{"id":252526,"date":"2025-10-31T15:04:17","date_gmt":"2025-10-31T15:04:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/252526\/"},"modified":"2025-10-31T15:04:17","modified_gmt":"2025-10-31T15:04:17","slug":"oak-bay-contraception-program-for-deer-drives-down-population","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/252526\/","title":{"rendered":"Oak Bay contraception program for deer drives down population"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>From 2019 to 2022, an <a href=\"https:\/\/cheknews.ca\/20-does-tagged-in-first-phase-effort-to-manage-urban-deer-in-oak-bay-436354\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">experimental trial program <\/a>took place in Oak Bay where deer were being vaccinated with an immuno-contraceptive.<\/p>\n<p>The aim was to test whether a non-lethal approach, like using birth control, could effectively control the urban deer population.<\/p>\n<p>Now, for the first time, the numbers are in, according to Alina Fisher, a wildlife biologist with the <a href=\"https:\/\/uwss.ca\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Urban Wildlife Stewardship Society<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe found that immuno-contraception is actually effective at reducing the deer populations. We saw an immediate response with the fawns decreasing the following year after it was initially applied,\u201d Fisher said.<\/p>\n<p>Watch below:<\/p>\n<p>She said it took several years for any noticeable change to appear in the adult population.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe reduction for the fawns was 65 per cent just in the following spring after immediate immuno-contraception. So it was very effective, very quickly,\u201d Fisher said.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the program\u2019s success, deer are still noticeable across Oak Bay and neighbouring municipalities.<\/p>\n<p>Oak Bay Mayor Kevin Murdoch says the deer are still regularly culled by vehicles.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe don\u2019t have any direct measure of exact deer population. We have some proxies, most notably dead deer that are picked up the street from our public works,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat went down considerably after the contraception. It\u2019s going back up now \u2013 of course we haven\u2019t applied the immuno-contraception for a couple of years,\u201d Murdoch said. <\/p>\n<p>According to the district, vehicles struck and killed a high of 85 deer in 2021, and that\u2019s dropped to 62 last year.<\/p>\n<p>The mayor says he would like to see the program continue.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEverything that we\u2019ve seen so far appears that the contraception is effective, and it makes sense, the deer turnover is fairly high,\u201d Murdoch said. \u201cAnd if they stop fawning then there\u2019s less deer being produced.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The municipality is meeting with the province in November to determine whether the program should be reinstated and funded again.<\/p>\n<p>Oak Bay received a grant of $42,000 in fall 2019 under the Provincial Urban Deer Cost-Share Program for the trial.<\/p>\n<p>READ PREVIOUS:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From 2019 to 2022, an experimental trial program took place in Oak Bay where deer were being vaccinated&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":252527,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[117792,117793,49,48,117794,117795,66,1062,323],"class_list":["post-252526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-alina-fisher-wildlife-biologist-urban-wildlife-stewardship-society","tag-black-tail-deer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-kevin-murdoch-oak-bay-mayor","tag-oak-bay","tag-science","tag-video","tag-wildlife"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=252526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/252526\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/252527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=252526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=252526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=252526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}