Which Minnesota County Has the Most Car-Deer Crashes?
It's unfortunately not all that uncommon to hit a deer with your car here in the Land of 10,000 Lakes, but do you know which Minnesota county has the most car-deer crashes?
A recent survey by Farmers Insurance lists Minnesota as one of the top states where car-deer crashes are the most common again this year. (You can see just where we placed HERE) But car-deer crashes don't appear to be evenly distributed here in Minnesota.
So just which county has the most? Well, according to MnDOT data from 2015 (the most recent available), it looks counties in the Twin Cities metro contain the most car-deer crashes.
Dakota County leads Minnesota, with 158 total car-deer crashes. Hennepin County was second with 146 car-deer crashes. Just northwest of the Metro, Stearns County (near St. Cloud) was third with 133, while Carver County was fourth with 126. Sherburne County was fifth with 111.
Meanwhile, in our area, Olmsted County 'only' had 27 car-deer crashes, while Goodhue County had 51. Dodge County had 19, with Wabasha County coming in with 16. Steele County had only 6, Fillmore County had 5, and Mower County had only 3 car-deer crashes.
And I'm no statistician, but I'm wondering, though, if those high totals for the metro are due to the fact that there are more PEOPLE and a higher concentration of drivers in those counties, not just that there are more deer?
And, of course, the further north in Minnesota you go, the higher your likelihood of hitting a deer with your vehicle. St. Louis County, along the North Shore, while less populated than any of the metro counties, still had 71 car-deer crashes.
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