Life is not a highway for bears. It's not that for turtles, snakes, or armadillos for that matter. Our highways for human life, i.e., convenience, are empirically death sentences for wildlife. Recent federal regulation to hasten wildlife friendly crossing is almost too little and almost too late.
In California, the first black bear, "BB-12" in generations to live in the Santa Monica Mountains was struck and killed on the 101. The male wore a tracking collar, proving he liked to visit the beaches of Malibu too.
A bear crossed I-94 in broad daylight west of Milwaukee on July 21. Southeast Wisconsin rarely documents bears. The Santa Monica bruin crossed busy roads and highways many times until the one time he was unsuccessful, permanently. The Waukesha county bear showed a fitness for transecting a major barrier, this time.
But as the BB-12 case, road crossings are a loser's game. Do you recall playing the video game "Frogger"? I do, and I never, ever won the whole game. Wildlife can't either.
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