tick populations and the risk of Lyme disease can be cut substantially by maintaining the deer population below about 10 deer per square mile. When the population is below four deer per square mile, even the secondary effects of climate change become irrelevant to Lyme risk. Yet, the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife continues to set deer population targets above these thresholds, at 10 to 15 deer per square mile in the northern part of the state and 15 to 20 deer per square mile in the southern part of the state. The reasons have little to do with wildlife conservation and everything to do with economics.
US Wildlife Policy Is Misguided and Outdated—Let’s Fix It
The “Adventure Journal” puts some of this into perspective, in this sad state of land use: “From Golf to Wilderness, This Is How the US Uses Its Land.”