Deer population explosion in Chatham County

Date: Wed, 25 Feb 2009 08:29:44 -0500
From: gardener
Subject: overpopulation of deer in Chatham county

In response to the well-intentioned posting below, I must respectfully disagree.

While it is absolutely true that habitat destruction is putting pressure on wildlife, that is not why deer have become such a problem. The population explosion among deer is well-documented, and it is largely a consequence of two factors: reduction in hunting, and availability of food in suburban (and urban) neighborhoods. It is a common myth that deer move around looking for food as they are displaced. Actually, deer are very territorial and will remain on their home ranges and starve to death rather than move elsewhere.

I agree with the poster who indicated that deer are significantly responsible for the increase in tick population near homes, because the deer constantly graze around our homes now. If the deer were not there, tick populations would decline, at least away from home sites. Having grown up in North Carolina, I played in the woods all the time. In the late 60s when I was a child, I NEVER saw deer tracks, much less deer. That was in Alamance County. And the only time I picked up ticks — the big dog ticks easy to spot — was when I waded through tall fields of grasses.

You are correct that other animals also pick up ticks. But their populations are not undergoing the explosive increases seen in the deer population. The other animals you mention (except for coyotes) still have natural predators in place in our woods. Their populations wax and wane, and they have no reason to feed in our yards with the frequency exhibited by desperate starving deer.

There is nothing cuter than a Bambi cavorting on the grass. But in my yard, I watched last year’s fawns thin and weaken, because after they were weaned, adult deer outcompeted them for food.

We have two choices: One is to watch the destruction of our homes and woodlands accompanied by watching the deer doing the damage suffer from malnutrition. The other is to manage deer populations through more significant hunting.
“Living in harmony,” is a wonderful ideal. But animals aren’t interested in harmony. Animals will exploit an environment until there is nothing left to exploit, and then they die. In this case, the more harmonious option is to manage the animal population to mitigate their suffering, preserve what’s left of our diminishing woodlands, and reduce tick populations around our homes.
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