Heading out towards Premier Arms, my route takes me past Indianapolis's sprawling Eagle Creek Park, a forested area just north of 56th Street that is almost five times the size* of NYC's Central Park.
Needless to say, this huge stretch of urban woodland has a... somewhat out-of-control deer population.
Broad daylight, just shy of lunch hour, joggers on the sidewalk along 56th Street, and you could lean out the window of your moving car and harvest a doe or two with a tee ball bat.
Sitting at the traffic light at the corner of Reed and 56th the other day, with the packed parking lot of the Indianapolis Colts' training facility to my right and light planes on short final to Eagle Creek Airpark overhead, I could have leaned out the passenger window and hand-fed the three deer that were standing there dumbly staring in the passenger window of the stopped Subie, no doubt wondering if I was about to do just that.
Naturally, the bunny huggers love these hoofed rats, these plush traffic hazards, and go bezonkoids when anybody suggests doing anything about them, and so we let nature, red in tooth and bumper, take its grisly course.
*Not counting the 1900-acre reservoir, which is Indy's primary water source, and along the base of whose dam I have counted as many as ten deer at a time, cavorting in broad daylight, visible from the interstate.
Ah, good.
ReplyDeleteThey allow crossbows to be used on deer inside city limits.
I blame Walt Disney. And Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings.
ReplyDeleteWas said Volvo driven by Grandma? For some reason I read your headline to the tune of a truly awful "song."
ReplyDeleteWV: solspoo How apropos...
Yeah, we tend to be a little more realistic out here. As long as you aren't violating a 'firearms in town' restriction, or gutting it in someones front yard, things are a bit more...'see no evil, hear no evil'.
ReplyDeleteWhich is why last deer season found me in bay #2 at the car wash hosing out the cavity of my doe.
I love the way the state asserts ownership of the herd, even when it strays upon private property. How it wholly controls how the animals are allowed to be hunted, and yet totally washes their hands of all responsibility when a member of their herd happens to j-walk in front of oncoming traffic...
ReplyDeleteHaving almost died more than once due to teh hooved rats, I have an interest in seeing them managed responsibly.
-SM
Even in Alabama where there's plenty of hunting we have trouble keeping the off the hoods of our cars and out of our gardens.
ReplyDeleteYears ago, in my home state of WI, a place that also has a "deer problem," I once saw a sign in a farmer's corn field:
ReplyDelete"Hunters Welcome."
There has to be some way to tie this in to the paleolithic diet craze. I propose a really primitive weapons season, no projectiles at all, just a stabbing spear.
ReplyDeleteNo no no, Bruce. Humans like to throw things. Make it hand-launched projectiles friendly. We be all high-tech these days. I suggest an atlatal/spear.
ReplyDeleteAh yes, the Indianapolis Colts. The only team with 16 away games.
ReplyDeleteWe jacklight and IR the excess cervids down here in DC.
ReplyDelete@New Jovian, a quote from the article you posted, "They advocate using non-
ReplyDeletelethal methods — from birth control to fencing — as a way to control deer populations."
Jumpin' Jesus on a pogo stick. We can't even get ADULTS to use birth control, but we want to do it for deer?!
I knew stupid knew no bounds, but that one takes the cake for stupidest thing I've read all week and it's only Sunday!
-Rob
One clever lad suggested introducing wolves to Rock Creek Park. But only if they come out to feed on the liberal journalist living in NW.
ReplyDeletemy favorite deer stand? my back deck. with a crossbow.
ReplyDeletethere's a funny story about that....
It's typical. A friend of mine used to respond to the folks who couldn't bear to have Bambi shot, by asking them to come and watch Bambi starve to death in her back yard and see if they still thought shooting was crueler.
ReplyDeleteWhere we lived in Virginia we knew a few folks with farms and varmint licenses. Deer is tasty.
Same thing down here... Mass PSH over taking deer in Rock Creek Park... sigh
ReplyDeleteThe city that I live in has a special bow only season where you have to take a doe or does if you want more than one.
ReplyDeleteThey hired a contract professional to do the herd reducing a few years ago and they did kill many deer. But the local government figured why have the money come out of the city coffers when the residents would rather do the culling themselves and pay for the privilege too.
Life in the U.P. is good.
Well, if someone gets killed by Bambi, they obviously had it coming for insulting Mother Gaia by driving a car fueled by hydrocarbons instead of sustainable algae cakes.
ReplyDeletePerhaps start a campaign accusing the deer of smoking, using assault weapons, and voting conservative, and there'll be a hue and cry to start the mass roundups in minutes.
I would also start putting up official-looking metal road signs near all the local schools that said "Warning: Rabid Deer".
Rules For Radicals works both ways, and there's no reason disinformation can't be fun.
For reference, the Left Side Of The Country should start a campaign claiming wolves are eating all the pot plants on farms in states that have legalized.
That would result in permits for helicopter hunting them with miniguns by a week from Wednesday.
Anonymous Stretch said...
ReplyDeleteOne clever lad suggested introducing wolves to Rock Creek Park. But only if they come out to feed on the liberal journalist living in NW.
4:21 PM, April 07, 2013
I had someone suggest wolves for the DC deer problem, and countered with my suggestion: Bring in a herd of the 800 lb. Russian wild boars destroying parts of Texas. Who cares if they kill the deer, the residents, their pet bichon frise's, and destroy the landscape. It's Washington, DC. for pity's sake. If you let the Potomac out of its banks after they are done, it can go back to being a perfectly good swamp.
