Damn Deer

The deer are back. They were snacking on my newly sprouted tulips. *sigh*

I love the way deer look, but I really wish that they would stay in the woods, instead of wandering through the middle of my suburban neighborhood. The MetroParks are a few miles away and apparently this is close enough for them to invade my yard.

I really support the culling of the herd they do each year, though many people are opposed to it. (Some protester can get a little scary.) The poor dears/deers starve in the winter due to overpopulation and are forced into the ‘burbs to find food. That may seem like a minor inconvenience for a gardening type, but actually it causes them to be hit by cars and do some really serious property damage. My nibbled tulips are minor, but a totaled car or a mangled tree (they strip the bark) is a bit more extreme. Not to mention that the deer still end up dead from injuries or starvation and their death is significantly more painful than the swift bullet to the head.

What many of the anti-deer culling people don’t realize is that we have killed off the natural predators of the deer. Coyotes, wolves and bobcats have been killed off or chased out. We are all that’s left and since hunting is prohibited in the MetroParks, the deer population is out of control. Nature made a plan and we disrupted it, so we have to take steps to correct it.

The MetroParks use sharpshooters to ensure the kills are as quick and painless as possible. The meat goes to homeless shelters. It is really no different than raising cows for food, except perhaps that the deer are treated better and are killed quicker.