Who deals with animals that meet their untimely demise on the road in Minnesota?

Roadkill in Minnesota is unfortunately a common sight. Deer, coyotes and skunks often meet a sad (and in the case of the latter, odorific) fate on the state’s roadways.

But what happens to the animals after they meet their untimely demise? That’s what reader Bob Abbott has been wondering. He contacted the Strib’s community reporting project, Curious Minnesota, to find out.

“I live in Alexandria at a lake in the summer. And as we head to our winter home in Florida, we see so many dead deer, raccoons, et cetera, alongside the highways,” Abbott said. “I’ve always wondered, who risks their lives to retrieve the dead bodies?”

It depends. Workers with the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) and other local road authorities are on the roadkill retrieval front lines. But agencies like the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) also issue permits to regular folks wanting to pick up a carcass.

This means that roadkill in Minnesota typically ends up in one of three places — it could land in a shallow roadside grave, in a special compost heap or on someone’s dinner table.

Roadkill incidents occur all year long. But as the Curious Minnesota questioner Abbott observed, they tend to increase during the fall, said Anne Meyer, a MnDOT spokesperson.

This is because the deer rut during fall. Their behavior changes as they seek out mates, causing them to become more active near roadways.