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Health & Fitness

Petitions Sent to National Park Service To End Killing Of Wildlife In D.C.'s Rock Creek Park

Two petitions have been sent to the Depertment of the Interior and the National Park service to halt the killing that started just before Easter and is scheduled to begin again this fall in the National Capital’s Rock Creek Park.

 The first Petition presents a new scientific analysis by Yale University forest ecologist Dr. Oswald Schmitz demonstrating that the data relied on by the Park Service as a basis for killing the deer last Spring do not demonstrate  that deer are having any adverse impact on forest regeneration in the Park.  The Petition also demonstrates that the real threat to the Park’s native vegetation is the increase in invasive exotic plant species that are destroying the native vegetation, causing the native deer to leave the Park in search of food.  A copy of the petition at http://www.mediafire.com/view/s57rky4zja0ckli/1-Petition.pdf  

The second Petition is a change.org petition signed by over 11,000 individuals who have asked the National Park Service to stop killing the deer because this “will forever change the character of this very special national park in the midst of our nation’s Capital from a haven of peace and tranquility to just one more place of violence.”  A live copy of that Petition can be found at http://www.change.org/petitions/national-park-service-don-t-kill-deer-in-our-nation-s-capital

We are requesting the Park Service to halt all further killing of the deer, especially when, under the sequester, the agency has been forced to eliminate or cut back much more justifiable and essential conservation programs throughout the country and even impose a hiring freeze.  

Instead of these lethal means, we  urge the Park Service to use  fertility control, an approach that is more effective in the long run and cheaper for the NPS in the short run.  NPS has rejected such alternatives in the past, but new information has emerged on the viability of using reproductive controls to suppress free-ranging deer populations.  In fact, this new information sheds doubt on many of the conclusions that were central to NPS’s rejection of a nonlethal alternative.


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