Red oak seedlings as indicators of deer browse pressure: Gauging the outcome of different white‐tailed deer management approaches

Abstract

After decades of high deer populations, North American forests have lost much of their previous biodiversity. Any landscape‐level recovery requires substantial reductions in deer herds, but modern societies and wildlife management agencies appear unable to devise appropriate solutions to this chronic ecological and human health crisis. We evaluated the effectiveness of fertility control and hunting in reducing deer impacts at Cornell University. We estimated spring deer populations and planted Quercus rubra seedlings to assess deer browse pressure, rodent attack, and other factors compromising seedling performance. Oak seedlings protected in cages grew well, but deer annually browsed ≥60% of unprotected seedlings. Despite female sterilization rates of >90%, the deer population remained stable. Neither sterilization nor recreational hunting reduced deer browse rates and neither appears able to achieve reductions in deer populations or their impacts. We eliminated deer sterilization and recreational hunting in a core management area in favor of allowing volunteer archers to shoot deer over bait, including at night. This resulted in a substantial reduction in the deer population and a linear decline in browse rates as a function of spring deer abundance. Public trust stewardship of North American landscapes will require a fundamental overhaul in deer management to provide for a brighter future, and oak seedlings may be a promising metric to assess success. These changes will require intense public debate and may require new approaches such as regulated commercial hunting, natural dispersal, or intentional release of important deer predators (e.g., wolves and mountain lions). Such drastic changes in deer management will be highly controversial, and at present, likely difficult to implement in North America. However, the future of our forest ecosystems and their associated biodiversity will depend on evidence to guide change in landscape management and stewardship.

Wolves make roadways safer, generating large economic returns to predator conservation

“…Importantly, our study implies that wolves regulate deer populations and behavior in ways that a waning number of human deer hunters cannot. In many areas, deer are considered overabundant (18,19), and managers have struggled to incentivize recreational hunters to reduce deer numbers to a level that would reduce the harmful ecological effects of deer (72)(73)(74). A sharp decline in deer hunting participation in recent years will make it more challenging to rely on recreational hunters (75,76).…”

Public Perceptions of Deer Management in Scotland

“…Long-term justification for any decision to increase the deer cull based on social acceptability will require strong evidence that doing so does in fact serve broad public interests (Bremner and Park, 2007;Crowley et al, 2017). This will require developing ecological assessment metrics that are scientifically defensible and accessible enough to gauge impacts of increased deer culls (Blossey et al, 2019), as well as developing metrics to monitor social acceptability of deer management policies and programs over time. These metrics could contribute to a fair, transparent, adaptive system of setting, monitoring, evaluating, and reporting progress toward ecological and socioeconomic objectives at local and landscape scales (Kirkland et al, 2021).…”

Effecten van hoefdieren op Natura 2000-boshabitattypen op de Veluwe

“…Dit is in een veelvoud aan studies aangetoond (zie o.a. Gill & Morgan, 2010;Royo et al, 2016Royo et al, , 2017Blossey et al, 2019). Chevrier et al (2012) Amerika.…”