The Status of Deer in a Changing World Environment

Abstract

Changes in wildlife habitats throughout the world are accelerating as human populations continue to expand. Deer species have responded negatively to habitat loss or alteration from cutting of rain forests in Southeast Asia, Central and South America, and the Pacific Northwest of North America. Conversely, practices by the timber industry have contributed to increases in distribution and numbers of moose in Scandinavia and the Soviet Union. In China, India, and other countries of Southeast Asia, increasing pressures from agricultural expansion and livestock grazing have resulted in deer habitat loss, as well as reduced deer numbers and local extirpation of populations through increased hunting pressures, both legal and illegal. Although the production of meat from deer in captive herds continues to expand, pressures to increase agricultural crop production worldwide may have a far greater opposite effect on total deer numbers through loss of habitat. Industrial pollution, largely through its contribution to acid precipitation, is altering forests and other deer habitats in eastern North America and Eurasia with associated adverse effects on deer.