Dealing With Deer

We hesitate to trot into the woods, so to speak, on the issue of deer, a subject that generates strong and conflicting emotions. Nevertheless, comment must be made about a pending change in state law that would allow weekend hunting here for deer in January.

Few reasonable people here disagree with the observation that there are far more deer than there used to be within East Hampton Town and Village limits. Each fall, dozens of vehicles and deer come into expensive, and for the deer, often-fatal contact on the roads. Meanwhile, residents and visitors suffer from a host of tick-borne diseases, the rise of which has, at least in part, been linked to the growth of the deer population.

Where once you could garden and raise fruit trees on open lots, our charming East End now resembles a gulag, with high wire fences lining roads and house lots, all intended to keep the four-footed marauders at bay.

Among the steps officials have considered to control the deer is the expansion of recreational hunting in January to include Saturday and Sunday, and to allow bow hunters as close as 150 feet from houses and other structures. While the bow-hunting change does not seem dangerous — though the sport is said to result in more injured deer — weekend firearms hunting is something that does not sit right.

For a place in which Saturdays and Sundays are pretty much the whole outdoor enchilada in winter, making the woods effectively off-limits for most people, even for part of the year, is unwise. Consider for a moment the various community organizations that organize guided trail walks more or less year-round.

Though hunting is a long established tradition here, it cannot provide the reduction of the deer population that is warranted. The so-called four-poster insecticide stations intended to kill ticks do not resolve all the problems that too many deer create, and proposed sterilization is an unproven method that would be very expensive.

Given the emotional nature of the debate, it is not surprising that officials would tiptoe around the matter. The day will come, however, when they have to admit that these half-measures have not worked and in the end recognize that a carefully managed effort by professional sharpshooters is necessary if meaningful and humane reduction of the deer population is to be realized. The sooner, the better.