What To Do About the Deer:
An Ongoing Rural Debate

By TED MEBUST

ONEONTA – The City of Oneonta’s Quality of Life and Infrastructure Committee recently heard findings from a commissioned report on the various impacts of increasing deer populations in the area. Carried out over two months, the Deer Management Task Force report named overabundance, Lyme disease and an increasing number of deer-related accidents as driving forces behind their investigation.

“Our goal is not to eliminate deer. It’s to reduce the population to a sustainable level and mitigate the problems surrounding the issue right now,” explained Betsy Holland, an Oneonta resident who led the special task force and presented at the meeting on Monday, November 28.

Overpopulation, Holland stressed, has wide-ranging impacts on our ecosystem, endangering the health of both deer and humans in Otsego County. Consulting with Donna Vogler, a professor of biology at SUNY Oneonta, the task force detailed how vegetation on forest floors is decimated and biodiversity decreases when deer populations are too dense, allowing invasive species to flourish. With this comes increased competition for food and transmission of diseases and parasites amongst deer populations. Recorded Lyme disease cases in Oneonta alone have jumped from eight in 2020 to 114 in 2022, according to Bassett Healthcare practitioner Diane Georgeson, MD. Additionally a survey linked to the report found 75 percent of Oneontan respondents rated the negative impacts of deer on people as very important and 88 percent described having been affected by a deer-related accident.

Considering the absence of any natural predators for big game, such as wolves and mountain lions, the main control for deer populations today is hunting. Though not its sole recommendation, the task force encouraged antlerless deer hunting on the city’s outskirts and proposed that city officials apply for a nuisance license from New York State’s Department of Environmental Conservation to allow hunting deer outside of season.

“Regulated hunting remains the most efficient means to manage deer. Adequate harvests of antlerless deer are essential to successful efforts,” cited the task force from a DEC deer management report.

Their recommendation comes at a time when the benefits of late-season hunting in rural communities have come into question.

Following the introduction of a Holiday Deer Hunt by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation last year, extended bow and muzzleloader seasons have stretched deer and bear hunting into January. While regular firearm season runs from November 19 to December 11, the Holiday Deer Hunt allows bow and muzzleloader hunting from December 12-20 and December 26 to January 1 in the Southern Zone, within which Otsego County is located.

A State Senator Joe Mannion-sponsored bill, S6510/A07785—which has passed both the Senate and Assembly—provides counties an opportunity to opt-out of the added days. Proponents of the bill argue that the Holiday Deer Hunt could have “significant economic impacts on rural communities and businesses” that “depend on revenue generated by activities such as hiking, cross-country skiing, snowmobiling and farm-to-table operations,” which are less accessible during hunting season, according to the New York Press Association.

Regardless of this hunting debate, the task force’s report shows that deer populations in Otsego County have reached an unstable limit. Their Management Policy offered smaller-scale suggestions to help mitigate associated problems, such as landscaping with deer-resistant plantings, constructing eight-foot fencing, and distributing educational materials on the issue to city residents, emphasizing that it will doubtless require a community effort to address this issue.