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Overpopulation, Inbreeding Dooms Walden Deer

By Lee McGuire / 11 News

CONROE, Texas—Walden is where people come to live in harmony with nature, take in the scenery and watch the deer.

For years, June Roberts planted a garden of flowers deer don’t normally eat.

“They don’t like zinnias,” Roberts said. “But we’re noticing that they’re eating stuff now that a couple of years ago, they didn’t eat. So I think they’re getting hungrier all the time.”

When Walden’s General Manager Nancy Renfroe submitted the last deer census to Parks and Wildlife, the state told her there were far too many deer in the area for the population to survive.

“The last census was over 300,” Renfroe said.

“Basically, they’re trapped. There’s no way for them to get out of here,” Roberts said.

In short, the deer at Walden are starving. They’ve also started inbreeding, because there is no more room to expand.  Two deer have run into plate glass windows. One had its head caught in a wrought iron fence.

“There were two residents that developed Lyme disease. There was one resident that was head-butted while she was jogging,” Renfroe said.

There are still those in Walden who bring food to the deer. But even they are resigned to the sight of the feeders, which Parks and Wildlife will use this winter to attract as many as 200 deer.

Those deer will then be tranquilized and euthanized.

That’s hard news to take for people who come to see the animals.

“There is no good solution right now,” Roberts said.

When it’s all over, there will still be 100 deer left in Walden – in the woods, where residents wish they would have stayed.