Road agencies and animal welfare groups launched the DeerAware campaign this autumn to draw attention to the 74,000 deer-vehicle collisions in the UK each year.

In most cases the deer are killed or fatally injured, but between 2000 and 2005 deer-vehicle collisions cost 20 drivers' lives as well and left 134 people with serious injured.

In Mid Sussex the problem was highlighted by the accident last month that killed 51-year-old Plumpton College department head Simon Bishop when he and another driver were involved in an accident with a deer on the B2191 near Uckfield.

With Mid Sussex rich with wooded areas, common and forestry land Middy reader Harriet Clark from Handcross wrote in to highlight Balcombe, Handcross and Staplefield as among the black spots.

She said: "In 12 years of living in Handcross I have never seen as many deer as this year.

"It is not only at night, as I know only too well, having had an accident in the summer when one ran straight through the hedge into the side of the car."

She said the B2110 High Beeches Lane was rife with deer.

"People already speed on this road and there will be a fatality eventually.

"No one is responsible for wild deer, there is no culling carried out, therefore the population is ever growing."

Motorcyclist Tim Ensing, from Balcombe, said he was considering getting a bike alarm to protect himself.

He said: "Driving through Balcombe forest you see deer all the time, and there's usually several.

"Hit one at speed and you'd be finished."

Farmer John Howe was called out by police after a deer was hit by a car on the B2036 in Balcombe Forest only last week.

He said accidents usually involved fallow deer that were herd animals.
He said: "Fallow deer are large animals and if people see one they need to slow down because there could be four or five or six or seven coming after it."

He said deer suffered horrendous injuries to their limbs and internally, and he repeated official DeerAware warnings not to touch them as they could lash out.

He said: "I went to one where a woman had stopped and put a blanket over the animal and was stroking its head.

"She may have thought she was being kind but people need to remember that deer are wild animals and touching them is enough to cause an adrenalin rush and one kick could wipe you out."

The Deer Awareness Initiative's DeerAware campaign says drivers need to be most alert and slow down when deer are particularly active - in autumn and spring, and at dawn and dusk.

If a deer-vehicle collision occurs drivers should call 999.