Identifying the hotspots of wildlife–vehicle collision on the Çankırı–kırıkkale highway during summer

Abstract

In this study, we identified hotspots of mammal–vehicle collisions that occurred on the Çankırı–Kırıkkale highway between May and October 2014. We collected 58 records from 6 species. Sixteen casualties occurred on the part of the road with low traffic volume (1818 vehicles/day) and 42 casualties occurred on the part with moderate traffic volume (4680 vehicles/day). The two species with the highest number of records were hedgehog Erinaceus concolor (n = 27) and red fox Vulpes vulpes (n = 21). Hotspots of mammal– vehicle collisions were detected with the CrimeStat3 program using 750-m bandwidth. We identified two spots of high incidence of roadkill and 3 spots of moderate incidence of roadkill on the highway. Strategies to reduce the incidence of roadkill should be considered for these hotspots.