What question did this study set out to answer?

The research aims to understand how roadkill impacts various species in arid landscapes, focusing on the Karoo region.

April 25, 2026Cambridge Prisms Drylands0 citationsOpen Access

Roadkill in arid landscapes: winners and losers in the Karoo, South Africa

WDW Richard J Dean SMSuzanne Jane Milton

Key Points

The research aims to understand how roadkill impacts various species in arid landscapes, focusing on the Karoo region.
Counts of road use and roadkill were analyzed to assess species outcomes.
Comparative analysis was conducted between nocturnal and diurnal foragers.
Focus on specific species, such as herbivores, insectivores, and birds like owls.
Nocturnal mammals experienced more than five times the roadkill rates compared to diurnal foragers.
Herbivores and insectivores that tend to flee from predators were frequent roadkill victims.
The Pied Crow benefited significantly, likely increasing its distribution by scavenging roadkill during breeding season.

Abstract

Roads and roadsides are resource-rich patches in unproductive arid environments.The attractions roads and roadsides offer include greener or more productive vegetation on road verges, and spilt grain and the remains of animals killed by vehicles on the road surface.Here we use counts of road use and roadkill to show that the outcomes of attraction to roads vary greatly among species.Nocturnal mammals are killed more five times more frequently killed than diurnal foragers, and herbivores and insectivores that evolved to flee predators are commonly traffic victims.Among birds, owls were disproportionately common as roadkill.The species that appears to have gained most from roadkill in the Karoo is the Pied Crow whose extended distribution may partly be linked to its increased reliance of scavenged roadkill during the breeding season.

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