Red deer at three roadside viewpoints are arriving at consistent times that correspond to the daily pattern of vehicle stops, according to observations collected over two seasons.
At the most studied site the animals appear between 17:30 and 17:50 on six days of the week. Attendance on Sundays is markedly lower, which corresponds to a reduced coach schedule.
The researchers are careful about the wording. The deer have not learned a timetable. They have learned that a particular period reliably produces food, in the way that any animal learns anything, which is by it happening over and over.
Why this is bad
It is easy to find charming and it is a serious welfare and safety problem.
Deer fed bread, crisps and sandwiches suffer digestive damage; ruminants are not built for it and the effects range from acidosis to death. Animals that associate vehicles with food approach vehicles, including moving ones, on a trunk road where the average speed is 55mph.
Collisions involving deer at the three sites have risen by a factor of four since 2022.
“Every person feeding them thinks they are the only one and that one sandwich cannot matter. Two hundred people a day think that. The stag is on his fourth loaf by teatime.”
A deer management officer
The stag
One animal, a mature stag known to the monitoring team and to a considerable number of social media accounts, now positions himself at a specific point of the layby from which he is visible from the road in both directions.
He does not approach vehicles. He waits, in profile, at the point offering the best view of him.
At the three sites
- Consistent arrival window: 17:30–17:50, six days a week
- Sunday attendance: substantially lower
- Vehicle collisions involving deer: up fourfold since 2022
- Animals showing dental or digestive damage: 9 of 14 examined
- Signs asking people not to feed them: 4
The signs, the officer notes, are well made and correctly positioned, and are read by people who are already holding a sandwich.
