Pittman’s $50 deer bounty won’t help
But these strategies could curb out-of-control herd
Much has been made in the press over County Executive Steuart Pittman’s plan to pay $50 to hunters for each legally harvested deer delivered to a butcher to be donated to the Anne Arundel County Food Bank. This would be funded with up to $128,000 in CARES Act Coronavirus Relief Funding.
The secretary of natural resources, backed by an Assistant Attorney General’s opinion, advised Pittman that such a payment amounts to a bounty and is illegal under state law. Pittman is defying the state and continuing the program.
I fully support anything done legally to support the Food Bank to feed the hungry. My wife and I just made our second generous donation this year to the Food Bank. I urge readers to do the same. I also support all legal actions to manage the greatly overpopulated white-tailed deer population. Seemy column ofNov. 1.
The $50 payment to deer hunters appears to be illegal, and it also is not an effective way to provide food for the needy and to reduce deer populations. Hunters take most deer harvested in Anne Arundel County by bow hunting, and most of that season has ended.
Many fewer deer are taken during the short 15-day firearm season that begins today. This means there would be very few deer donated. The money and effort, which includes even more funding for the butchers, would be better spent by donating the funds directly to the Food Bank.
Maryland harbors 240,000 deer, up from 140,426 in 1989. This super-abundance causes significanthumanhealth, ecological, and economic problems. In Maryland, 31,500 deer-car collisions annually injure and sometimes kill people. The collisions cause $100 million in damage.
Deer spread Lyme disease and cause $7.7 million in losses to farm crops. Deer chomp down on our ornamentals, flowers, and food plants. Overabundant deer also destroy tree seedlings preventing reforestation and undergrowth and affecting bird and small mammal populations.
Nothing is more efficient and costeffective in managing deer populations than regulated hunting with high bag limits. DNRdoes agoodjobof thisandhunterspay for the privilege. But we have eliminated deer predators such as wolves and created perfect deer habitat in our urban/suburban landscaped world with fragmented forest where hunters cannot hunt — a whitetailed deer Garden of Eden.
This means broader techniques must be used to control deer populations as deer have reached biological and cultural carrying capacity.
Instead of the $50 County program, the county should step up and develop a meaningful strategy to manage white-tailed deer. Here are suggested elements:
County Recreation and Parks has 15,000 acres it manages with many parks and natural areas overrun with deer. The County allows well-trained hunters during the hunting season to hunt at only three sites: Magothy Greenway Natural Area, Glendening Nature Preserve, and Jug Bay Farm Preserve. The hunt is limited to mornings before 11 a.m. on just eight days in each area. Deer hunting should be expanded to much more county land with more hunting days.
The county should seek legislative approval expanding Sunday deer hunting as its three-Sunday allowance is one of the lowest in the state. They should join seven other counties with 20 Sundays open to hunting.
The Department of Natural Resources Public Property Deer Management Program allows the county to open its lands to deer hunting during and beyond the hunting season and at night. Hunters may donate their deer to food banks and the program costs the County nothing. Unfortunately, the county does not fully participate even though such hunts are conducted at Fort George G. Meade, Sandy Point State Park, and the Smithsonian Institution property in Edgewater.
The county should promote DNR Deer ManagementPermits whereby farmers and other landowners can harvest antlerless deer on their property outside of state hunting seasons and bag limits. This is a
valuable tool for farmers to protect their livelihoodwhendeer are causingdamageto commercial crops.
Thecounty should promoteDNRSpecial Permits allowing sharpshooters or expert bow hunters to kill overabundant deer on private property where hunters cannot access deer. On the Annapolis Neck Peninsula where I live, deer are grossly overabundant. For years, several communities here have successfully brought inDNRapproved entities that have the requisite training and skills to cull deer safely and at no charge. The venison is donated to food banks. Contact me for recommendations.
It is not a question of if, but when there will be serious injury or death inflicted on an innocentmotorist in a deer-car collision in Anne Arundel County. Too many people already have been afflicted with Lyme disease. Commonsense demands meaningful action now.
We can control deer or they can control us.