Since 1994 we have been recording the Rye and New Castle, New Hampshire Road kill. This year I chose to figure out if rabies had an effect on road kill specifically on fox and raccoons To figure this out I had to make a graph on the data we have collected in the past 16 years on raccoons and fox. Then I had to look for significant drops in the amount of road kill. You would think you would look for significant high amounts of road kill in that species but if there infected with rabies they will more likely die in the woods.

 

The results I found where shocking. In 1994 until 1997 the fox and squirrel road kill amounts where 0 and that means that both of them had rabies until raccoon had a sudden boom in road kill in 1998 and fox went up one and then fell right bock down just as the raccoon did in 2000. Then in 2003 the raccoon went all the way back up and to fall again in 2005.

In this project I expected more fox to die then raccoons. There could have been some errors like the identification of the animal or why the animal crossed the street. Maybe we didn’t check every single street in Rye and New Castle.

Next year maybe we should assign streets to students to check every two days or shifts with other students every day to check for road kill and examine it. And they should be a little more specific on the location and the surroundings on the wear about of the remains of the road kill.