NEW BRUNSWICK NEWS: Significant Winter Deer Mortality in 2008

Fewer deer hunting licences will be available this year because of the high mortality rate for deer over the winter, says the New Brunswick Department of Natural Resources.

About 25,000 deer died over the winter months in New Brunswick, because of starvation, predation and collisions with cars, said Rod Cumberland, a biologist with the department.

About a quarter of the province's deer population died during the winter, Cumberland said.

In the north, where the most snow fell, the mortality rate reached about 34 per cent, he said.

The heavy snow cover in the province made it difficult for deer to find food, and the crusty snow conditions made them easy prey for predators, Cumberland said.

The mortality rate is about double the usual figure for a winter in the province, he said, which means the province will offer fewer hunting licences for deer.

"Two-thirds of the province will see a decline in their licences," he said. "They might even be as scarce as hen's teeth in some places."

Regulating the number of licences, especially for does, will give the herd time to recuperate from the winter's losses, he said.

"It minimizes what we take as hunters, so the herd can get a jump start and start growing again in some of these areas where we'd like to see more deer."

It will take about two years for the province's deer herd to recover from the winter, Cumberland said.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/6axf9g

UK NEWS: Muntjac Cull at Bardney's Limewoods

A TWO-DAY deer cull took place in Bardney's Limewoods, including Chambers Farm Wood in early April, the Forestry Commission revealed. It was part of a county wide ongoing operation.

A spokesperson for the Forestry Commission said: “The aim for this species is to create a sustainable and healthy deer population.“

“If left unchecked, increasing deer numbers would cause significant damage to the biodiversity of our woodlands Muntjac deer in particular uproot wildflowers, like bluebells, and over time destroy the flora of ancient woodlands like Chambers.”

Wildlife ranger Malcolm Armstrong said the growing population of deer was endangering certain species of plant in woodland across the county.

He said reports of road accidents involving deer were also increasing.

"There's certain plants that grow in here that deer favour, so when the deer population expands they are going to eat those plants out of existence.”

Mr Armstrong, who is also head of field operations for the Lincolnshire Deer Group, said the cull would be ongoing and carried out by qualified marksmen.

"Shooting is by far the most humane method," he said.

Mr Armstrong said an ongoing cull was also expected to take place next year.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/4n2uq3

NEW JERSEY NEWS: Arboretum Considers $142000 Deer Fence

Erecting a deer fence completely around the 22-acre Shaw Arboretum at Holmdel Park may not be neighbor-friendly or cost-efficient, members of the Monmouth County Board of Recreation Commissioners said at their meeting at Tatum Park on Monday night.

The project will cost at least $142,000 based on bids that have been received, but the board is not expected to take action until its June 9 meeting.

The proposal was spurred by increasing amounts of damage caused by deer to expensive specimen trees donated to the arboretum local arborists, said Bruce A. Gollnick, assistant director of the parks.

"We're not interested in putting up fences. We don't like it," Gollnick said. "Fences cost money, they cause problems, they need repairs."

A handful of residents have communicated concerns about the placement of a 10-foot-high fence near their properties, though board Chairman Edward Loud said he believes that issue has been exaggerated.

"If I wasn't looking for it, I wouldn't see it," Loud said of the proposed fence.

But other commissioners pushed for more study of the matter.

"Is it necessary to encapsulate the entire area and spend that kind of money?" Commissioner N. Britt Raynor asked, while fellow board member Michael G. Harmon said such fences tend to corral creatures — not only deer — that enter the fenced property at gate openings but can't escape.

"I'm not sure that fencing in 22 acres is not overreaching," Harmon said. "I also think we do what we can to be good neighbors. I don't think somebody who lives right next to the property should need to get in their car and drive all the way around to an entry point. We also push the deer onto nearby properties if we use the fence."

The $142,000 price was the lower of two bids opened last Friday. It was submitted by Accent Fence Inc. of Egg Harbor City; the other bid was a $202,000 offer from National Fence Systems Inc. of Woodbridge.

The fence would stretch about 1,650 feet. The park system in 2003 spent more than $180,000 to fence the 52-acre Deep Cut Gardens in Middletown.

