The New Hotness

This herd, a family unit that’s been traveling around the neighborhood in recent weeks, paused for morning brunch in our neighbor’s yard. They generally cross the road at a dead run, but haven’t gotten themselves or anyone else killed. Yet.

They and their ilk are why our vegetable gardens must have ten-foot fences with robust supports. There are no understory plants left in the wooded areas and precious few young trees; the deer population is literally eating everything in sight.

Vassar College recently culled 60-odd deer on their preserve in about ten hours, much to the dismay of the local animal huggers. It wasn’t a hunt; professional sharpshooters took ’em out.

We have a proposal: if you like deer so much, adopt ’em, haul ’em home, and take care of the things. Let them eat your shrubbery, crap all over your lawn, and infect your children, but keep them off the streets and out of your neighbor’s yards. Fair enough?

And let’s not get started about deer ticks. Dutchess County is the epicenter of Lyme Disease infections, for well and good reason.