Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) proposes to hunt and trap bears and cougars and then kill them, claiming that this will help deer populations. This is an old disproved claim. Aldo Leopold wrote in 1949 that idea of killing predators to increase deer numbers was wrong.

“We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes—something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger-itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters’ paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view.” —Aldo Leopold, A Sand County Almanac, 1949.

Further predators are not the main cause of deer declines. The National Wildlife Federation , the Humane Society of the US, and WildEarth Guardians say that deer populations are down due to winter range reductions due to habitat loss and habitat fragmentation due to oil and gas wells and roads and housing developments . The Bureau of Land Management plans to allow 15,000 new oil and gas wells in deer habitat in northwest Colorado. The CPW is proposing restricting oil and gas activity between Dec. 1 and April 15. State may euthanize bears, lions to try to boost deer numbers Email the Colorado Parks & Wildlife Commission