Mississippi Deer Overpopulation

The environmental issue I am researching is the overpopulation of deer throughout the state of Mississippi. Being from Mississippi and hunting deer, I know first-hand that the deer population is remarkably high. The Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks has stated that the deer population is about 1.75 million. This is a prominent issue for many varied reasons. One of those reasons is the scarcity of food for the animal. Overpopulation can lead to issues like starvation and malnutrition, which leads to more destructive foraging behavior. Additionally, when talking about the destructive behavior, the freeze experienced last winter, killed off the majority of the animal's main food source being acorns. Nutrition plays a huge …show more content…
The Mississippi Department of Transportation stated that in 2022, there were 3,000 accidents caused by deer. These accidents are not only deadly for the deer, but also for the person driving and anyone else inside the car. The movement of deer is what causes these accidents, which leads me into my next reason. Which is that overpopulation in an area can cause deer to relocate to less occupied areas. When deer move, they may cross state lines, enlarging the population in another state. The neighboring states of Mississippi are already dealing with high deer populations, and with the continuous growth in each state causing deer to move. This creates an endless cycle, which makes it harder to control the population …show more content…
My first idea is to change the hunting season to start earlier and last longer. While the hunting season starts in early October, I believe the season should start in the middle or end of September. Along with the early start, I think the season should end in the middle of February instead of late January. The new season needs to be put into effect to keep the deer population under control. Another way I believe to solve this issue is to allow hunters to kill more deer in a season. Hunters are allowed to kill a limited number of deer based on the region they hunt. With this, I believe that hunters should have less restrictions on their kill limits based on the region they hunt. My third and final reason to help lower the population is to reintroduce and grow predator populations in rural areas. With this intention, hunters will need to be informed to not kill as many predators to help lower the deer population. Also, with this, not only do local civilians need to be cautious when letting pets out at night, but farm owners especially need to for the sake of livestock. A smart thing to do with the reintroduction is have the predators chipped to keep track of where they are in case, they leave the permitted area. There have already been several methods tried by the state to try and lower the population, but none have been fully successful so

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