The arboretum is named for David C. Shaw, former superintendent of the Shade Tree Commission. According to the Monmouth County government Web site, the arboretum was started in 1963 with plantings of crab apples, cherries and hollies, and the area now contains nearly 3,000 trees and shrubs.

Park system officials said future donations of materials could be withheld if steps aren't taken to protect the existing stock.

Source: http://www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080521/NEWS01/805210427

UK NEWS: Muntjac Deer Cull Underway in Lincolnshire

Hundreds of deer will be killed across Lincolnshire in a bid to control the population.

Malcolm Armstrong, a wildlife ranger for the Forestry Commission and head of field operations for the Lincolnshire Deer Group, said the cull would be ongoing and be carried out by qualified marksmen.

He said: "Culls have always happened in the area but deer are becoming more and more prevalent in Lincolnshire."

Around 200 deer are usually killed in Lincolnshire every year in an attempt to manage populations but this year's total may be higher.

A one-off cull in April has already seen the killing of 41 deer.

The small muntjac deer browse on low-lying plant life and have been damaging populations of bluebells and wild orchids.

Mr Armstrong said: "Muntjac really like to eat low ground plants and that really creates a problem with the flora and fauna in some woods.

"If populations get really high then rather than deer being a cute animal that people want to see they can become a pest.

"If the general deer population gets too large then they can start to pick up diseases and we need to strike a balance in management."

Muntjac deer thrive in temperate conditions and have become increasingly common in England due to climatic change and warmer winters.

Any deer killed in the operations will be sold on for human consumption.

To find out more about the cull of Lincolnshire deer, see Wednesday's Echo.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/4yj9nw

HOW TO: Build A Deer-Proof Fence For Your Garden

When I moved to our property on Farm To Market Road in Whitefish, Montana, I chose to build a deer-proof fence to last 100 years. Though there is a path around the outside liberally sprinkled with deer dropping, no deer have gotten in for the past seven years. And I did it all myself.

Materials
Field fencing (4 ft. high hog wire)
5 six inch pieces of iron pipe, 10 ft long
Fencing pliers
Roll of smooth wire
Cement and sand/gravel mix
Fence post digger
Chain link gate, or one made from pipe and wire
Drill for hinge attachment
Fence stretcher
Coffee cans
L Bolt for hinge
T posts, 10 ft tall


1. Dig holes 2-3 feet deep (to frost line) at the corners of your garden, and one extra for a gatepost.

2. Mix cement as directed on the package with sand and gravel.

3. Insert the iron pipe into the holes, plumb with a strong and plumb bob.

4. Fill with cement mixture and let set for a couple of days.

5. Run a string between your posts and measure every 8 to 10 feet for placement of T-bars.

6. Pound the T-bars for a 2-foot depth, in line between the iron posts (I stood on the truck cab to do this).

7. Cut vertical cross wires out of two feet of the end of your field fencing.

8. Starting at the bottom, wrap horizontal wires around the post. Secure by twisting ends of wire around the first vertical wire tightly.

9. Unroll wire past the T posts to the gate and corner posts.

10. Attach a fence stretcher to the wire to tighten it along the fence posts, or pull with an attachment to your truck, or use a come along. Attach stretched fencing to the posts with wire fencing clips.

11. On fence corners, use smooth wire to attach each horizontal strand to the pipe.

12. At the end post, cut off vertical cross wires for two feet of horizontal wire to wrap and twist around the end post for secure fastening.

13. Repeat for the top 4 feet of field fence.

14. Wire top to the bottom strands by weaving smooth wire between the middle edges of the two fencing pieces.

15. Fit gate between the gate and corner post. Position so it is 6" off the ground for snow clearance and possible sagging.

16. Mark the hinge placement of the gatepost. Drill holes straight through the gatepost, and fit with a long L shaped bolt that can be tightened on the far side of the gatepost.

17. Use commercial chain link attachments or fit pipe gate with pipe clamps to hook onto the hinge.

Source: http://www.organicgardening.com/feature/0,7518,s1-65-70-1558,00.html

IOWA NEWS: Sustained Cull Reduces Urban Deer in Dubuque

Urban deer-population surveys are inexact science, but the Environmental Stewardship Advisory Commission will present its deer-management plan to the Dubuque City Council on Monday with some good news.