Crossbows might be a good solution, but honestly, in an urban or suburban environment it's really hard to follow Rule 4 with a rifle, anywhere but a purpose-built shooting range. Getting rid of the excess deer is all well and good, but we still need to do it in a way that prevents us causing death, injury, or serious property damage to innocent humans.
ReplyDeleteAhhh, deer.
ReplyDeleteThe most dangerous large mammal to man in North America.
A Wicked beast known for it's kamikaze runs against vehicles and occasional muggings to hunters for snacks.
The north end of campus is a nature reserve. At least once a year some concerned citizen calls to inform us "the deer have escaped." It's not fenced...
ReplyDeleteIt gets worse. In Helena Montana, we prohibit hunting within the city limits, then hire professional hunters to thin the herd on the taxpayer dime. But we give the meat to the food bank, so it's all good I guess.
ReplyDeleteHaving spent quite a bit of my misspent youth just over 465 from there, before the Colts complex or the range were installed, or at least before the range was used all the time. The deer there have always been a problem.
ReplyDeleteIn High School, after the complex and range were up, it was almost like joining a club if you smacked a deer. Eagle Creek Reservoir Overlook was a place young folk could go in the evening and exchange thoughts on life and suck face. I preferred Park 100, fewer cops roaming around looking to break up sex ed 101. But that overlook supplied fresh cars and drivers to scare the shit out of and wreck every weekend.
Last time I was actually in Eagle Creek Park I noticed the extreme lack of underbrush and low branches. Oddly enough, we manage to get Ft. Ben's Park hunted every couple years, and it's smaller and more delicately placed.
lelnet,
ReplyDelete"Crossbows might be a good solution, but honestly, in an urban or suburban environment it's really hard to follow Rule 4 with a rifle, anywhere but a purpose-built shooting range. Getting rid of the excess deer is all well and good, but we still need to do it in a way that prevents us causing death, injury, or serious property damage to innocent humans."
Eagle Creek Park is 3900 acres of fairly rolling topography covered in trees and bordered along one edg by a lake that's most of a half-mile wide; it's not like a five-tree copse in the middle of a country club. I'm not suggesting turning J. Random Bubba loose in there with a belt-fed fifty, but deer could be safely culled with firearms in there, especially from tree stands.
Actually, Bubba with a 50 cal might be ok, use the dam as a final backdrop with his back to 465. Put in engineering stakes as his markers and charge admission to watch him. Hell, pay for park maintenance for quite a while.
ReplyDeleteMost people who go to that park don't even see half of it. Its seriously huge. I've been to many smaller parks that have camping.
Same problem everywhere. Local hospital had Canada Geese move into their little lake. Three years later they had a year round resident population approaching 100 and all of them as protected as Federal Judges. You couldn't even scowl at one without drawing a felony arrest. Parks and Wildlife was sympathetic and started sheltering a little gator in the lake in the summer. That got the population down to managable level, though now there are lot of non-aquatic Canada geese evolving hooves.
ReplyDelete"Eagle Creek Park is 3900 acres of fairly rolling topography covered in trees and bordered along one edg by a lake that's most of a half-mile wide [etc]"
ReplyDeleteFair 'nuff. I'm certainly no expert on Indy geography. :)
Up here, we've got plenty of places with meaningful deer populations, but not nearly big or isolated enough to safely shoot rifles in, except where there's a berm in place and somebody trustworthy's already scoped out the whole "what's behind your target" thing for the one and only direction you'll be shooting in. (But then, you can also see our reservoir with the naked eye from the moon. So we've got our perks, too. :) )
Tam:
ReplyDeleteYep. Tree stands and maybe low velocity loads, like pistols or muzzleloaders.
I think the danger of a rule four violation from a hunter in a treestand with a pistol or a smokepole is about nil.
At Camp Atterbury the deer are pretty acclimated to ACU camo. They come up and bum cigarettes while you're outside the barracks on your cell phone. They hog the tables on bingo night at the all-ranks club. They have PX priviledges.
ReplyDeleteYou never see one outside the cantonement area but "inside the wire" they're thick as fleas.
gvi
Perhaps those things could be used the same way reindeer are, they seem to be half tame already (which is about what reindeer are). Gather them once a year in corrals, leave the best breeding animals and let them free again, butcher the rest and sell the meat and the skins, keep a few tamer ones so they can pose for photographs with tourists and animals lovers.
ReplyDeleteThe largest urban deer herd in my hometown is, ironically, on the grounds of Federal Cartridge Corp., one of the world's largest manufacturers of hunting ammo. :)
ReplyDeleteTam, you need to read up on poaching tech. That is a lot of free meat walking around, there. Oh, and don't get caught.
ReplyDelete"I blame Walt Disney and Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings." -- Bob
ReplyDelete"Nature Fakers"? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nature_fakers_controversy
Don't forget Ernest Thompson Seton and Felix Salten himself.
There were deer running through the fancy-pants neighborhood off Diamond Estates in Palcerville, they looked mangy and pathetic and nasty - how anyone can thing "deer = cute" is beyond me and it appeared that just shooting them right there would alleviate a lot of pain, disease, and misery. And in that town I can carry!
ReplyDelete