OT: Rabbit story

I had this discussion with my mom just the other night. She's just moved into a retirement home that's adjacent to a college campus, and deliberately chose the campus side so she can enjoy the natural woods that the college deliberately doesn't "maintain" in order to keep the area more natural. (i.e., when trees fall, they're left in situ to rot, just as they would in a natural wood.)

Two years ago the college was going to have a controlled deer hunt (with bows and arrows, I think) in the winter while students were gone in order to limit the deer herd, which had grown to unsustainable levels. Students (and others, of course) got wind of it and protested and they called off the hunt.

So the other night Mom said, "It's terrible that they don't feed the deer in the winter." (Parroting an opinion of someone else in the building, I imagine, since she's only lived there two weeks.) And I said, "But that will only maintain the already overburdening status quo and encourage more deer. And undermine the intention to keep the area in its natural state." This campus is "inside the beltway" in an urban area, and if they don't control numbers, we'll see the deer running across highways, out into major boulevards, and *that* will wreak havoc as well.

There's no easy answer. Either they allow a hunt, or let them starve. Either way, it's painful to watch, but necessary, IMHO.

Sue

Is that Towson, Sue?? DD went there eons ago.

Gill

We`re overrun with deer almost as badly as with rabbits - and they have to cull them quite often. There are always deer causing road accidents, or just getting hit by cars. Jane and Peter are listed by the police as deer stalkers, and are frequently called out to put a deer out of it`s misery. People think they do well for venison, but a traumatised deer is no good for eating (makes `em tough).

Pat

If they allow them to starve, they will naturally only have a herd that can sustain itself. WE think it is terrible but that was the way it always was. This past year in our woods it was very bad for deer but by the same token, the black bear population thrived. The thing is for humans to stay out of it.