Gun season for deer hunting in Connecticut begins Wednesday.
Over the past few years, the state has expanded its hunting seasons and relaxed deer hunting restrictions.
Part of the reason for that was to reduce collisions between deer and cars in the state’s two most troublesome deer zones, Fairfield County and along Connecticut’s coast, said Howard Kilpatrick, a wildlife biologist with the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection.
“There’s been quite a few liberalizations,” Kilpatrick said. “We’ve allowed hunters to harvest more deer, so we give them a bigger bag limit. In some places, like Fairfield County, there’s actually no limit on how many deer a hunter can take.”
The state says nearly two deer a day were reported killed on Connecticut roads and highways in 2018.
Officials estimate that for each reported deer roadkill five more go unreported.
Still, state numbers indicate Fairfield County’s deer collision numbers have been trending downward, from highs of around 600 per year in the early 2000s to around 100 annually since 2014.
