HELENA — Helena Police Department are counting how many deer are living within city limits and already seeing an increase in numbers.
This year's urban deer count began on October 16th. Animals are counted for a minimum of six days spread out over two weeks.
The HPD urban wildlife program coordinator and officers drive a predetermined route through the city at night beginning around 9 pm and shine spotlights to count the deer.
"The urban deer count we are doing annually gives us kind of a base idea of how many deer per square mile are actually within the city limits of Helena," Sean McCarthy, the urban wildlife animal control officer for the city says.
McCarthy says by determining how many deer live within city limits, it can be determined how to best manage the urban deer population.
"Kind of a surprise is that we are actually counting more deer this year than we ever have per night, so it is where are they coming from and where are they going?" McCarthy says.
After Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks review the data, they will set traps to capture and euthanize a portion of the urban deer population.
This year the goal is to focus on most of the culling to be on sick or injured animals.
McCarthy says when populations become too concentrated lots of problems can arise like car collisions, property damage and disease transmission, but that is not all.
"Then we have the conflicts between the deer themselves when they start overpopulating an area they will start competing against each other in that space and there will be much more conflict and aggression," McCarthy says.
All deer that are euthanized through this program are processed and the meat is donated to the Helena Food Share.
Animal control says it is important to make a call if any deer conflicts occur to better track that activity and keep both people and deer safe.
At this time the survey is not complete for 2024.