The aerial count conducted in February recorded the fewest deer in the city limits since the bow-hunting program began in 1998, at 219. That figure comes after an unusually high number in 2007, when 466 deer were counted.

Greg Harris, wildlife depredation biologist for the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, monitors the aerial surveys in eastern Iowa. He said counts are down or stable everywhere except Muscatine, which saw a spike.

"It's nice to see the numbers down, but you can't explain it by the harvest," Harris said. "There are other factors involved and habitat destruction is one. That's something you can see through the air."

Harris also said the bitter winter probably forced deer to travel farther afield.
"If they're starving and there are food sources outside the city, they will move, and (they) won't move back in right away," Harris said.


The Dubuque City Council meets at 6:30 p.m. Monday at the Historic Federal Building, 350 West Sixth St. "Those does will drift back in."

The bow hunt, which opens in late October and runs through late January, targets does to control population growth. The city's goal is to stabilize the population below 20 deer per square mile. While that measure is often met north of U.S. 20, it hasn't been accomplished south of that line. According to Harris, reaching that "magic number" isn't of high importance.

"The better goal to shoot for is a reduction in damage and in deer/vehicle accidents," Harris said.

Mary Rose Corrigan, public health specialist for the city of Dubuque, reports deer/vehicle crashes dropped significantly in 2007 to 29. There were 48 in 2006, which bucked a trend of fewer accidents in recent years. From 1998 to 2001, deer/vehicle crashes averaged in the 40s, Corrigan said.

The city is divided into 12 deer-management zones. Harris said two zones that regularly have the highest deer concentrations also have some larger-property owners that don't allow hunters. One area encompasses nearly 2,100 acres in the northeast corner of the city, south of John Deere Dubuque Works and east of Central Avenue. The other is 536 acres south of U.S. 20, mostly between Fremont Avenue and Cedar Cross Road.

"The bottom line is there is always going to be a problem because of private-property rights," Harris said. "It would be easier if everyone allowed the hunters in, but that doesn't happen in rural areas, so it sure isn't going to happen in the city.
He said the key to population control is consistency.

"Once you start hunting, you can't stop. Let's say you hit this man-made magical number of 20 per mile and let up for a couple of years -- you're right back to square one. We come up with these parameters and want to fit wildlife into them. Wildlife doesn't play by man's rules."

Source: http://www.thonline.com/article.cfm?id=202217

WISCONSIN NEWS: City Bans Deer Feeding

OSHKOSH, Wis. - Oshkosh residents can no longer feed deer in the city.

The Oshkosh Common Council approved a ban on deer feeding Tuesday in an effort to discourage deer from entering urban areas.

People caught feeding deer can be fined nearly $220, when court costs are added to a base fine of $75.

Council members agreed to seek other suggestions for detering deer from the residents and the Humane Society of the United States. They also are looking at killing some deer in the fall or early winter.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/6r94qx

MINNESOTA NEWS: Over 1200 Deer Killed in TB Cull

A total of 1,207 deer were killed by state and federal sharpshooters, hunters and landowners the past six months in bovine tuberculosis-infected northwest Minnesota, the state Department of Natural Resources said Wednesday.

The sharpshooting effort to remove deer started in February and ended Friday, the DNR said. Free-ranging deer, believed to be carriers of bovine TB to cattle, were targets of removal since the deer-hunting season closed last fall.

The concentrated bovine TB area for deer removal is basically northwest Beltrami County and southeast Roseau County, in the Skime area.

Brad Swenson Archive The deer population in the 164-square-mile core of the bovine TB disease management area was estimated at 800 animals during an aerial survey conducted in January before sharpshooting efforts began, the DNR said. Aerial sharpshooters took 416 deer and ground sharpshooters took 546 deer in and near the core area, bringing the 2008 sharpshooting total to 962 animals.

During the regular deer seasons, 1,449 deer were harvested in the bovine TB deer permit area, the DNR said. Hunters harvested an additional 120 deer a January special hunt. Since the close of the deer hunting seasons, landowners have taken an additional 125 deer in an area that was expanded to include private lands to the north of deer permit Area 101. In total, 2,656 deer have been taken from September 2007 to May 2008.

“The large take is evidence of the extraordinary effort that has been underway since autumn,” Dave Schad, DNR Fish and Wildlife Division director, said in a statement. “This has been a highly successful operation that has gone a long way toward achieving our goal of eliminating bovine TB in deer.”

