Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law

by Mary Roach

Shweta points out that people’s ire is for the government as much as for the leopards. If there were school buses, children wouldn’t have to walk two miles at dusk, when the risk of a leopard attack is greatest. If there were hospitals and ambulances, an attack might not mean a life lost. But there are not. A leopard is an expedient outlet for their anger.

In 2012, a North Dakota woman named Donna called in to a morning talk-radio program hoping to draw attention to a situation that had been bothering her. She’d been in three car crashes involving deer, and each time, it had happened near a DEER XING sign on a busy road. “Why,” she lamented in a recorded encounter that would eventually top one million internet hits, “are we encouraging deer to cross the road in such high-traffic areas?” A short silence followed. “You seem to think,” one of the hosts began tentatively, “that deer-crossing signs are telling deer where to cross?” As nicely as possible, he explained that the signs are meant for us, the drivers, to tell us to slow down.