Axios Boston reporters (here it is) that Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard are expanding deer hunting season and may even – gasp! – allow hunting on Sunday. the reason: diseases carried by ticks that the deer spread around. Lyme disease cases are 11 times higher on the islands and alpha-gal syndrome exploded from 2 positive tests in 2020 to 724 in 2024.
I don’t hold out much hope that this will work, though. There are over 100 deer per square mile in some areas, according to state data, and the target is between 12 to 18I “It’ll take at least 5,000 hunted deer to reduce tick populations on the islands.Last year, hunters killed around 800 deer.”
Deer overpopulation is, of course, a big problem in many places. Aside from ticks, they browse so much underbrush that they alter the composition of the forest.
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