![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1.-roadkill1-619x350.jpg\" "\\"The")
<\/p>\nConservation group\u2019s US 64 study finds \u2018remarkable carnage\u2019<\/p>\n
Published 10:11 am Saturday, September 13, 2025<\/p>\n
\n 1 of 2 <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The carcass of a bobcat killed on U.S. Highway 64 is shown in this photo courtesy of the Wildlands Network.<\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/2.-roadkill-619x350.jpg\" "\\"An")
<\/p>\n
An unidentified member of the Wildlands Network team collects a dead snake from the roadway. Photo courtesy Wildlands Network<\/p>\n
By Catherine Kozak, CoastalReview.org<\/a><\/p>\n EAST LAKE \u2014 In the sadder, more gruesome labor of wildlife conservation, a new count of dead wildlife on the asphalt of two strips of highway within Alligator River Wildlife Refuge continues to reflect the merciless decimation of living creatures by vehicular traffic.<\/p>\n A new report, \u201cUS 64 Roadkill Monitoring Survey Year One Interim Report,\u201d released Aug. 13 by the nonprofit Wildlands Network, counted more than 5,000 vertebrates representing 144 species, as well as 1,050 snakes, 1,186 turtles, and 1,529 frogs dead alongside the highway or flattened on the pavement. The first year of the two-year study covered Aug. 1, 2024, to July 31, 2025.<\/p>\n Get the latest headlines sent to you<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s pretty remarkable carnage, and we\u2019re sure that\u2019s an underestimate, because some things get removed by vultures,\u201d Ron Sutherland, the conservation group\u2019s chief scientist, told Coastal Review.<\/p>\n The updated information will be valuable to planning for proposed wildlife crossings under sections of U.S. Highway 64 and nearby U.S. 264, a need highlighted over the years by numerous vehicle strikes of critically endangered red wolves. Huge bear and deer that run into the road are also increasing hazards to human life, especially at night.<\/p>\n Although the red wolf had once roamed much of the Southeast, the only wild population of about 30 red wolves, including about a dozen pups, is currently managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service\u2019s Alligator River and Pocosin Lakes refuges within a five-county recovery area in northeastern North Carolina, a good portion of which is intersected by the two highways.<\/p>\n \u201cOne happy surprise is we didn\u2019t see any red wolves,\u201d Sutherland told Coastal Review. \u201cOne of the reasons we set out to do the project, one of our goals, was to keep the road clean of roadkill.\u201d<\/p>\n Vehicle strikes, in addition to gunshots, have threatened recovery of the species.\u00a0 Wolves have been known to be drawn to the highway to eat the dead animals, and tragically suffer the same fate as their would-be meal.<\/p>\n \u201cResearch is an important step in the construction of wildlife crossing structures,\u201d the report states. \u201cIn order to be cost effective, it is imperative to know where hotspots of wildlife road-crossing activity occur so the sites can be chosen that are most effective both in mitigating wildlife road collisions and maintaining habitat connectivity.\u201d<\/p>\n The study route was chosen to inform planning efforts by North Carolina Department of Transportation, Fish and Wildlife, and the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission to develop proposals for wildlife crossings and fencing installations on U.S. 64, the report stated, \u201cwith the immediate goal\u201d of reducing wolf strikes.<\/p>\n \u201cWe also realized that providing more recent roadkill data would be essential as a fresh baseline for evaluating any future wildlife crossings that were installed on the highway,\u201d according to the report.<\/p>\n Earlier roadkill surveys along U.S. 64 were completed between 2008 and 2011 as part of the North Carolina Department of Transportation planning for a proposed 27.3-mile-long widening and bridge replacement project. The road-widening plans, which had included numerous wildlife crossings, have since been dropped, but construction of a replacement bridge connecting Dare and Tyrrell counties over Alligator River is underway. Construction plans include wildlife crossings and under-road tie-ins at both ends of the bridge.<\/p>\n Sutherland said that the survey team chose to drive at a less pokey pace, about 35 mph or so, and skipped weekend surveying, due to the increased amount of traffic now on the highway.\u00a0Wildlife officers were informed about large carcasses such as bear so they could be promptly removed, and smaller creatures were scooped up and tossed into the woods. Not pleasant, but unfortunately dead animals along the road are not unusual.<\/p>\n \u201cOverall, you know, I\u2019ve had a lot of years of experience working down there and seeing the wildlife before we started the survey,\u201d Sutherland said.<\/p>\n While he wasn\u2019t shocked by the continued high numbers of roadkill, he said he didn\u2019t expect to see so many birds. In one period of time, after a rare snowstorm, the technicians found hundreds of deceased yellow-rumped warblers alongside the road, many of which were apparently struck while seeking patches of grass without snow cover. It may not prove Darwin\u2019s theory of natural selection, but intelligence matters even for birdbrains.\u00a0 As Sutherland noted, of the 68 different types of dead birds \u2014 totaling about 800 \u2014 there were only three crows, the geniuses of the bird world.<\/p>\n \u201cWe know how to keep all these other wildlife species from getting hit on the road, because you can build crossings under or over the road, with fencing to steer them to the right places,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd it works for basically everything, but the birds. That\u2019s going to take some work to figure out.\u201d<\/p>\n Last December, U.S. Federal Highways\u2019 Wildlife Crossing Pilot Program awarded a $25 million grant to build crossings on U.S. 64 by Buffalo City Road, a red wolf \u201chot spot\u201d in East Lake on the Dare County mainland where the animals often cross into the refuge. Wildlands Network teamed up with the Center for Biological Diversity, another conservation nonprofit, to raise an additional $4 million in private donations for matching funds, Sutherland said.<\/p>\n If all goes as hoped, Sutherland expects that construction of the crossings could start in late 2026.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s expensive because they\u2019re having to raise the road up to be able to put underpasses underneath,\u201d he said, adding that design details are still being worked out.<\/p>\n With the project construction including what he described as a kind of \u201cbig ramp,\u201d there will be opportunities to also put small crossings and tunnels on each side for the little crawling, slithering and hopping species, hopefully allowing a total of six to 10 crossings.<\/p>\n \u201cBut that\u2019s going to be kind of a win-win situation, because that way that at least part of Highway 64 is going to be elevated,\u201d Sutherland said. \u201cAnd with sea level rise and storms and hurricanes and so forth, it\u2019s going to be a good for climate resiliency, too, to have the road elevated.\u201d<\/p>\n Reprinted from CoastalReview.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n READ ABOUT MORE NEWS HERE.<\/a><\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/your-news-delivered-sub-600x100-1.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Conservation group\u2019s US 64 study finds \u2018remarkable carnage\u2019 Published 10:11 am Saturday, September 13, 2025 1 of 2…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":154599,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[79,201],"class_list":{"0":"post-154598","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-science","9":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=154598"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154598\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/154599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=154598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=154598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=154598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}