Chad Forcey doesnt blame the Pennsylvania Game Commission for what he perceives as its failure to properly manage white-tailed deer.
He isnt surprised by it either, though.
The Game Commission is flawed by design, said Forcey, director of government relations for the Pennsylvania Landscape and Nursery Association. They were created for another era.
Forcey was one of several speakers who addressed a crowd of about 30 people Saturday at Westmoreland County Community College, site of one of the Deer in Your Backyard: How to Deal with the Challenges of Overabundant Deer in Your Community seminars being held around the state.
Most of the other speakers agreed with Forcey in suggesting that the Game Commission needs to a broader-based, sustainable, adequate source of funding if its to manage all wildlife for all of the people of the state.
One of those was Gary Alt, chief of the Game Commissions deer management section until resigning in December. Alt called it unfair to rely on hunters alone to fund wildlife management by buying licenses. He also said that asking Game Commission employees to manage all wildlife for all people under those conditions is equally ineffective.
I dont have any problems with the executive director of the Pennsylvania Game Commission. I dont have any problems with the board of commissioners or the agencys field staff either. Theyre trying to do whats best for wildlife, Alt said. They happen to be in a bad system.
If we dont make sweeping changes in funding, well all die before this problem gets solved.
Its up to hunters and especially non-hunters to make sure those changes get made, said Audubon Pennsylvania executive director Tim Schaeffer. Himself a hunter, Schaeffer said people need to carry three messages to Game Commissioners and elected officials: theres a need for diverse, stable funding for wildlife management, all wildlife should be managed for all stakeholders, and science should be used to make all management decisions.
When it comes to managing deer in urban and suburban areas, there also need to be some rules changes, said Bryon Shissler, a certified wildlife biologist with Natural Resource Consultants Inc. Contraceptives that can be used effectively on deer in those areas have not been developed yet, though the day when they are available is coming, perhaps within a decade. The reintroduction of large predators is not viable either.
Hunting can work in some though not all situations, if wildlife managers look at the hunts as deer control and not recreation and accordingly give hunters the right tools. That may mean allowing hunters to use bait to draw deer into areas where they can be shot, allowing them to share doe tags, longer seasons, higher bag limits, and the like.
Urban hunting also means relying on hunters who are highly skilled.
This isnt the place for first-time hunters. Youre looking for effective predators here, Shissler said.
Making the change to that kind of management funded by a broader base of constituents wont be easy, Alt admitted. Commissioners who have traditionally heard only from hunters, and lawmakers who follow the demands of voters, are going to have to hear from lots more people from a lot more backgrounds if they are to be expected to break away from tradition when it comes to managing deer.
There is no animal that is so controversial. There is no easy solution, Alt said. Were going to need leadership to get us through it, and plenty of it.
