Every year the continent’s most dangerous wild animal kills about 200 Americans, injures 29,000 others, causes $4 billion in vehicle damage, spreads debilitating diseases to tens of thousands of humans and dogs, destroys gardens, wildflowers, and herbs, threatens forest sustainability, and damages native ecosystems.

That animal is the white-tailed deer. It is grossly overpopulated in the eastern half of the nation because its major predators — wolves and cougars — have been eliminated and because suburban landscapes have created ideal deer habitat. In rural areas hunting provides only limited control; in heavily settled areas it provides none.