Communities find hunters willing partners in deer population control

City officials and homeowners are establishing mutually beneficial relationships with deer hunters.

CLARKSON VALLEY, Mo.-Connie Stoecker has given up planting day lilies around her home in this St. Louis suburb. She says her plants are "just salad for the deer," which nip off lily buds before they can open.

Stoecker's husband, Norm, has thrown up his hands in frustration, too.

"I have given up on euonymus. The spreading yews I put in looked awful all year. I finally gave up and tore the roots out of the ground. You know, that's an expensive plant."

In another St. Louis County community, Chesterfield, some residents now can wave hello to neighbors whose homes used to be hidden by strips of wooded land. Deer have browsed out low vegetation and denuded tree branches as high as they can reach by standing on their hind legs. Spring walks in the woods no longer feature wildflowers.

These aesthetic sacrifices are not suburban Missourians' biggest worry, however. Commuters play a dangerous game of dodge-the-deer on their ways to and from work. One unlucky Columbia resident has hit five. Areas of high deer population density in Kansas City, Blue Springs, Independence and Lee's Summit are marked by the mangled carcasses of deer on highway shoulders.

Deer-car accidents kill more than 150 people nationwide each year. In Missouri, the average deer collision causes more than $2,000 in vehicle damage. With more than 8,000 such accidents reported in Missouri each year, the bill tops $16 million.

There are other dangers to consider, too. Residents of neighborhoods with large numbers of deer report increases in fleas. Ticks, which transmit diseases including Rocky Mountain spotted fever, tularemia and Lyme disease, also multiply along with deer numbers.

As city dwellers come to grips with the practical facts of living with Bambi, they are increasingly turning for help to a group that would have been unthinkable a few years ago-hunters.

Last year, Clarkson Valley joined a group of municipalities in an urban deer task force organized by the Missouri Department of Conservation. The goal was to discover the causes of deer proliferation and find solutions. The causes were easy to identify.

Wendy Geckeler, who represents the city of Chesterfield on the task force, said one major contributor is the trend toward greener neighborhoods. People are building homes on larger lots, leaving undeveloped space and placing subdivisions near parks, conservation areas and other wildlife habitat.

Options for deer control are a harder nut to crack. Geckeler called nearby Town and Country's three-year experiment with trapping deer and moving them to new, rural homes, "a disaster." Besides being enormously expensive, the strategy turned out to be fatal to many deer.

Contraception for free-ranging deer remains appealing but prohibitively expensive and ineffective. That leaves only two options, living with deer problems or lethal controls.

Clarkson Valley Alderperson Susan Shea represents her town on the urban deer task force. She said city officials believe it is their job to protect both citizens and the environment from deer overpopulation. "We can't coexist with deer at this level," she said, voicing the opinion of most Clarkson Valley residents.

"Many people who fed deer when they were rare now are among the strongest advocates of hunting," said Clarkson Valley Mayor Scott Douglass. He noted that his town legalized bowhunting in the city limits last year, and Chesterfield is considering doing so.

Hunters shot 81 deer in Clarkson Valley last year. Although the city has removed legal barriers to hunting, it doesn't sanction hunts. That, said Douglass, is up to individual landowners and community associations.

Douglass said some citizens expressed concerns about safety when his town began discussing bowhunting as a remedy for deer problems.

"They couldn't believe we were going to expose them, their children and their pets to danger," said Douglass. "We were very concerned about that, too, so we took measures to ensure that hunting would be done safely."

Those measures included requiring hunters to complete a Conservation Department-approved bowhunting safety course. The agency set up a special class so archers who wanted to hunt in Clarkson Valley could qualify.

The city also set ground rules for hunting in the city. Hunting can only be done with bows and arrows. These have a short range, and because even a small twig can deflect an arrow, archers must have unobstructed shots. This helps ensure positive target identification.

Archers are allowed to hunt only from elevated stands, so arrows that miss their targets will not travel far. They can't hunt on less than 1 acre, and they must observe a minimum distance from the nearest home.

"We took people's safety concerns very seriously," said Douglass. "I think those concerns have pretty much been put to rest."

Kansas City's experience has been similar. Deer-vehicle collisions are the No. 1 concern there, too. In 2002 alone, state and local government agencies removed 1,267 deer carcasses from streets and highways in Jackson, Clay, Platte and Cass counties.

Kansas City is different from St. Louis in one respect. The area has more rural and agricultural land. Consequently, the second-biggest deer-related problem there is property damage.

"Agricultural crop damage is a big concern in this area," said Urban Wildlife Biologist Debra Burns, with the Missouri Department of Conservation. Deer also can be very destructive to trees and shrubs in nurseries. Home landscape plantings are at risk, too."

Burns said neighborhoods that border agricultural land or urban green space are most likely to experience deer problems. As in the St. Louis area, Kansas City and surrounding communities are becoming more receptive to the idea of hunting as deer problems grow more common. Kansas City, Liberty, Raymore, Belton, Lee's Summit, Grandview and Smithville all allow archery deer hunting under some circumstances. Hunting with modern firearms has always been legal in unincorporated portions of Jackson, Cass, Clay and Platte counties.

According to Burns, the Conservation Department will conduct 18 managed deer hunts in the Kansas City metro area this year. Seventeen private landowners in Kansas City proper now allow archery deer hunting on their property. Sharpshooters control deer numbers at Kansas City International Airport.

Burns said firearms deer hunting is the most effective, affordable way to control deer populations, but not every community is ready for that yet.

"Most cities want to use archery because they feel it is safer, but it isn't as efficient as firearms hunting," said Burns, "so it takes longer to bring the population down."

Deer numbers and annual harvest levels are stable in some areas where hunting has been going on for years. She cited Fleming Park as an example. The 7,800-acres oasis of urban green space is Jackson County's largest park. To prevent the deer herd there from becoming overpopulated, damaging the area's ecology and causing problems in surrounding neighborhoods, the county conducts managed hunts. Participants use black-powder rifles, whose shorter range makes them more suitable than modern firearms for suburban settings.

Towns taking an active interest in deer management are not all in metropolitan areas. Boonville, population 8,200, is the biggest town in Cooper County. Citizens of this Missouri River community began reporting the usual deer-related problems about five years ago. Elected officials responded by instructing their staff to work with the Conservation Department to find solutions.

Gary Nauman, director of the Boonville Parks and Recreation Department, said the Boonville Police Department and Conservation Agent Paul Wunderlich arranged to have sharpshooters remove deer from city property. Deer taken this way were given to local charities or to citizens who put their names on a waiting list.

More recently, Boonville changed its ordinances to allow archers to thin the local deer herd. Hunters must get landowners' permission, and follow state deer hunting regulations.

Last year, sharpshooters removed 89 deer from Boonville's city limits. The city doesn't keep records of bow kills.

Lonnie Hansen, the Conservation Department's deer management specialist, said urban and suburban deer control efforts have best success when local officials tackle the problem before it gets out of hand. He said it also is important to recognize that one community cannot solve deer problems alone.

"It takes a coordinated effort of all the communities in an area," said Hansen. "Otherwise, deer from areas of abundance continue moving into neighboring communities."

For information about managing urban deer populations, call the nearest Conservation Department office.

-Jim Low-

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