| About Us | | | Awards | | | Portfolio | | | News | | | Seasonal Tips | | | Speakers Bureau | | | Links | | | Contact Us |
|
Another View on Deer by Joanne Kostecky Morning Call, Monday November 3, 2003 On Wednesday nights over the last eight years, Marge and I would meet with the rest of our "Jazzercise" exercising group. Last week-randomly and senselessly-Marge was killed when a deer hit her car. She is the second person I've had in my close circle of acquaintance that has been killed by a deer. Neither passing resulted in great newspaper headlines of wrongful deaths. Why? As I write this letter, one of Garden Design's trucks is in for repairs because a deer hit it as our nursery manager was returning to our nursery in Center Valley. I have hit a deer with my car. And I would feel safe saying that we all know someone who has been in an accident with a deer here in the Lehigh Valley-many resulting in serious injury. In a study released by the Insurance Information Institute, "deer-automobile collisions occur at a rate of 500,000 per year, and result in over $1 billion worth of vehicular damages, 29,000 human injuries, and 200 human fatalities-every year!" Additionally, in the Lehigh Valley, there's the ever-increasing threat to the landscapes that we spend our hard-earned dollars to install and grow. Deer-related destruction of natural vegetation is a problem for cultivated landscapes as well as for natural habitats. With cultivated landscapes to protect, many homeowners are choosing to fight the battle. Time and money is spent on an increasing array of sprays, powders, packets and potions to break the deer feeding cycle. So far, they have met with mixed success. In other cases some people choose to plant only "deer-resistant" plants. Many lists are available that select from a very limited plant pallet. Just like most humans, deer don't all like or dislike the same type of food. And if they are really hungry (particularly in the late winter) they will eat most any plant. From an ecological standpoint, large deer populations are jeopardizing our children's future natural world. The deer are destroying small under-story plants by over-browsing. These are our future forests. When the trees that are currently providing the forest canopy die, there will be few sapling trees left to replace them. In an assessment on Urban Deer Damage completed by the extension service of West Virginia University, "deer-caused damage in urban areas…would amount to $61.95 per urban household if every household shared equally in the costs." With statistics like that it's hard for me to be neutral about white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus.) But deer-automobile related accidents and deer depredation of the urban landscape are not the only reasons for promoting a campaign to reduce human-deer conflicts and their resulting ecological impact. A major risk to everyone who opens his or her front door is the blacklegged tick (Ixodes scapularis.) We all recognize them as the deer ticks that carry the bacterium Borerelia burgdorferi that causes Lyme disease across mammalian species. White-tailed deer are the primary host for the adult stage of the deer tick. Each blood-fed, engorged female tick can lay 1,000 to 2,000 eggs. All of the next generation will be carriers of the bacteria for the disease. Lyme disease is the leading segmented-bodied, insect-associated disease in the US! Nearly 130,000 cases have been reported nationally for the eleven-year period from 1989 to 1999. Over 90% of these cases have been reported from the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, and upper Midwest. In Saucon Valley, I know parents that won't allow their children to play in some parts of their own property because of the fear of deer ticks. How many of us don't walk in the woods or do other outside activities as much as we used to because we're concerned about getting Lyme disease? So what shall we do about it? Animal rights groups are organized. All the people frustrated with expanding deer populations for various reasons are not. In my director's position on the board of the National Landscape Association I have access to information to what other communities in other states are doing about the problem. I do not hate deer. I think they are beautiful animals and they are a part of the food chain in nature. In the wild, both Coyotes and Wolves are natural predators and contribute to deer mortality, especially fawns. That's how Mother Nature set up our system. But Coyotes and Wolves don't coexist with urban human neighbors. The huge herds that race around our neighborhoods-sleeping and browsing in people's front and back yards like they are the pet dog-are not a balance of nature. Their population has exploded because they live in such a protected environment. Simply put: homeowners are not allowed to protect their own homes. In studies released by the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station in New Haven, a healthy doe in a suburbanized landscape can give birth to one or more fawns every year. Humans have disturbed nature by providing mixed green salads in suburban landscapes while at the same time reducing the number of natural deer predators. Taking lowered mortality into consideration, deer populations can increase by 50% or more each year. Deer will browse an average of 5 to 15 pounds of vegetation per day! Are there any viable solutions to the problem? Live capture and relocation is prohibitively expensive. Contraceptives require multiple treatments on the same female each year. The technology is in the trial stage and currently is neither practical nor affordable. Sterilizing large males and retaining them in the population might reduce the number of fawns born. This is feasible because white-tailed deer exhibit a distinct hierarchy in which dominant males monopolize most mating. It is an expensive proposal. Another answer is to have controlled deer kills in heavily deer-populated areas by trained sharp-shooters. They are hired to shoot bows and arrows or guns from above. They aim down into a heard in a safe area away from homes. Organize your Homeowner's Association, your residential neighborhood, or your community and let your municipal officials know how you feel. Deer belong in the woods, not roaming our neighborhoods. The only way there will ever be a solution to this problem is for concerned individuals to commit to action. Individuals banding together will create neighborhoods that require a response from their local municipal authorities. Don't let one more person be killed needlessly because you're too busy to get involved. |
