Pronghorns are North America's fastest land animal, conducting ancient migrations that modern fences and roads now threaten. Protecting migration corridors is essential for their welfare.
Pronghorn welfare depends on the integrity of ancient migration routes connecting summer and winter range. When fences block these routes, pronghorn congregate at fence lines and may starve waiting for passage. Road networks fragment habitat and cause vehicle collision mortality. Pronghorn that cannot reach adequate winter range arrive nutritionally depleted, and pregnant females may lose their young from poor condition. The good news is that solutions are straightforward: fence modifications allowing crawl-through and wildlife underpasses on roads restore connectivity at modest cost. Community partnerships between ranchers, conservationists, and agencies have successfully modified hundreds of miles of fencing in key pronghorn corridors.