I want to say something about how the pig control works in my area, even though it isn't Puna, still East Hawai'i.
What happens is that a pig family will show up and start ravaging the garden and the whole yard. There are stream gulches here that are real tough for humans to negotiate, but the pigs do it easily. They hang out in the gulches by day and rampage and destroy by night.
A hunter will get called in, but it's not exactly fun sport hunting. Because it is private land, he has to be very careful. All the neighbors have to be warned that a firearm might be discharged at night, so that no one calls the police thinking someone just got shot in a domestic dispute.
Sometimes the hunter will set snares, but he has to check them daily, and the snares can also catch household pets, so that's not good. (One animal here that was snared had its guts eaten out by rats as it dangled, after that I said no more snares on my land where that could happen to my pets.)
With all that effort, the hunting is not very effective, and the damage to the vegetable garden and landscaping is always heavy.
There is no way to keep pigs or deer roaming only in areas that hunters are free to go and not on private property. Nobody wants strange hunters roaming at will through their back yards, especially at night. So basically it turns into an eradication process that each home owner has to negotiate with a hunter and so many nights of having potential gunfire around the house.
There is nothing desirable about it, and having deer would be much worse!
I have nothing against the pig hunting culture here, but if people imagine that the pig hunters keep any sort of control over the population -- how can they? They can only hunt in designated areas, whereas the pigs have no such limitations for foraging, and neither would deer.
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I think this is great. I hope the axis dear are here and spread over the entire Island. They will help to eat down all the invasive plants that has taken over this place. You will see more and more animals introduced secretly now that this Government and Sierra Club is adamant about killing off all our mountain sheep. They like push, we going push back!
quote:
They will help to eat down all the invasive plants that has taken over this place.
Doesn't sound like you know much about deer's eating habits. They are very good at finding the best plants, like food crops. And how do you know that they won't like the native plants best of all? You don't.
A lot of the invasives are trees. Deer only eat up to a certain height. Deer prefer the tender new growth, like what is in the veggie garden.
What a horrible philosophy. You will wreck the ecosystem because you don't like the policy with the sheep.
Well, thanks for posting so we know there is at least one person who thinks it's a good idea to overrun the island with smuggled in wildlife.
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Hello All
First off, Senator I would like to say that I am much more concerned about snakes, horned lizards, and flying squirrels establishing themselves in Hawaii than axis deer. All of these would be impossible to eradicate much like the coqui, and snakes can actually kill people!
Actual pictures of axis deer roaming the big island have yet to be released to the public, I won't fully believe it until I see it!
On to my response to many posts about this topic. I am afraid that many of you are not as much of an expert on the matter as you may think.
Axis deer will eat anything including many invasive plant species such as grouse which is a terrible thorny bush taking over large portions of palila habitat on mauna kea. They will be doing us a favor. Unfortunately they will not spread as far and wide as you expect, deer need sitting water to drink so they will not survive in dryer parts of the island. Unlike many of you may believe, axis deer are originally from India. So please stop comparing them to north american whitetails, they come from completely different environments. Axis deer actually do not multiply like rabbits, they generally have one fawn a year. The presence of deer in the state is not a recent thing, they have been adapting and evolving here since 1868 (our wild sheep arrived in 1786) which is long before any of us or even our ancestors arrived. The first axis deer where a gift to King Kamehameha (same story for the wild sheep) and were protected and wanted on Hawaiian lands, unlike our haole ancestors haha. Now in recent times we suddenly feel the need to kill of these amazing animals which arrived and adapted to this Hawaiian environment just the same as we have. The only difference is that we have damaged the environment and killed off many more native species than any wild deer or sheep ever could. What next, start eradicating certain ethnicities of people because they arrived here later than others and cause damage to the environment? I don’t think so. In killing off wild deer, sheep, goats, and pigs in Hawaii we are actually killing off our culture and way of life.
I have to agree with oink on this, if the deer are already here we have to make the best of it. I'm surprised that nobody mentioned that axis deer and mouflon sheep hunting account for most of lanai's economy. This offers a great opportunity for profit. Currently hunting and wildlife watching accounts for nearly $230 million towards our economy! ( http://www.hawaiistateassessment.info/SW...eation.pdf) This number will only increase with the presence of axis deer.
As kipa mentioned, you kill off all of our sheep on the mountain and there will be a large flux of other animals brought in to fill the void haha
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You haole's are the worst invasive species. You destroyed America and its people and now you come to Hawaii and think you know everything. You people are parasites!
SaveHawaiisWildlife -- thanks for pointing out that axis deer have different habits. If I have been wrong to put all deer in the same basket, good to know. I'll read up on them. I admit to having a prejudice against deer because of years of bad experiences with mainland deer.
kipa, it is sad that you think of haoles as one people. There have been so many different cultures that came to America, and they aren't all alike at all.
