Dubbo WIRES volunteer urges public to report animals injured on roads

"We're not here to judge you for hitting an animal - it happens, it's life - but we do want you to call us as soon as possible though," Penny Cook, a volunteer with the Dubbo WIRES branch told the Daily Liberal.

"Usually the driver of the car isn't the one that calls us, they just keep driving and it will be someone that drives past later on that sees an animal still alive or a joey that's been thrown out of the pouch.

"It's pretty much never the person who hit the animal. If you hit an animal, even if it's just a glancing blow, please stop."

The call to action comes after the Dubbo region was again named the number one spot in NSW for animal collisions. According to data released by NRMA Insurance, Dubbo had the most animal-related car crashes of anywhere in NSW or the ACT with 689 claims made between 2015 and 2022.

But Ms Cook said the data - which tallies insurance claims made over damage from animal collisions - doesn't reflect the true number of native animals injured or killed on roads in the region.

"We get around three to four rescues a day in our branch and that includes not only large mammals like macropods but also birds, and the majority of them are motor vehicle related," she said.

"The birds don't do a lot of damage to the car - unless it's an eagle, and that does happen - but for the larger animals which do damage to cars, it's probably four or five times a week we get calls.

"But obviously it happens a lot more often than that because the animals are killed instantly on impact and so nobody actually makes a call for a rescue."

The NRMA research found dusk was the most dangerous time for wildlife-related road accidents, with 26 per cent of accidents occuring between 4:30pm and 8pm. And as winter approaches and it starts getting dark earlier the risk increases.

Ms Cook said even non-high speed collisions which do no damage to a car can lead to deadly injuries for adult kangaroos. And, sadly, not all injuries are able to be treated.

"You can seriously injure a kangaroo just by glancing it with your car. Because the way that they work is that their muscles are so tightly strung that a glancing blow can break their leg easily and it's always a compound fracture," she explained.

"So pretty much if they're still alive after being hit by a car they have to be euthanized. An adult animal often can't survive coming in to care to be treated because the stress levels are far too high and there's no guarantee that the bone can be mended strong enough for them to survive in the wild.

"But it should still be reported. My husband is licensed in firearms euthanasia [...] some of the rescues are quite horrendous, you can tell when an animal has been suffering and slowly dying for a week. We'd rather be called sooner."

On the other hand, Ms Cook said if joeys are not harmed in a collision which kills their mother, and are found and assisted by a trained carer in a timely manner, there is an "almost 99.9 per cent" chance that they will survive.

If an animal is killed due to road trauma WIRES recommends motorists check if it is a female and if there's a joey in her pouch or around her. Pouches and flaps of wombats and echidnas should also be checked as well as the surrounding area, as young echidnas are often dislodged during a vehicle collision.

If there is a joey, Ms Cook said it can be removed from the pouch and taken to the nearest vet or WIRES volunteer, however, should not be taken too far away from the area it was found.

"If you've picked up an animal and you have no phone service, drive until you've got service and then call, don't tack the animal all the way home with you. If you can't get a hold of WIRES or WIRES doesn't have a carer, call the local vet from the town you've just driven into," she said.

If you find injured wildlife or unaccompanied joeys on the roadside, or you hit a native animal, phone the NSW WIRES rescue line on 13 13 00 094 737.

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