Posted24 August 2022, 06:54
JuraThe rail, a deadly trap for deer
A doe and two fawns were hit by a train in a bottleneck. Report two days later, at the same time.
Here a doe and her fawn photographed three years ago, in the spring, near Rebeuvelier, on the other side of Mont Raimeux. The first evidence of deer reproduction in the wild in the canton of Jura since the 19th century was observed at Vellerat.
Jura office for the environment
Established at the station, Joseph saw nothing, noticed nothing on Saturday evening at 9:12 p.m.: “I sometimes see the deer under the rocks where there is a passage in the forest but never in front of the station”.
le matin.ch/Vincent Donzé
The death of a doe and two fawns hit by a train last Saturday in Choindez saddens the Jura wildlife inspector, Amaury Boillat, especially since this accident is the second to occur in two years: a male fawn has already been broke in early summer 2020.
It was 9:12 p.m. last Saturday when the IC51 Bienne – Bâle train passed Choindez, a largely disused industrial site from another time, between Moutier and Delémont. At dusk in the gorges where the railway line is interspersed with tunnels pierced in the anticlines of Mont Raimeux, the blue sign of the station is lit, but no train stops.
gray cliffs
In the Raimeux range, characterized by its gray cliffs and preserved forests, game has found a passage to come and go, at the cantonal border. Established in the disused station, Joseph sometimes sees deer passing under the rocks. Normal: this section is regularly crossed by wildlife, on both sides of the Birse, a fish-filled river.
What were a doe and two fawns doing on the tracks last Saturday? Grazing on herbicide-free ballast? Certainly not. Perhaps the trio simply got lost on the ballast. The problem is that on one side there are protective nets in the slope and on the other, a stack of pipes which form an obstacle likely to keep the animals on the rails.
The rails hissed
“There is a disposition to improve here,” comments Amaury Boillat. Why didn’t the doe and fawn jump to the side when approaching the ICN? “The train doesn’t make a sound and when the rails whistled it was too late,” the wildlife inspector surmises, hearing that a red deer doesn’t have the same dynamics as a roe deer.
By the way, were the two fawns those of the doe? Not sure, but not ruled out at all: “A doe gives birth to a fawn, but more rarely, she can have two,” says Amaury Boillat. A fawn takes two years to mature. Probably born in April or May of this year, those mowed down last Saturday were already robust. As for the doe, this was not her first birth.
bottleneck
The bottleneck formed by the industrial site of Choindez with Roche Saint-Jean is located on a wildlife movement corridor of national importance. A passage used by deer, roe deer, lynx and perhaps also by wolves, while chamois roam there, as evidenced by a postal bus driver who sees four of them almost every evening.
Last Saturday’s accident cut the wings of the Jura Office for the Environment. “While the species continues its discreet development in the Jura forests, this new accident has somewhat delayed the establishment of the first herd of deer since its disappearance in the 19th century, following the destruction of its forest habitat and of an uncontrolled hunt”, informed this office.
Importance nationale
The disappointment is all the greater since “the disturbances linked to the presence of several communication routes had benefited from improvements” in this sector listed in the inventory of natural sites and monuments of national importance.
On the Jura side, the A16 motorway blocks colonization from the east, but the merit of its development is to prevent collisions. How many deer are there in the township? Probably regarding twenty, a figure articulated following twenty years of observation.
To each his herd
The males on one side and the females on the other, each in his herd as long as it is constituted. “The groups are never mixed, except during the slab, when the males fight over the females”, explains Amaury Boillat.
A census is not easy: “The deer is an attentive and wary animal which colonizes the places less traveled by man”, indicates Amaury Boillat. The herds of females are made up of sisters and cousins, with their bichettes, while the daguets are asked to look elsewhere.
New assessment
With the Clos-du-Doubs, the Raimeux range constitutes a second nucleus of deer. In the Choindez lock, a new assessment of the situation will be made by the Office of the environment to allow possible additional measures at the level of the railway line.
Following the destruction of its forest habitat by massive cutting, as well as intense and uncontrolled hunting, the deer had almost disappeared from Switzerland in the 19th century. As early as 1870, the first stags returned to Graubünden from Austria, thanks to a federal law on hunting adopted in 1875 which limited hunting periods and protected females.
