Beliefs about Ecological Impacts Predict Deer Acceptance Capacity and Hunting Support

Abstract

Ecological impacts of deer overbrowsing often lead resource managers to recommend deer control through hunting, which may be strongly opposed by local residents. Adaptive impact management argues that understanding wildlife impacts of concern to the public can improve wildlife management. However, research on public wildlife acceptance capacity for deer, and on support for hunting, has emphasized concerns about household impacts and deer well-being, general environmental beliefs and attitudes, and beliefs about consequences of hunting, but not public concerns about deer ecological impacts. Our survey of neighbors of urban wetlands shows that beliefs about deer ecological impacts are statistically significant predictors of deer acceptance capacity and of support for hunting, controlling for other factors. Including ecological-impact beliefs adds substantially to the explained variance in deer acceptance capacity, and slightly to the explained variance in support for hunting.

Keywords:

• adaptive impact management
• environmental impacts
• hunting
• public perceptions
• wildlife acceptance capacity

Acknowledgments

We gratefully acknowledge the support of the late Prof. Joan Ehrenfeld, and the suggestions of our colleagues on her multidisciplinary research team on questions for the survey instrument, particularly those on deer impacts. Although the research described in this article has been funded in part by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (see Funding), it has not been subjected to the agency's required peer and policy review and therefore does not necessarily reflect the views of the agency, and no official endorsement should be inferred.

Notes

Note. Varimax normalized rotation.

Note. Standardized coefficients.

†p < .10, *p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001 or better.

Deer density counts were available for only two of the five sites: 30.5/km² at Ash Brook, and 139/km² at Lenape (for details see Johnson and Horowitz 2014).

Ash Brook neighbors were questioned about an actual hunt 8 months earlier. Responses of the few (19 of 60) aware of that hunt were not significantly different from responses of neighbors of other sites about hypothetical hunts.

One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) identified significant differences by site in hunting support and effectiveness (ps < .01) and in natural area harms and deer acceptance capacity (ps < .05). Post hoc tests (Tukey's HSD for unequal N) showed Lenape neighbors reported, relative to Dismal and Polansky neighbors, greater hunt support (ps < .10 and .05, respectively) and hunt efficacy (ps < .05 and .01, respectively), and relative to Dismal neighbors lower deer acceptance capacity (p < .05) and natural area harms (p < .10). Using Lenape as the reference value and dummy variables for the other sites, we repeated Table 3 regressions including ecological impacts (results available from first author). Adjusted R ² increased by less than two points in both cases; perceived site biodiversity lost its marginal significance in explaining hunting support. Dismal Swamp neighbors exhibited more deer acceptance capacity than Lenape neighbors (β =−.14, p < .05), and Polansky neighbors were less likely to support hunting (β = −.08, p < .10).

Repeating Table 3 regression analyses with demographic variables added little to explained variance; hunting support was now significantly predicted by natural benefits rather than natural harms.

For example, substituting a Total Benefit index for our two benefit indices, as suggested by factoring results in Table 2, did not change results of analyses in Table 3 in either significant predictors or variance explained. Details are available from the first author. Correlations of household and ecosystem benefits (r = .60) and of their harms (r = .53) merit further study.

We note other findings in Table 3 relevant to the WAC literature: (1) despite prior studies' emphasis on beliefs in household harms, we found that disbelief in household benefits was more influential; (2) the more people think natural control of deer numbers is inhumane, the less likely they are to want managers to limit deer numbers, the opposite of what might be expected; and (3) although, as expected, men had lower deer acceptance capacity (nonsignificant) and greater hunt support (p < .01) than women, surprisingly they rated leaving deer control to nature as more humane (p < .10) and hunting as less humane (p = .001) than did women; both genders rated hunting as more humane than letting nature take its course.