Too many deer can create road hazards

To the editor:

On March 16 at approximately 6 a.m., our son left home to go to work in Waterloo. Less than two miles from home he struck a deer. At 11 a.m. trauma doctors in Iowa City worked to save his life. He had a ruptured spleen, several broken ribs, a collapsed lung and head and facial injuries so severe my wife and I could not recognize our own son. He also sustained a traumatic brain injury from which he may never recover.

Our son lives on the Black Hawk Bremer County line north of Dunkerton. These counties are two of the 26 counties the Department of Natural Resources allowed no does to be killed the first shotgun season. Each healthy doe produces from one to three offspring each year. We have a film of over 200 deer in one field a mile east of our son's house, yet the DNR says the herd numbers are down by 35 to 38 percent.

Every driver, motorcycle rider and passenger should have the right to expect safe travel on Iowa roads. Due to the overpopulation of the deer herd, no road in Iowa is safe. Iowa ranks third in the nation, third, for deer related accidents. There is something wrong when it seems greed, money and sport shooters can drive the DNR to supply more deer for them that takes precedence over public safety.

Merle Wilson

Jesup