The state of Minnesota is under the federal designation of Modified Accredited by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the third of five categories which outlines strict regulations for the testing and movement of cattle across state lines for bovine TB.

Hopes are to see the state split into two zones, with a concentrated bovine TB management area in northwest Minnesota, and classifying the rest of the state as TB Free.

Gov. Tim Pawlenty signed into law last week measures to allow the Minnesota Board of Animal Health authority to increase livestock testing, tighten restrictions on animal movement, provide cost-share assistance for fencing in certain areas and offers to “buy out” livestock owners in the bovine TB management zone.

“This disease is an economic burden for our beef producers, and we are committed to eradicating it as quickly as possible,” state Assistant Agriculture Commissioner Joe Martin, the state’s bovine TB response coordinator, said last week.

“We had strong, bipartisan support for this legislation from legislators, producers, and industry groups such as the Minnesota State Cattlemen’s Association,” he said.

“This critical legislation will provide the Board of Animal Health the authority they need to restrict movement of livestock within the bovine TB management zone and implement split-state status,” said Minnesota Farm Bureau Federation President Kevin Paap. “The bill also provides significant resources to control and eradicate bovine TB, including a voluntary herd buyout for cattle producers in the management zone and cost-share money for fencing.”

Paap added that the new law “bans wildlife feeding in the zone and establishes a temporary assessment of $1 per head on all beef cattle sold in Minnesota. Money collected from this assessment will go to the Board of Animal Health for bovine TB control efforts. This assessment shows how cattlemen across Minnesota are willing to contribute toward the eradication of bovine TB.”

Since the initial 2005 discovery of bovine TB in Minnesota, the state has identified 11 infected beef cattle herds—all in the northwest Minnesota counties of Beltrami and Roseau, the state Animal Health Board said. In addition, 20 infected deer have been confirmed to date in the same area, with several additional suspect deer awaiting final test results.

“This bill puts Minnesota in the position of being a national leader in controlling and combating bovine TB,” said Sen. Rod Skoe, DFL-Clearbrook, an author of the bill.

“Up to this point, there really has been no road map for dealing with this issue and other states have had only marginal success,” Skoe said. “This bill helps Minnesota lead the way toward eradicating the disease in our state and helping other states develop aggressive and successful plans.”

The final legislative plan will lay the groundwork for USDA split-state status in order to focus bovine TB eradication efforts only in affected areas, he said. The plan offers cattle producers an option to accept an animal-buyout or extensive fencing to control animal movement and help control the spread of the disease.

In addition, herd testing will continue to be required until TB-free status is regained, and deer eradication efforts will continue. The Department of Agriculture, Board of Animal Health and DNR all cooperated on the comprehensive plan, he said.

“With this bill, we’ll make significant progress toward no additional TB-positive test results in the state,” Skoe said.

Landowners and tenants, and their agents designated in writing, can continue to take deer without a permit in the landowner/tenant area under the provisions of a special emergency rule that took effect March 31, said the DNR’s Schad. The rule is currently scheduled to expire Aug. 31, but the rule may be modified or ended earlier in the summer based on discussions with local residents and landowners. A final decision will be made in the next several weeks.

The DNR will finalize plans for the fall hunting seasons in that area by July, he said. Specific details on permit area boundaries, special and regular hunts, and other provisions will be announced mid-summer.

Schad added that he appreciates the cooperation of private landowners during a difficult time. “We couldn’t have accomplished what we did without the assistance of local citizens and federal sharpshooters. Both deserve our thanks,” he said.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/5ez2s5

WEST VIRGINIA NEWS: More CWD Appears in Hampshire County

BECKLEY, W.Va. — Hampshire County remains an enigma to the West Virginia Division of Natural Resources in its campaign to track down and understand why Chronic Wasting Disease is haunting deer in that popular hunting region.

Now that 11 more deer the DNR killed this spring have tested positive, the mystery has only deepened.

All told, 31 deer now have been afflicted with the ailment, a fatal neurological disorder found in deer and elk. To date, the only affected deer have turned up in Hampshire — a fact that puzzles the DNR’s assistant wildlife chief, Paul Johansen.

“That’s the $64,000 question,” he said Thursday.

