State Pares Hunt but Leaves Does, Fawns Fair Game : Environment: Activists concerned about San Diego County’s shrinking herd say they will continue the fight.

The California Fish and Game Commission voted Thursday to trim a month off the deer hunting season for archers in San Diego County, but turned down requests by animal rights activists and county supervisors to suspend hunting of does and fawns altogether so they can be counted.

Under a schedule adopted as part of the statewide deer hunting season, the commission agreed to restrict archers stalking both male and female deer to a season that runs from Dec. 1 to Jan. 31. The new season begins one month later than the traditional archery season. The season for rifle hunters will remain unchanged, running from Oct. 7 through Nov. 5.

In addition, the commission agreed to reduce from 200 to 170 the number of rifle permits for antlerless-deer hunting in the county, a move designed to make up for the fact that state game officials killed 30 of the animals late last year to study the condition of the herd.

But those decisions fell far short of the countywide moratorium on hunting does and fawns urged by some local hunters, animal protection advocates and the County Board of Supervisors--groups that called for the full suspension of hunting to study the deer population and see what could be done to replenish it.

“We’re not going to drop this issue,” said Sally Mackler, president of San Diego Animal Advocates. “It will be pursued. There’s always the legal system.

“We have critiqued and analyzed the environmental impact document that was prepared by the Department of Fish and Game, and there are many, many shortcomings in the document,” she said, referring to the department’s documentation to support the new season. “We may see the Fish and Game Commission in court.”

Campo hunter Bob Turner, who spearheaded the drive for the county moratorium, added, “I just think it’s terrible, and it is going to come back to haunt them.”

Yet Fish and Game staff members continued to maintain Thursday that there is no hard biological evidence to support the request for a moratorium. If anything, they say, their necropsies last year of the 30 antlerless deer from San Diego County showed that the animals were running extremely low on food. Hunting, they contend, would thin the herd and allow the rest to eat better and grow stronger.

“There’s as many deer as the habitat can support,” said Kenneth E. Mayer, a state wildlife management supervisor. “The cup almost runneth over.”

Mayer said current department estimates set the county deer herd at 5,800, down dramatically from about 26,000 estimated to roam the northern and eastern reaches of the county in 1949.

Taking the greatest toll on the deer population has been the county’s rampant growth, which is squeezing the animals out of their foraging areas. But there the agreement ends. The department claims that a sustained, reasonable hunting season and permit numbers will actually help restore the herd, by easing the competition for food and allowing younger fawns to grow.

Turner and Mackler, however, strongly disagree. If the herd is suffering, hunting will only claim the stronger animals and leave the weak behind, thus compounding the problem, they say.

“Say the deer are starving to death,” Turner said. “Wouldn’t you, as a non-hunter, let Mother Nature take its course and let Mother Nature cull out the weak? Now, if you turn the hunters loose on the herd, what are they going to do? They are going to shoot the prime animals, the best.”

Mackler said hunting should be suspended because, of all the factors hurting the deer herd, it is the only one the state has control of.

“It is the one pressure we can relieve,” she said.

Supervisor Mayer said Thursday that last year’s totals show that hunters are not killing that many deer in San Diego County. Of a possible 8,200 deer allowed during the 1989 season, hunters killed only 355, he said.