The Impact of roads and vehicular traffic on wildlife through vehicle collisions spans all taxonomic groups, although a few taxa overshadow the others in the roadkill scenario. The roadkill phenomena are underestimated in almost every Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), especially on small vertebrate animals (González-Gallina et al. 2013). Roads negatively affect a wide range of species via direct mortality, barriers to movement and behaviour alteration (Trombulak & Frissell 2000). Roads are the largest sources of anthropogenic mortality for many vertebrates (Hill et al. 2019). Ray et al. 2023, Sur et al. 2023, Sur et al. 2022, and Das et al. 2007 reported the mortality along the NH 37 passing by the Kaziranga National Park. Flying squirrels are one of the world's lesser-known mammals. Due to their crepuscular and cryptic habits, research on these species is limited and irregular. In India, there are a total of 13 species of flying squirrels (Mukherjee & Mhanagore 2022). Flying squirrels are an essential component of the ecological system, as they aid in seed dispersal (Nandani 2008). In India, particolored flying squirrel (Hylopetes alboniger) is distributed in Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya, Manipur, Nagaland, Sikkim, West Bengal and Assam (Talukdar et al. 2021).
On 23rd November 2022, a roadkill specimen of particolored flying squirrel (Fig. 1) was found at 06:32 h, at an altitude of 103 m als in Halowa NC village (26°35'26.83"N; 93°25'7.37"E) situated along NH 37 passing adjacent to Kaziranga National Park in the Golaghat district of Assam, India. This was an opportunistic observation made while travelling on the highway. The species was identified based on its morphological characteristics- dorsal brown hair confined to its back, while the rest of its upper body exhibits a grey hue, and its underside is white, excluding the tail. The tail, too, shares the grey color, with a darker shade along its underside (Thorington et al. 2012; Molur et al. 2005).
This is the first observation of a particolored flying squirrel reported as ‘roadkill’ from Assam and the third species of flying squirrel from India after the Hairy-footed flying squirrel (Belomys pearsonii) from Arunachal Pradesh (Mukherjee & Mhanagore 2022) and the Indian giant flying squirrel (Petaurista philippensis) from Tamil Nadu (Arockianathan 2014). The particolored flying squirrels are found in tropical forest to subtropical montane forest with elevations ranging from 100–4000 m asl. (Molur et al. 2005, Krishna et al. 2013). Roadkill surveys often yield ecological insights that may not be attainable through other means. Moreover, they offer valuable morphological data on nocturnal species, which are typically difficult to observe except for brief glimpses (Mukherjee & Mhanagore 2022).
The expansion of the human population has extended anthropogenic pressures into wildlife habitats, leading to wildlife-vehicle collisions becoming a significant cause of high mortality rates for many wildlife species (Schwartz et al. 2022). Concentrated investigation into wildlife and its interaction with roadway infrastructure in biodiverse regions can aid in developing efficient mitigation strategies for linear development activities like roads and railway