Saturday - November 29, 2014

But They’re So Cute!

2008 24 deer X 2 =

2009 48 deer X 2 =

2010 96 deer X 2 =

2011 192 deer X 2 =

2012 384 deer X 2 =

2013 768 deer

Buck’s Hollow, in Staten Island’s Greenbelt, might sound like a natural home to whitetail deer, but the New York City parks department is doing its best to keep them out. [ and failing, of course ]

The department, which is restoring the forest in the area, has surrounded six acres with eight-foot fencing intended to keep the deer away. In the past year, workers removed invasive species like Japanese honeysuckle and Chinese wisteria from the parcels. Next year, the department will enlist volunteers to plant 8,000 trees and shrubs — native species like red maple, beech, cherry, sweet gum and spicebush. The plan is to keep the fence around the four plots of land, called exclosures, until the saplings are 10 feet tall or big enough to survive the deer’s voracious appetites.

Deer are a relatively new presence in Buck’s Hollow, which is named after the Dutch word for goat, bok. While the city has a robust population of small mammals like raccoons, groundhogs and skunk, deer were scarcely seen in the five boroughs before 2000.

As recently as 2008, a state count of deer on Staten Island put their numbers at just 24; the animals were believed to have swum from New Jersey. But that number has exploded: An aerial count of the herd last winter, using infrared technology, put the number of deer in the borough at 763.

State Assemblyman Joe Borelli, a Republican whose district includes the Greenbelt, said the department should instead install permanent signs in those locations. And he believes that the city should move to thin the deer population.

“Every option should be looked out at, whether it is successful methods of birth control or lethal culls,” he said. “Something needs to be done, clearly.”

A new task force made up of representatives from several city agencies and the State Department of Environmental Conservation is studying how to control the deer population. At the very least, city officials want to alert the public not to feed them and to be careful on nearby roads, especially at dawn and dusk when deer are most active.

No, what they need is a crossbow hunt, special season. Issue 900 tags, one deer of any age or gender per tag. Wipe them all out, because the next crop is here in Carteret NJ, thinking “That river is only 200 yards wide. We could swim it easy, and get out before the pollution sets our fur on fire.”

Posted by Drew458     on 11/29/2014 at 11:53 PM   
Filed Under: • Animals •  
• Comments (4) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

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