An ambitious plan to eliminate about 10 percent of the estimated 30,000 white-tailed deer inundating eastern Long Island has been severely scaled back following protests and a court challenge by animal-welfare advocates and others.
The plan announced last summer called for the killing of up to 3,000 deer by sharpshooters. The proposal by the US Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Services division and the Long Island Farm Bureau has since been downgraded to a goal of 1,000 deer.
Federal, state and local officials have said the deer significantly damage vegetables and other crops in Suffolk, the state’s highest-producing agricultural county.
They say the deer also are responsible for hundreds of car accidents and are carriers of ticks that spread Lyme disease.
“It’s been absolutely devastating,” said Scott Russell, the supervisor of the town of Southold on the northeastern tip of Long Island.