For one of my summer classes, Environmental Science, the professor opened a discussion online for people to voice their opinions on whether wolves should be reintroduced to NY, particularly the Adirondack area. Here’s my response:
I believe wolves should be reintroduced to the Adirondack region. There is an over-population of deer in the state, and reintroducing the wolves to the state can have positive effects in reducing the population of the deer. Deer are very common carriers of ticks and Lyme disease, thus if the number of deer are reduced, the risk of the ticks latching to humans and infecting them with Lyme is reduced. Also, more Americans are killed each year by deer than any other large American mammal. Wolves, although potentially dangerous to humans, will not be roaming around people’s back yards like deer have been, due to the small initial population that would be reintroduced. Also, there are many other mammals humans would need to worry about before coming into contact with wolves, such as beer, coyotes, cougars, moose, and the list goes on. The reintroduction of wolves to this state should be the least of our worries living here anyways.
Then some tree hugging whiner posted this:
Actually there is an over population of humans, not deer. Plus deer carry ticks right? Who cares, people carry aids, STD’s, and all kinds of diseases and other nasty habits. And deer in our backyards…maybe because its cousin used to live there before some developer came in and build 200 houses. Or their just running around trying to get away from humans. I know I am. I moved upstate to get away from the crowds. If you think there is an over population of deer than you should go where I used to live, there was probably 1 million people for every one deer you saw. We should open a hunting season against people if were so worried about population control.
My reply:
Care to elaborate with physical proof of the overpopulation of humans over deer?
Deer population in NY was around 20,000 in the early 1900’s, and currently there are well over 1,000,000 so that’s a 5000% increase over about 100 years (http://wildlifecontrol.info/pubs/Documents/Deer/Deer_factsheet.pdf).
Human population in NY was 19,378,102 according to the 2010 census. Population in 1900 in NY was 7,268,894 (http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0004986.html). That’s a 267% increase.
So again, what species is overpopulated in New York?
Then his:
Nice little research…but how would anyone know how many deer there really are? Do the deer hand in a census? To me a guess-timate holds no weight. Also who cares if there is such an increase in deer. The deer aren’t the ones who are on welfare, food stamps, un-employment, medicaid, out there committing murder, rape, robbery, not paying child support, polluting and littering…should I go on? One million deer compared to 20 million people is a ( in the words of Fucillo) “HUUUGE” difference. Who determines that the deer are “over populated” anyway? People who are inconvenienced by the deer eating some of their garden, or because maybe once in your life you might hit one with your car? Plus, we need one million bambi’s. Who else is going to keep all those trigger happy hunters entertained? Who cares about the increase rate? I’d rather see deer than people. Deer don’t walk around with their hand out.
And finally, my last reply to which I have not heard back from:
The argument you’re trying to use against me is the same exact argument I can use against you. Since the deer population can not be 100% accurately measured, you cannot determine if they are over or underpopulated. It seems to me that your main argument really is that deer are less detrimental to their own species. Yes, humans are on welfare, food stamps, etc (which really has nothing to do with our initial question on whether wolves should be reintroduced to the Adirondacks, mind you) and commit murder, fraud, and all other crimes that are defined in lawbooks made by humans. So it’s humans commiting crimes against humans. That will happen when the species has a more complex brain capable of extensive thinking, it comes with the territory. And about deer being an inconvenience… Along with deer walking around with their hand out… In the way you’re arguing, you treat the deer as if they were humans, thus if a deer is eating something out of someone’s garden, wouldn’t that be theft?
Trigger happy hunters? It’s a way to get food, and has been around since the beginning of time. All animals hunt for their food. Just because someone hunts, doesn’t mean they’re trigger happy. What’s next: reel-happy fishers?
Am I wrong here in that this guy is not providing any proof to his statements which are based on only his opinions? Also, if the guy hates humans so much and believes deer are so much better, why has he not offed himself?
