With deer populations rising on the Island, fueling the spread of tick-borne diseases, wildlife experts are keeping a close eye on this year’s deer hunting season.

Deer season begins Monday, Oct. 7 and continues through Dec. 31. Hunting is permitted Monday through Saturday, a half hour before sunrise to a half hour after sunset.

Archery hunting runs from Oct. 7 through Nov. 30, shotgun season follows from Dec. 2 through Dec. 14, and primitive firearms is from Dec. 16 through Dec. 31.

Hunting is permitted Monday through Saturday, a half hour before sunrise to a half hour after sunset.

Ray Ewing

Hunting is permitted Monday through Saturday, a half hour before sunrise to a half hour after sunset.

Ray Ewing

Martin Feehan, a deer and moose biologist for the Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife, said the state encourages hunting in the region as the deer population numbers are increasing on both the Vineyard and Nantucket.

“The Islands have kind of unique scenarios where there really isn’t any predation occurring, and so the only modes of mortality for deer on the Islands are predominantly either vehicle collisions or hunting,” Mr. Feehan said.

Deer have an incredibly high reproductive output. A single buck will impregnate three to four dozen females in a season, Mr. Feehan said. Fawns can get pregnant at six-months old and have a baby by the time they’re one year-old. At two years-old, they start averaging twins every year.

To try and keep the herd size down, the division has a pending proposal to add a January hunting season for the Islands next year, according to Mr. Feehan. The proposal will have to go through a hearing process before it is approved.

“The current proposal, as approved by the [state fisheries and wildlife] board, would be a full season for the month of January, allowing the use of primitive and archery equipment,” Mr. Feehan said. “Hunters would be able to utilize the new buck tags on their new license and then be able to purchase new antlerless permits for that January season.”

Last year the Island was projected to have unprecedented rates of deer kills but bad weather later in the season halted the upward trend, Mr. Feehan said. About 850 deer were harvested on the Vineyard and the Elizabethan Islands last year, according to state data. 

Patrick Roden-Reynolds, a public health biologist at Island Health Care and the unofficial “tick czar” of Martha’s Vineyard, operates the Agricultural Society’s deer locker, where hunters will hang their deer in a refrigerator until they can process the meat. 

The Vineyard has the highest rate of Lyme disease in the state, and lone star ticks have been gaining traction here. Both largely feed on the Island’s robust deer population. 

To help study the issue, Mr. Roden-Reynolds collects ticks from deer that are brought to the locker and sends them to various researchers across New England. 

“It’s hard for [ticks] to find a host, versus a mosquito that can fly to their host,” Mr. Roden-Reynolds said. “Ticks kind of sit and wait. So the higher densities of deer just make it much easier for them to randomly encounter one.”

In 2019 the locker started an incentive program to encourage hunters to take in more does to help curb the population. Hunters were paid $100 for each doe after the first two.

Mr. Roden-Reynolds decided to end the incentive program this year because it didn’t appear to be working as well as he had hoped.

“In the last few years, not many people were taking part in the program, and I figure there might a be better use for the funds to either reinvest into the cooler or better yet, help support the venison donation program,” he said.

Mr. Feehan said he is looking forward to a successful, and safe, hunting season.

“I think the biggest thing is for everyone to get out and enjoy the fall weather, and also for hunters to be able to harvest as many deer so we can deal with the over abundant population,” Mr. Feehan said.