“I’ve stayed up nights pondering that question. Why did it show up? How did it get here? The reality is we may never know. I guess the important thing is to make sure we do engage our management plan to try to put in place appropriate management strategies to try to address the disease.”

While not harmful to humans, cattle or other domestic animals, CWD is a death sentence to any deer or elk that contracts it.

Some hunter-harvested deer tested positive last fall in Hampshire, but so far, not a single CWD-infected whitetail has been discovered outside that county.

“We’re pleased to see from a distribution standpoint, looking at the landscape, all of those positives were pretty tightly confined to that geographic area around Slanesville, where the original index animal was,” Johansen said.

“We did not pick up any additional positives in that Yellow Springs area.”

For the past few years, the DNR has performed a statewide surveillance program but hasn’t found any CWD outside a small pocket of Hampshire, he said.

In fact, the original index animal surfaced Sept. 2, 2005, as part of the DNR’s roadkill surveillance, Johansen pointed out.

Besides roadkill vigilance, the DNR looks for the disease in targeted areas, seeking out any animals that exhibit the clinical signs of it.

“We try to get our hands on those as well,” he said.

Scientists believe the disorder is caused by abnormal, proteinaceous particles known as prions engaged in a slow assault of the brain, causing deer and elk to progressively become emaciated, display bizarre behavior and invariably die.

DNR Director Frank Jezioro said in a statement from his office that “some of the best wildlife biologists and veterinarians in the world” are working on CWD, including those at the Southeastern Cooperative Wildlife Disease Study in Athens, Ga.

“Landowner and hunter cooperation throughout this entire CWD surveillance effort in Hampshire County has been excellent,” he said.

“As we strive to meet this wildlife disease challenge and implement appropriate management strategies, the continued support and involvement of landowners and hunters will be essential.”

Source: http://tinyurl.com/3gm9j3

NEW YORK NEWS: Deer Sightings on Staten Island Continue to Rise

There will be no deer hunting on Staten Island. Not anytime soon, probably not ever.

But there are deer aplenty, and in growing numbers, on Staten Island, the closest thing New York City has to a suburban borough, browsing in people’s yards, drawing double-takes at highway interchanges, getting hit by cars. There are so many deer that the state decided it needed to study them and figure out what to do about them.

According to the study, released on Friday, there are at least 24 deer, concentrated on the western side of the island, including at least two fawns. It is enough to constitute an unusual pest-control challenge in the nation’s largest city.

“Deer are beautiful animals, and we love to see them in the wild,” Suzanne Mattei, the regional director for the State Department of Environmental Conservation, said at an outdoor news conference at the Greenbelt Nature Center in the island’s lushly wooded heart. “But when they come into urban areas, we have to manage them carefully.”

The proposals made in the study are modest ones: more deer-crossing signs (eight were installed along the West Shore Expressway last year at the urging of Assemblyman Michael Cusick), some fencing and a public-education campaign.

“We want Staten Islanders to be deer-savvy,” said the deputy borough president, Ed Burke.

Officials warn that in addition to endangering drivers, deer are host to the ticks that carry Lyme disease.

And if unchecked, the deer could put a serious dent in Staten Island’s greenery, which is already threatened by development, said Joseph Pane, the state biologist who conducted the survey by traipsing through the woods for most of January and February.

“They’ll eat everything within reach, to the point where you have nothing growing,” Mr. Pane said, as if describing an attack by 350-pound rats with antlers. “They go after things as soon as they sprout and you have no seed source.”

While the survey took in only a fraction of the island’s wooded areas, Ms. Mattei said the department felt that 24 deer counted represented most of the herd.

“At least now we have data,” she said. “We have something more than just, ‘Golly gee, I saw a deer.’ ”

Deer sightings began to be reported with some frequency on Staten Island around 2000. State officials say the deer swam across the Arthur Kill from New Jersey, decades after having been wiped out on the island.

But old-timers in the island’s rugged southwest corner say the deer never left. “There have always been deer on Staten Island,” said Cherryl Mitchell, who runs a stable called Richer Farm in Charleston, just north of the Outerbridge Crossing. “My husband is a native Staten Islander, he’s 66 years old, and he’s seen them since he was 6 years old.”

