Will this story ever end? If you remember, after great consternation (including a protester holding a deer head he bought at a butcher shop) the park commission agreed to allow cops to shoot a whole bunch of deer within the boundaries of Shawnee Mission Park in an attempt to reduce the population from 200 per square mile to around 50. They got it down to around 75 before the archers got a chance* at them towards the end of December. Unfortunately the archers were relatively ineffective.

* The process for selecting the archers led me to believe that a pre-determined group of hunters was expected to be given the opportunity. After the final class was closed we were informed that the otherwise unnecessary bowhunter’s education course would be required regardless of experience, age, proximity, or anything else. Since Kansas does not require the class basically no one has taken it. One can only guess why they didn’t inform us during the late summer and early fall of this requirement…

So the deer head guy and his friends are back and hoping that the parks commission will install a plan to catch the deer and give them some form of birth control. No problem except for that whole $400-2000 per animal price tag. Oh, and the Department of Wildlife won’t approve the plan.

Unfortunately the precedent has been set that archery can’t handle the job even though it was not given a fair chance so I suspect we’ll see the police “sharpshooters” again next fall. I’ll keep you informed if I hear any different.