||| ORCASIONAL MUSINGS BY STEVE HENIGSON |||
We keep hearing that there is a “plague of deer” here on Orcas, and that people of good conscience who care about the natural environment should help to restore the proper balance by acting as the top-level predators that we are, and, each one of us, kill a deer or two for the good of the herd and of the island in general.
I cannot but agree that there is a huge Orcasian deer glut, but I do not believe that it is really necessary to make Annie get her gun in order to accomplish the desired end (of the deer). Instead, as I’ve noticed recently, the deer seem somehow to be bent on doing the job for us.
My wife and I had just gotten off of the ferry—the very first car off, for once—and were headed home under a deeply dark night sky. As we turned right to go past The Exchange, my wife noticed a doe, grazing late along the road. She pointed it out with a warning, and, just as she said it, the doe jumped out onto the highway, right into our path. I hit the brakes and twisted the wheel, and we missed her, but just barely. Although this is what roadside deer frequently seem to do, it still left us puzzled.
And then, recently, I had cause, at mid-day, to drive down Horseshoe Highway to the ferry landing. During the entire trip, I was following another vehicle at about four car-lengths distance. Both of us seemed to be very careful drivers, and we submitted ourselves to the posted speed limits all along the way.
But about halfway between McNallie Lane and Swan Road, a doe who was grazing peacefully on the west side of the highway suddenly decided that she had a pressing appointment elsewhere, and trotted out, right in front of the vehicle I was following. Its driver jammed on the brakes and came to a panic stop just inches short of the deer. I jammed on my own brakes, and my little old SUV came to a panic stop just inches short of the leading car’s rear bumper.
The doe looked at us a little disdainfully, and seemed somehow disappointed, as she completed her crossing and entered the woods at the edge of Driftwood Ranch. I was left with the distinct impression that she had, no doubt for some good ecological reason, decided to off herself, and that she was miffed that we hadn’t aided and abetted her carefully laid plan.
And then, coming back from Orcas Village later that same day, another doe (or maybe the same one) tried to ambush me at almost the same place. But this time I was on the lookout, slowed down as soon as I saw her, and quite easily stopped to let her pass when she darted out in front of me. This one, too, looked at me with what I thought was disappointment.
Perhaps it’s the pressure of the rut. Or maybe it’s because this year’s bucks are somehow less desirable than usual, although they all look fit and healthy to me. But for some, so far unknown, reason, several does seem to be unswervingly bent upon suicide, and they seem to depend upon us not to swerve as well, when we encounter them in our travels.
So it becomes a moral issue: Is it the right thing to do, to invoke the spirit of Dr. Kevorkian and assist these does toward their desired end? Should we just blunder on and let it happen, perhaps with some sort of snowplow device—a “doe catcher,” as it were—attached to our front bumpers, to minimize damage to our vehicles while maximizing death to the deer? Or should we do our best to avoid the whole issue, and the deer as well? As King Mongkut said in The King and I, “It is a puzzlement.”
Steve, as always.. thought provoking thoughts.
I’ve been having the same experience a lot lately. Each time, ready for the greeting.
I’m beginning to wonder if the deer arent under some interlocal agreement with the sherrifs for traffic control..
I also wonder what app they use to know our traffic patterns!! But this year seems much busier then normal!!
“semi-circadian migration:” based on ferry traffic patterns;
after so many years the wildlife have evolved to adapt to this regularity in their environment to control population size, just as in a less anthropocene milieu natural predators whether wolves or viruses, or limitation in natural resources, control population. There is a virus that causes rodents to be attracted to cats, there must be a novel mechanism that attracts normally self respecting deer to autos, their only natural predator today. Perhaps there is a special insurance program that will allow us to resume our appropriate role as apex predator in this local food chain and repair our vehicles after these inevitable encounters.
(I still think that darting ten dozen of them per year with birth control until their numbers stabilize is the best solution .. and less discomfiting to car bumpers or driver’s nerves.)
As you probably know, if there’s a doe on the side of the road, watch out for her passionate erstwhile mate, lurking back a ways, who likely will be the next to attempt crossing. Unlike chickens, who presumably want only to get to the other side, male deer have no more sense than politicians at this time of year.
Chuckling out loud at the feeling of being under siege! We try so hard and drive so carefully, but there always seems to be a deer bent on self-destruction!
I have often thought we need a sign just north of the ferry landing “Welcome to Orcas Island, speed limits enforced by suicidal deer” Perhaps with a graphic of a deer in a straight-jacket.