Letters to the Editor: Blaming Catalina’s deer for fires is unfair justification for a ‘mass slaughter’
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- A new conservation plan seeks to shoot thousands of mule deer on Catalina Island, with officials citing wildfire risk concerns.
- Critics dispute the wildfire threat claim, arguing that deer eat the very brush that fuels fires and calling the plan an inhumane mass slaughter.
- Island residents report feeling excluded from the decision-making process, with some proposing relocation as a humane alternative.
To the editor: Catalina Island should not become a killing field (“New conservation plan seeks to shoot Catalina’s deer on the ground instead of from helicopters,” Oct. 8). The claim that deer are a wildfire threat has been disputed by our own county fire chief. Deer eat the very brush that fuels wildfires.
Blaming deer for fires is a convenient rationale for a cruel and unnecessary mass slaughter. The real drivers of fire danger on Catalina are drought, wind and unmanaged vegetation — not wildlife.
Wiping out thousands of deer with professional hunters is not conservation. It’s drastic and inhumane. I continue to hear from Catalina Island residents who feel betrayed by the Catalina Island Conservancy and shut out of the process. The conservancy should retract this plan, get real input from Catalina residents and find a balanced, compassionate path forward.
Janice Hahn, San Pedro
This writer is a Los Angeles County supervisor.
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To the editor: Instead of killing the mule deer because someone isn’t doing their job, why not catch them, make sure they are healthy and relocate them to the deserts of California and Arizona?
Lee Armstrong, Yucca Valley
