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Posted on Wed, Nov. 19, 2003 | |
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Roadkill deer could be used for roadside compost Associated Press ALLENTOWN, Pa. - The hundreds of deer killed by cars and trucks as they wander onto roads could be returned to spur new life along the roadside. Under a new program in Lehigh County, deer carcasses would be taken to a compost facility and turned into raw material for fertilizer to grow plants along the roads. The carcasses are now hauled to private landfills or pits on state game lands, and the roadkill recycling plan could save the state money as well as providing fertilizer. "It's a win-win situation," said Douglas Killough, regional director of the state Game Commission. "The carcasses could be utilized in a more ecological way than by wasting them." Workers would haul dead deer to the North Whitehall Township facility, and they would be placed in long piles resembling burial mounds over two to three acres. The mounds would be up to five feet high, 200 feet long and 15 feet wide. The deer would decompose in three to nine months, creating compost that would be tested for safety before being used, county compost specialist Cary Oshins said. The state Department of Transportation now hires a contractor for $26,000 a year to haul away 600 to 650 dead deer from state roads in the county. PennDOT services manager Bill Bellas said the disposal price per deer has jumped a third over the years because landfills are requiring more permits from contractors. Game Commission employees pick up another 200 to 300 dead deer a year on local roads and dispose of them in pits on state game lands - a method "increasingly suspect" due to concerns about odor and groundwater pollution, Oshins said. The county is checking on zoning or other legal issues, Oshins said, and a PennDOT spokesman said the agency is reviewing whether it would agree to have its contractors dispose of the deer at the county facility. Oshins said it may take six months to a year to develop the program. Alabama chicken farmers started composting dead animals at least 10 years ago after realizing that there had to be a better way to dispose of large numbers of dead birds than burying them. Other farmers turned to composting in the late 1990s after renderers started charging fees for picking up dead animals, said J. Craig Williams, a Penn State cooperative extension agent in Tioga County. Ginny Black, a spokeswoman for the industry group U.S. Composting Council, said roadkill compost programs have become a more accepted means of dealing with roadkill. Such programs have been adopted in Ohio, Indiana, West Virginia and Texas. Williams said a survey this year indicated that 30 percent of Pennsylvania dairy farmers got rid of their dead cattle that way. "You can compost anything," said environmental engineer Bill Prince of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. "You can compost me and you." |
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