Township seeks to curb deer numbers

Animal rights activists are questioning Princeton Township's new deer management program as the local government continues its plan to reduce the deer population.

Under the plan, White Buffalo, a wildlife management firm from Connecticut, will be hired to catch deer and destroy them. The minimum cost is $400 per deer kill.

Princeton Township's five-year deer management program aims to reduce the deer population from between 1,300 and 1,600 to approximately 500 deer.

Township Mayor Phyllis Marchand said the procedure is "instantaneous and humane." But animal protection groups disagree.

The New Jersey Animal Rights Alliance described the process as a "painful method of slaughtering." Along with the Mercer County Deer Alliance and the League for Animal Protection Voters, the group is distributing videos of deer being killed.

Animal rights supporters further argue that such operations have met with little success where applied. The resulting increase in food per deer merely increases the survivors' birth rate, they assert. They call it "a quick-fix, make-it-right approach."

Another grievance of the animal rights groups is the absence of a public hearing or discussion before the new method was decided upon. Initially, the idea was to trap and relocate them to a farm in upstate New York.

State management of deer herds has been an ongoing project, as the high deer population has been cited as the reason for a 10-fold increase since 1972 in car accidents involving deer collisions as well as for damage to crops and brush.

Last year, White Buffalo contacted the University, one of the largest landowners in the township, for permission to allow sharpshooters on its property. The University informed the sharpshooters, however, of its restrictive firearms policies. In the past, members of the University community, including bioethics professor Peter Singer, have spoken out against the deer hunt on humane grounds.