A Wildlife Article from All-Creatures.org

Florida's Endangered Key Deer – is time running out to save them?

From Reality Checks with Staci-Lee
July 2024

Feeding wildlife isn’t just illegal it's a slow way to kill them. We humans never feed wild animals anything they would eat in the wild but instead processed crap food. I've often said the food we give wildlife isn't just toxic for them but for us as well since it's mostly contaminated with pesticides/fillers/preservatives that neither we nor wild animals are able to digest. Don't feed them work towards restoring their natural habitat instead.

The Florida Key Deer are a subspecies of the White-tailed Deer, only found on Big Pine to Sugarloaf Keys . Their adorable diminutive size make them popular for people to photograph and watch. We all know the more popular an animal the more prone they are to human caused problems it’s just a fact we can’t ignore. Over the years human feeding of deer has led to many being raised without fear of humans they need to survive.

Feeding wildlife isn’t just illegal it’s a slow way to kill them. We humans never feed wild animals anything they would eat in the wild but instead processed crap food. I’ve often said the food we give wildlife isn’t just toxic for them but for us as well since it’s mostly contaminated with pesticides/fillers/preservatives that neither we nor wild animals are able to digest. Don’t feed them work towards restoring their natural habitat instead. For more insight on this endangered species I spoke with Valerie Preziosi, President of Save Our Key Deer, Inc. a 501-c3 nonprofit.

Deer are naturally skittish darting off in any direction when sensing danger. Like most animals they’re curious about humans but prefer to watch from a safe hidden distance, often obscured by vegetation.

Valerie Preziosi has been saving the key deer for years and sees the obvious: “With all studies and model forecasts showing that sea level rise will inundate much of the Keys in the next 50-100 or so years, it is obvious the Key deer will lose their existing habitat. They will actually lose it much faster because of the lack of drinking water and effects of more frequent hurricanes. So the options are to either let them go extinct, or translocate them somewhere else. Short of just keeping a few isolated in zoos, the translocation areas will have to be free of other deer, otherwise they will interbreed and lose their unique genetic identity. While this somber forecast is pretty much accepted by all, the USFWS is doing nothing to plan and prepare for it.

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Please read the ENTIRE ARTICLE and SEE MORE KEY DEER IMAGES HERE.

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Posted on All-Creatures.org: July 11, 2024
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