News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon
This doe charged Squawback Woods resident Jim Smith and his dog on Thursday, June 7. She was probably protecting her fawn.
Jim Smith was walking his dog along a street in Squawback Woods early Thursday morning, June 7, when he heard the clatter of hooves behind him.
He turned to see a doe bearing down on him.
"That sucker came right up to me and I wasn't sure I was going to get rid of it before it attacked me or the dog," Smith said.
"She just kept coming. She got within three feet of me. I hit (her) in the snout with a newspaper."
The doe appeared to be protecting a fawn that was bedded down in a nearby open lot (See Letters to the Editor, page 2).
Such incidents are becoming more frequent as deer and people try to share the woods around Sisters. Some residents believe that deer are attracted to neighborhoods and hang around because the living is easy.
"The problem is that we've got people in the neighborhood who feed the damn deer," Smith said.
It's not illegal to feed deer, though professional wildlife managers discourage the practice.
"Basically we don't approve of it, we don't like it," said Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife biologist Steven George.
According to George, feeding concentrates animal populations, risking transmission of disease. It also habituates deer to people, the biologist said.
"They tend to lose that fear of people in places where they just stay," George said. "Unless they see people as dominant, they tend to try to dominate them."
That can lead to encounters such as the one Jim Smith reported. Sometimes, such encounters have deadly consequences. Deer are strong animals, with sharp hooves that can easily kill a small dog and can injure or even kill larger dogs or a person.
"We've had numerous dogs killed," George said, noting that does see dogs as canine predators, threats to their fawns.
Deer also devastate gardens and flower beds. Some Squawback Woods residents say they have lost large investments in plantings.
But extensive gardens and flower beds are themselves the problem, according to Russell Williams, who has fed deer in Squawback Woods since 1989.
"It has grown to be such a problem with the people who are turning their houses into what they enjoyed (in urban areas)," Williams said.
Williams knows that wildlife agencies -- and his neighbors -- frown on feeding deer. But he believes houses have displaced deer habitat and that his feeding replicates a natural process.
He feeds deer alfalfa during the winter months.
George said that feeding alfalfa is "okay" for deer from a health standpoint, although deer don't need the amount of protein found in that food source. The biologist emphasized that feeding wet or dry cob or cracked corn is the equivalent of promoting a junk food diet.
"That's in reality one of the worst things you can feed them," he said.
Williams believes he is feeding the deer properly -- and in the appropriate season.
"I do not feed them from April on, when they're fawning, and they don't come around (then)," Williams said. "I only feed them in the dead of winter."
He doesn't believe that feeding the deer has created a population concentration. In fact, he says, he sees fewer deer around now than he did when he moved to the Sisters area.
Williams recalls having 25-30 deer per day on his property 10 or 11 years ago, when his subdivision was more open, with fewer houses.
"I would say that the deer population here in Squawback Woods is half that of a decade ago," he said.
Williams notes that some of his neighbors actively scare deer away, banging on pots and yelling at them.
That's called hazing and it's illegal. However, ODFW's Steve George notes that his department issues hazing permits pretty regularly to residents who have on-going problems with deer.
In extreme cases, "if you get one that is persistently aggressive, what basically happens is we come out and kill it," George said.
State parks have had to eliminate whole herds when they became too habituated to humans and grew to be an intolerable threat, according to George.
Williams says he has a good relationship with the deer he feeds; he respects them and they respect him. He doesn't believe that the deer have lost any of their native caution.
In any case, he doesn't plan to stop.
"I am maintaining the same lifestyle that this area offered (when he moved here) and I'm not changing my lifestyle because people want to change the area into Los Angeles or wherever they came from," Williams said.
Continuing to feed the deer may get harder to do. George said his agency encourages subdivisions to prohibit feeding game animals. Some Squawback Woods residents would like to see such a provision in their bylaws.
"The biggest thing is to treat wildlife with respect and give them a lot of space," George said. "Enjoy them, but give them a lot of space -- and don't fed them."
Jim Cornelius is editor in chief of The Nugget and author of “Warriors of the Wildlands: True Tales of the Frontier Partisans.” A history buff, he explores frontier history across three centuries and several continents on his podcast, The Frontier Partisans. For more information visit www.frontierpartisans.com.
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