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Mamaroneck to conduct deer study with drone

Efforts to accurately assess deer populations in Mamaroneck will move forward, as a hired consultant gears up to survey the village using a drone.

According to Village Manager Richard Slingerland, it has been confirmed that the study will start on Dec. 31, 2016, and will survey several areas of the village particularly affected by the presence of deer such as Shore Acres, Orienta, Green Haven and Harbor Heights.

The three-day study will take place in multiple areas of Mamaroneck and is intended to track the town’s deer population. File photo
The three-day study will take place in multiple areas of Mamaroneck and is intended to track the town’s deer population. File photo

The drone study, Slingerland said, will take approximately three days and will cost $3,220.

According to Taffy Williams, the consultant hired to conduct the survey, the drone will use thermal and visible light imaging to provide the village with a sampling of various locations.

These images, Williams said—who is a wildlife rehabilitator with the state DEC and an FAA-licensed drone operator—will be sourced over at least three different excursions that could take as long as three hours each, and will then be analyzed for several weeks after they’re collected.

According to Williams, while there are other methods used to track deer, the use of drones will give the village the most accurate picture.

“There really is no other way to accurately assess numbers of deer,” she said. “Some people would swear by the pellet method, but it’s been widely discredited.”

A pellet-based method of tracking deer—which counts the number of deer pellets within a given area and then extrapolates that data—presents too many variables, according to Williams.

“One deer can produce a wealth of pellets,” she said. “Or there could be [an] opposite; if a deer is malnourished, they may put out just a few droppings.”

A study to track the deer was spawned in March from an Ad Hoc Deer Committee that was formed by the village Board of Trustees in November 2015 after Mamaroneck residents complained of an overabundant deer population exacerbating deer-related auto accidents, damage to landscaping, and the potential of contracting Lyme disease.

After Westchester County rejected pleas from both the city of Rye and the village last year for help culling their deer population, the village will now foot the bill for its own survey.