If you can judge a person by the way they treat animals, then Ron Day gets a five star rating.
The Cowes resident was first motivated to count roadkill numbers after his two granddaughters were distressed at the death of two echidnas on the road. “If they’re upset then other people will be too,” Ron recalls. “The carnage is also off-putting for tourists. I come from a farming background and I’d never seen such animal road deaths until I came here.”
So in April 2019 Ron started the gruesome task of each day voluntarily tallying animal deaths on a 3.6km stretch of the Cowes-Rhyll Road. Over three years, Ron estimated he clocked up about 8000km, driving the same stretch of road about four times a week.
The outcomes even surprised him. After three years of daily counting, the citizen scientist project recorded about 1200 kills and more than 20 different species, including wallabies, geese, kookaburras, long neck turtles, falcons and echidnas. Such was the impact of Ron’s voluntary wildlife work that it spurred multiple other projects.
In the early stages of the roadkill count Ron partnered with Bass Coast Shire on the rollout of new technology: a virtual fence trial. Funded by the shire, the trial saw solar-powered devices mounted to roadside bollards at 25 metre intervals along the Cowes-Rhyll Road. The devices emit an alarm and flashing lights when activated by approaching vehicle headlights to alert and repel animals.
Two half kilometre sections of fencing were first installed in April 2020 and the following year the fencing was relocated to two other locations. After each installation, Ron carried out a further 12-month roadkill count for comparison. Ron also partnered with Victoria University academics and Phillip Island Nature Parks on the roadkill project, to analyse the success of the virtual fence trial.
“This road is recognised as the most prolific wildlife roadkill road on the island,” Ron said. “Results of the trial will determine if virtual fencing is installed and deployed permanently in other locations of roadkill concern.”
And if all that citizen science work wasn’t impressive enough, Ron’s data has been used – among other research – to support a reduction in speed limits across Phillip Island by Regional Roads Victoria. Stage one of the review was rolled out in 2021, which saw roads on Phillip Island have a maximum speed limit of 80km/hr, including Berrys Beach, Ventnor Beach and Back Beach roads.
The next stage of the review will focus on high-speed unsealed gravel roads, which currently have a default speed limit of 100km/hr, such as Harbison Road, McFees Road, Pyramid Rock Road, Watts Road and Veterans Drive.
While Ron’s work on the roadside wildlife tally has finished, he remains passionate about finding a solution to roadkill on the island. “It’s only a matter of time before someone is seriously injured, or even worse, killed, in an animal avoidance accident.”
