The Knoxville News-Sentinel reported recently that the deer population in the Cades Cove are of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park was shrinking - but that the decline was probably a good thing.
In the early to mid 1980s, according the the article, deer counts in the cove often logged 300 whitetail deer a night. The article quoted Bill Stiver, a wildlife management specialist for the park, as saying that today the deer counters are "lucky to get 100."
The result of the smaller population is a healthier, more robust herd with bigger deer. Stiver told the News-Sentinel that the Cades Cove deer herd "is in as good a shape as it's been in during recent years."
The decline of the Cove's deer herd has been mostly the work of coyotes, bears and (until recently) red wolves.
"It's a tough life for a fawn out there," Stiver told the paper. "People don't like to accept it, but it's the weak that get preyed on."
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