I have so much to learn here. I certainly don't know everything or think I ever will about Hawai'i -- but each year I learn more, drop in the bucket, yes. [  ]
I'd like to hear what you have to say about the sheep. I wish you could say it with less anger.
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Dear KathyH,
I by no means are pointing you out. Everyone has something to offer and that is what makes this place so special. You are correct though, there are many of us that have become angry over the years due to what
is happening.
The sheep issue goes back a long way. It is a lengthy topic so I will just keep it short for now.
The Sierra Club sued our Gov't 30 years ago to force them to eradicate all our wild sheep because the sheep eat the leaves of the Mamane tree, and the Mamane tree seeds are part of the Palila bird diet.
The problem is this... There are hundreds of thousands of mamane trees with millions of seeds right now but the Palila bird numbers are still declining. How can they blame the sheep for the decline in the Palila bird
when currently there is millions of seeds for them to eat.
I can understand that over the next 100 years or so that with no new mamane tree seedlings that future populations could be affected as the older trees die off, but over the past 100 years the Palila has already declined drastically
and their food source has not declined.
The sheep population has declined as well. From well over 30,000 sheep to a few hundred on Mauna Kea in that past few years.
These people just have it stuck in their head that the sheep need to go and are not interested in real science to find out why the palila bird numbers are in decline. For now the sheep are the scape goat for lack of true research into the matter.
This is what frustrates us. When these animals are gone we will never get them back.
Just another food source gone from an Island that has to import most of our goods. So much for "eat local"!
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Looks like the hunting lobby is out in force. Lecturing other people about looking after the environment, what a joke, they're responsible for purposely introducing invasive species to locations all over the world.
Certainly, people are an invasive species too in Hawaii, but then you have to include ALL people.
Interesting information about the axis deer, thanks. Are they definitely on the Big Island, or not?
kipa,
thanks so much for explaining what is making people mad regarding the sheep. Thank you for educating me on this. I'm surprised I never heard someone talk about the sheep in all this time -- see, there is always a lot to learn.
I don't know what the counter-argument would be, but on the face of your argument I would support your position. Not that I have any power.
I am also not one of those environmentalists who is fervent about making the world bend to the task of saving one bird. Maybe I should be, but I don't feel that way. I feel that we as humans should stop reckless actions that extinguish species, but on the other hand, species disappear all the time as part of evolution.
I also understand that people want to hunt to put food on the table. I am sorry the powers that be are bent on putting an end to the sheep resource.
Rampantly invasive species do scare me. As I said, the pigs are a big issue. If only the pigs could be up in the hunting preserves and not destroying food gardens. If the deer will stay out of my garden, I have nothing against them. I'm trying to raise food too.
I would like to hear an accurate tale of what impact the deer have had on Maui. The report published by senkahele in his top post was alarming to me, as it indicated the deer do eat everything. When I looked axis deer up yesterday, I read that they eat grasses. They can have all the grass they like around my place ... just leave my veggies and fruit alone! I also read that they aren't very susceptible to ticks or to carrying diseases like the whitetails, so that was good.
It seems to me that the impact of axis deer on a Hawaiian island can't be a mystery, as we have Maui as a test case for a major island. We should be able to agree on the facts of how much damage they cause.
ETA -- I live in an area full of stream gulches, so I think the deer would have plenty of water to get settled into Hamakua coast.
btw, you said that to "us" haoles "You destroyed America and its people" -- but I am part Native American (Sierra Miwok, California tribe) and my sons are more so due to their dad's Cherokee/Sioux heritage. My current husband is 1/4 Shoshone. So some of us are a mix of the invaders and the invaded, as is true in Hawai'i.
And as someone who has a lot of Irish in me -- if you want to read a story of thousands of years of occupation and oppression and attempted genocide, read about Ireland, and Wales too (I have a good bit of Welsh Quaker stock too). Other people here could speak to their European ancestors who experienced oppression and persecution.
Very few of us come from the stock of arrogant missionaries, and even those who do are their own people; they may not subscribe to how their ancestors behaved at all.
I don't think it is fruitful to put people all in the same category because they are Caucasian, or Asian, or Pacific Islander either.
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Re: Threat of axis deer
Sen Kahele with all due respect,
It seems to me the criminalisation of augmenting food sources on island may not be the best focus in this time of economic implosion. Just today the forecast of a double dip recession and more hunger among the poor is in the news.
Judging by how the Coqui invasion has been handled by the department
Most likely not a good idea to get them in a position to send folks to jail .
Lets get some jobs in place, Give the schools a hand and tackle the difficult issues before we raise a tempest in a tea cup about deer that ultimately will become a sustainable food resource.
Regards
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