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A hiker was left in tears after finding four dead animals near each other while out hiking a trail in Central Oregon.
Oregon couple Sampson Sansgaard and Tonya Ross from Bend told KTVZ news Channel 21 they were left upset after finding the bodies of four animals including what they said was a pregnant deer on Monday.
The pair were out hiking in the Badlands Wilderness Area, Oregon, when they encountered the bodies of a cat, a pitbull dog, a fox and a doe all close to the trail and the nearby Highway 20.
"I did not respond well to the sight of it," Sansgaard told Channel 21 news on Tuesday, who interviewed the pair standing near the spot where the encounter happened. "It's not a normal thing out here at all. I was sobbing. That didn't need to happen to them," he said.
The pair said they go hiking in the Badlands Wilderness area east of Bend regularly and said that the doe found among the dead animals was pregnant.
"Very upsetting," Ross said. "It's very sad, and it's disturbing."
The pair reported the matter to Oregon Fish and Wildlife Department (OFWD), who in turn informed Oregon State Police (OSP) about the dead animals.
The Badlands encounter is the latest in a series of incidents where dead animals have been found in the state.
Newsweek reported on a 2-year-old wolf that was found shot and killed in Wallowa County on January 8. Several days later, on January 17, an Oregon state trooper responded to a report of two dead and two injured pronghorn antelope on private property four miles south of Crane.
That incident was described as a "thrill kill" by Oregon Fish and Wildlife Department who said there was a reward out for information that lead to an arrest in the case. An Oregon state trooper sent to inspect the animals said they had been harmed by intentional criminal activity.
There were several instances of animal poisonings in the state last year, including one in February 2021 where eight wolves from the same pack died after being poisoned.
Oregon State Police told Newsweek that they had been made aware of the dead animals in the Badlands Wilderness Area, which they said were all road kill.
"This is Oregon Department of Transportation property and all of these animals were road struck animals. ODOT picked them up off of the highway and placed them on their property," an OSP spokesperson said.
"There is no crime... ODOT commonly picks up dead animals and puts them in their gravel pit areas."
