With more vehicles on the road this long weekend, the Saskatchewan Wildlife Federation is reminding drivers to ‘give wildlife a brake’ and do everything they can to avoid collisions.

SWF Executive Director Darrell Crabbe says it is currently mating season for all large ungulates, including moose, deer and elk. This means they are more likely to be out and about looking for a partner.

To mitigate the risk of colliding with wildlife, Crabbe advises drivers to use their high beams at dawn, night, and dusk, slow down in highly treed areas, and pay attention to signage signifying high animal traffic.

“Those areas that are identified as’ high deer number’, usually around valleys or around tree lines, we should really take that message seriously. The signs are there for a reason.”

He says the signage in the province is great, however he thinks drivers get complacent with it, because they see it every day as they’re driving.

Last year, there were almost 9,000 collisions involving wildlife in the province, and each year, an average of 376 injuries and one fatality occurs. Crabbe says those numbers have been trending downward in recent years, however there are a lot of variables that play into recording those statistics.

“With the five-year average, we went through the Covid period during that stretch, as well, which reduced travel quite a bit.” In addition to that, “Wildlife numbers and populations in many of those species are low right now, so it’s hard. There are a lot of variables that have to be taken into consideration when putting out even the long-term averages.”

He says in the unfortunate event that you do hit an animal, let both the RCMP and SGI know about it.