Tifft Nature Preserve Management Plan - Buffalo Museum of Science

White-tailed Deer
The white-tailed deer is one of the major wildlife attractions at the preserve, but
also one of the biggest management challenges. The recovery of white-tailed deer
populations across the continent from unregulated hunting and habitat loss in the past is
a conservation success story, but now many communities are dealing with the reverse
problem of too many deer. Deer populations in some rural, urban and especially
suburban environments have expanded beyond both natural and cultural carrying
capacities and are damaging natural areas and creating negative human-deer
interactions. Negative impacts to the natural environment include a decrease in forest
vegetation diversity (Ness 2003, Waller and Alverson 1997), reduced or absent tree
regeneration (Ness 2003), and changes to bird communities due to changes in forest
vegetation composition and structure (McShea and Rappole 2000). Undesirable
human-deer interactions can include deer-vehicle collisions, damage to gardens and
ornamental plants, and a potential increase in human disease occurrences such as
Lyme disease. An overpopulation of deer harms the herd itself because animals in high
density environments can be malnourished, nutritionally stressed, and susceptible to
disease. The causes of these deer population increases vary by location, but are
usually a combination of the following factors: 1) reforestation of formerly cleared land
creating a highly fragmented habitat of woods and open areas (including grasslands,
farm fields, lawns and parks), 2) lack of predators (both natural predators and humans
where hunting is prohibited), and 3) supplemental food sources (both through deliberate
feeding and unintentionally on agricultural crops or ornamental plants). An increasing
frequency of mild winters in some areas also contributes to deer population growth
since the herd is not naturally controlled through winter die-offs.
The size of the deer population at Tifft Nature Preserve is well above natural deer
densities for the region and the impact on the preserve’s vegetation, especially woody
trees and shrubs, is apparent. Exact data on deer densities at the preserve is being
collected, but observations of 30 or more deer at a time are not uncommon. The
following table (Table 1) lists research studies throughout the northeast where deer
densities were at levels where negative impacts were being observed. When examining
the deer densities, keep in mind that the entire 264-acre preserve is approximately 1.1
km 2 .
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