Mrs. Mitchell, 57, said that when she moved to Charleston in 1979, she would see deer tracks, but after a wave of construction nearby, she started to see deer. She said she had been spotting one deer, which she named Grandpa, recognizable by a distinctly crooked nostril, for 18 years.

Mrs. Mitchell said she had also seen men with bows and arrows hunting the deer in Clay Pit Ponds State Park, adjoining her property. Last year, the conservation department received a spate of complaints about hunters shooting at deer.

Hunting, whether with bow and arrow or firearm, is illegal in New York City, which is why a harvest is not among the management options the state is considering. And though deer have natural predators elsewhere in the state, there are no plans to introduce bears or coyotes to Staten Island either.

“I think it’s going to be challenging enough dealing with the coexistence of the deer and the people,” Ms. Mattei said.

The deer survey, which will become an annual event, was based on sightings called in by residents in January and February. The sighting log reads like a tour of the island’s back roads and parking lots.

“Three deer, gully behind Target near Englewood Ave.”

“1/27/2008, six deer, skating pavilion, Arthur Kill Road.”

The sightings were concentrated in four areas: near Howland Hook in the northwest corner of the island, near Clay Pit Ponds State Park, near Mount Loretto and Tottenville at the southern tip, and around the Greenbelt. Mr. Pane bundled up, took clipboard in hand and went on the prowl.

Friday afternoon, Mrs. Mitchell led a reporter on her own deer tour in the woods just beyond her riding ring. In five minutes, she pointed out the tracks of at least six deer: does with rounded hoofprints, bucks with big pointy prints the length of a man’s finger, fawns with little prints.

Mrs. Mitchell had little use for the state and its scientist-bureaucrats. But she said she agreed with the conclusions of the study.

“They need to just properly put some fences along the highways, put some signs up and leave them the hell alone,” she said.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/5doymf

NEW JERSEY NEWS: Lowest Deer Harvest in 16 Years

During the 2007 and 2008 hunting seasons, New Jersey's deer hunters killed the least amount of whitetails in 16 years, according to newly released statistics.

The finding is reported in the state Division of Fish and Wildlife's just-published tally of the latest deer harvest. In it, the division says hunters took 47,017 animals in the Fall Bow, Youth Hunt, Permit Bow, 6-Day Firearm, Permit Muzzleloader, Permit Shotgun and Winter Bow hunting seasons.

That figure represents the fewest deer shot by hunters since the 1991 and 1992 seasons when 45,416 whitetails were culled. It falls far short of the 56,673 deer in 2006 and 2007, and pales in comparison to the high-water mark set in 2000 and 2001, when 77,444 deer were taken.

According to Fish and Wildlife, 17,467 of the most recent seasons' harvested deer were antlered and 29,549 were antlerless. As has been the case since the 1987 and 1988 seasons, most of the deer -- 17,094 -- were killed during the Permit Shotgun season. In 1999 and 2000, 28,498 deer were removed from the herd during Permit Shotgun season.

To find a Fall Bow season as slow as last year's, when 9,994 deer were arrowed, one needs to look to 1987 and 1988, when the tally was 8,483.

The anemic numbers are pretty much the same across the board: The 725 deer taken during the Youth Hunt is the second-lowest number since the hunt was initiated in 2001 and 2002; Permit Bow hunters, who took 6,086, fared worse than any Permit Bow participants since 1995 and 1996; 6-Day Firearm ("Buck Season") hunters managed 8,338 deer, fewer than in any season since 1995 and 1996.

However, there is one bright spot in the new numbers: The Winter Bow number of 1,232 is actually the third-best on record and is 110 more than reported for the comparable 2006-07 season.

Division of Fish and Wildlife assistant director Larry Herrighty said he'd like to see another year's worth of data before hypothesizing why the deer harvest is down so much.

"We don't see a pattern," he said. Herrighty added that a number of factors go into annual deer hunt numbers, including weather and hunter participation.

"During the early muzzleloader season there were heavy rains," he noted. "Even on opening day of buck season, the weather wasn't ideal."

The lower numbers could just be a sign that the efforts, by the division and the state Fish and Game Council, to winnow New Jersey's deer population are working. "We are attempting to decrease the population and, as we do, the harvest will go down," Herrighty said.

Source: http://tinyurl.com/3nbp6c