Deer gather at Adelaide's doorstep

September 4, 2024 10:28 AM

Deer gather at Adelaide's doorstep. Feral deer are increasingly being seen by bushwalkers and gardeners in the Mitcham Hills in Adelaide, where it is estimated about 300 exist around Brown Hill Creek and Crafers West. An eradication program is underway to rid South Australia of an estimated 40,000 deer state-wide.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries (7 comments total)

i misread the post title as "Adele's doorstep" and had visions of a live action Disney musical dancing in my head
posted by Jacqueline at 10:43 AM on September 4 [3 favorites]

They are fun animals to watch, but if you are a gardener watch out: they eat everything between the ground and about 6 feet high when they are in protected herds.
posted by The_Vegetables at 12:19 PM on September 4

I believe they are a major cause of traffic accidents in New England.
posted by charlesminus at 12:38 PM on September 4 [2 favorites]

There's a serious problem with the invasive Japanese axis deer on Maui and other Hawaiian islands, covered previously on the blue.

I'm guessing Adelaide is a lot more ground to cover than Maui or Moloka'i, so it might not be practical, but I highly recommend using the animal for food. It would make all the killing not wasteful, and wild venison is delicious and super healthy.
posted by tovarisch at 12:58 PM on September 4

i misread the post title as "Adele's doorstep"...

Thank gawd I wasn’t alone in that.
posted by Thorzdad at 2:53 PM on September 4 [1 favorite]

It's been a growing problem in Victoria as well. Red deer are at plague proportions in the Grampians National Park and Sambar deer have dramatically expanded their range. I think many Australians are on board with the idea that say rabbits are a feral species and need to be eradicated. Similarly foxes. But when you start getting up into the charismatic megafauna like deer, you lose support for culling and eradication programs largely because they are perceived as 'cute'.

Let it not be forgotten that they are voracious feeders who are alien to the Australian environment and are competing with and displacing native animals and damaging delicate ecosystems.

From a 2015 article published by the Invasive Species Council:

Sambar deer are already officially recognised as impacting on threatened plants with a listing as a ‘potentially threatening process’ under Victoria’s threatened species legislation. All deer are heavy grazers or browsers, reducing plant diversity and competing with other native animals. They cause physical damage through trampling, erosion and wallowing, and spread weeds and diseases. Deer create extensive tracks through moist gullies, removing ground cover and assisting the movement of other feral animals.
posted by tim_in_oz at 3:15 PM on September 4 [1 favorite]

tovarisch depending on where you draw the line between 'an outer suburb' and 'a country town rapidly metastasized into a commuter hub by developers,' the Adelaide metro area might be comparable to the island of Oahu, but heavily elongated on a north-south axis - sea to the west, hills to the east and south, plains to the north. Drawing that line is increasingly hard to do, so in addition to being a story about the devastating ecological impact of deer, this is also a classic example of the unintended consequences of urban sprawl; the feral deer population have been living in the protected national forests and farmlands to the east and the south, but as we rezone more and more of that farmland around little country towns to residential and light commercial with an implicit focus on commuting into the CBD and back, we dramatically increase the commuter traffic on what used to be fast country backroads roads, shortening the odds on unwanted interactions between deer and various forms of traffic, as well as pushing the deer out of the hills and down into already established metro areas like Mitcham Hills mentioned in the article.

Fortunately, between the bougie Adelaide Central Markets and some of the surrounding region's more German-inflected culinary traditions, there's an existing market and appetite for venison, and our general cost of living crisis here shouldn't make it very hard to grow that further. Of course, it'd be more effective if venison wasn't seen here as something of a luxury item, but...
posted by MarchHare at 7:53 PM on September 4 [3 favorites]