway and just don't have luck or instinct, jump the wrong way and Wham!, life is over. I've even been told of times when a deer has jumped out of the brush, probably in a mad run for the other side of the road, and hit a car, rather than the reverse. I've also realized that many people do agonize for life over hitting animals, but in this carnivorous society, I'm guessing that the agony (if any) is usually short lived.

2 deer in 2 days, I wonder what the effect our roadways and bigger bigger more more automobile attitude have on the deer population.

Why do I do this, anyway?

I'd like to preface this entry with a few disclaimers:

• I'm "nearly vegetarian" (chicken, eggs, turkey, cheese).
• I'm very careful about driving and have many times put myself in danger to avoid hitting an animal.
• I would NEVER intentionally hit an animal.
• I don't go out every day hoping that an animal has died, but rather with the hope that I find any that have, so that I may document their death.
  

That said, I've received quite a variety of reactions so far regarding this endevor of posting dead animal photos on the net, from "whatever" to "Thats sick and wrong, what is the matter with you". This has caused me to further evaluate my motives for photographing dead animals and posting them on the internet. There are many reasons for doing this, some of them morbid humor, some more benign.

I'd say that the biggest reason is that I have a camera, and I find road kill to be an interesting subject. There are all these animals who have strayed into our roadways for various reasons, to find careless uncaring drivers who couldn't give a shit about animals who stray into their path. There are of course other reasons that animals are hit by cars, a moment of distraction is all it takes. Quite probably there are people who even try to hit the animals they see trying to cross the road.

These animals are going about their daily business of survival, when WHAM! its the end for them. No one really cares, perhaps they see a dead thing on the side of the road and they think "Ewww" or "Poor little doggie" or whatever, but its not a big deal, and the event is soon forgotten. I'd like to think that by taking a photo and writing a little story, there will be some record, even if just a count, of the number and variety of animals that meet DEATH on the road.

Tonight as I drove home, I saw the following deer in the gutter near the Applegate store. I wonder if it was knocked into the gutter by the car that hit it, or if the driver or some passerby moved it there. I wonder how much the driver cared about the life that this deer lead, and how much the driver cared about the damage to their vehicle. I wonder if they were drunk, stoned, or just distracted. I wonder if it was the deer who was at fault. I wonder if this particular deer had propogated prior to its death, and if it had a mate and children who are even now wondering where she is. I wonder how long this carcass will remain by the side of the road, and where it will go when it is removed. I wonder what makes a photo of a dead kitten "worse" than a photo of a dead possum, but I guess that is a subject for a future post.

update 2005-07-06: the deer is gone, glad I stopped for it last night. I've send blogger a support request on the image issue, still no answer.

update 2005-07-06: photos work again, tho i still have no response from support.

Poor fuzzy kitten

This sad little kitten never had a chance. It was probably a little fluffy love toy for one of the neighbor kids, before it got out and went to investigate those loud noises on the road. Poor thing, I bet it was cute. I was told about this one from a land mate who had driven past it on his motorcycle earlier today, so when I was coming back from the store, I stopped and got some pictures. This was taken just down Tetherow, about 1/4 mile from our property.

Its interesting that the little kills, the kittens, possums, skunks, squirrels and frogs are left on the road to rot and merge with the asphalt. The big kills (deer, dogs, people) disappear quickly, snagged by passerby, no doubt, for burial, stew, or taxidermy.

Lucky I wasn't the tax collector.

It was a beautiful saturday today and I was driving down 238 between Applegate and Provolt and I saw a dead skunk on the side of the road. I saw it yesterday, but didn't have time to stop. I pulled over, got the tripod set up (borrowed from my ex-wife), got a few good shots, and headed back to the truck. I read somewhere that a good photographer takes care of their equiptment after every session, so instead of my first instinct (to lay the camera+tripod on the seat and drive on), I carefully began the process of disassembling the setup, resetting camera settings to my chosen defaults, and bagging everything up.

It was then that I noticed a pair of good ole boys crossing the road to come talk to me. The conversation went like this:
Guy 1: "Hey there, whatcha takin pictures of"
Me: "That dead skunk back there"
Guy 1: "Really?, What for?"
Me: "I have a website that I post pictures of road kill on."
Guy 1: "Thats wierd. So you're not takin pictures of the house? My wife sent me out here to see if you were the tax collector."
Me: "Nope, see..." I show him the photos.

At this point a big dirty guy in coveralls comes driving up the side of the road in a backhoe. He skids to a stop, with the front loader bucket up under the front of my truck, probably a half inch from touching the front tires. He hops down, says "hi" to the other guys, and comes and looks at the photos too. The same type of conversation happens, but this time, I tell them "Yea I live just up there in Williams" to which the reply is, "Heh, you can have the skunk if you want, I hear they barbeque them things up there."

After we chat for awhile, all laughing at this point, they all go off on their separate ways, and the big backhoe guy gets back up in the seat, starts up the monster, and yells down "Good thing you weren't the tax collector, I come prepared" as he waves a folding stock assault shot gun over his head.

So anyway, heres my choice from the shots I took:

road kill photography, an under appreciated sport

Road kill photography is a fun way to get some exercise (running down a road from the only possible place to park, a 1/2 mile from the kill), enjoy the morbidity of looking at dead animals in various states of decay, work on your dexterity (try dodging 55mph traffic trying to get a good shot of a gut-oozing possum, several days past its prime), and last but not least, improve your photography skills.

For months now, I've been commuting to work (an hour away) on Highway 238 between Williams, OR and Medford, OR and wishing I had a camera so I could photograph the many dead animals I see on the road every day. A wonderful bonus got me a nice camera (a Nikon Coolpix 5600) with not all the features I wanted (Macro mode would be awesome) but enough to make it a good first digital camera.

My first post is a very flat, very dead possum I saw today and just had to stop for. Bloody, flies everywhere, nasty in every respect.