Authorities have granted permits to a conservation organization to hire professional hunters to eradicate deer in a unique island ecosystem off the coast of California. The population of nonnative mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) brought to Catalina Island in the 1930s took off in numbers in subsequent decades due to a lack of native predators. The deer ate native vegetation, which caused ecological problems with native wildlife on the island. Past efforts to ship the deer off Catalina in the 1940s failed, as did management through hunting. “Even with the longest hunting season in California and years of prioritizing the removal of does before bucks, the program made little progress in reducing the herd,” wrote the Catalina Island Conservancy, the nonprofit organization managing the removal, in its Island Restoration Scientific Assessment. The removal, which the organization projects will take four to five years, has been in development for years and is part of a larger restoration project that aims to restore the native ecosystem through reductions in invasive plants, reseeding and plantings of endemic vegetation.
Read more in the announcement by the Catalina Island Conservancy.
