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Sit in someone’s dining room or den in Southfield, and it’s not unusual to see deer prancing around the backyard, some eating freshly planted flowers. Some residents are fed up.
To address the issue, the city councils of Southfield, Farmington, and Farmington Hills have approved plans to use trained sharpshooters early next year to cull the deer populations in their communities, The Detroit News reports. A cull is an organized hunt to reduce overpopulated deer numbers.
Some argue the deer can cause car accidents and damage to the landscape.
But there is opposition from some Farmington Hills residents and the nonprofit Advocates for Michigan Wildlife, who contend that deer aren’t a problem. They are advocating for alternative solutions such as sterilization and planting deer-resistant plants, The News reports.
“The killing of wildlife for harming our ecosystem is a no-win solution,” said Kim Korona, speaking at a Farmington Hills council meeting earlier this spring, The News reports. “Humans are destroying the ecosystem because of urban sprawl and habitat destruction. If we start killing deer as the solution to saving our ecosystem, it is killing wildlife forever. It is indefinite. Until humans change our behaviors, we’re always going to have this problem.”
