"Too_Many_Tools" wrote in message
oups.com...
Funny...if I were the Mob I would be worried. ;)

I too am seeing far more wildlife show up in my backyard...foxes,
woodchucks, hawks, coyotes, deer and more deer...

Not by coincidence, we are having a major construction boom.

I agree that it is unnatural to see the critter kingdom on my doorstep
but I figure with what is going on, a little modification of lifestyle
goes a long ways. My pets have become indoor pets and a fence is around
the garden. Landscaping plants are slowly being replaced with types
that deer tend not to bother. I figure that one can try to fight the
trend or you can adapt to a changing world. Kind of like having a give
and take arrangement with my human neighbors. In retrospect, my
wildlife neighbors are much easier to get along with then the human
counterparts. ;)

That's an interesting fact, that you're adapting, too, to the changing
wildlife environment.

All kidding aside, I think it's a very interesting phenomenon. As our
suburban lifestyle evolves, especially the spread-out version (which starts
at around $800,000 in New Jersey, but maybe a quarter of that in parts of
Pennsylvania, for instance), we're somewhat less lethal to the wildlife than
we were, say, 50 or 75 years ago. I've lived in NJ since 1948, with a few
gaps along the way, and I've seen a definite evolution in this direction:
more of the common species, and a considerable restoration of the ones that
were gone from here, or nearly so, a half-century ago.

I'd like to know more details about it. We do have a damned good wildlife
department, IMO, but they didn't do it all themselves. I followed the return
of the ospreys here (DDT nearly did them in), and I know something about the
deer and the Canada goose (we're inundated with them; if you want a dozen
geese and don't care how you get them, you can ground-sluice that many on
any day in some of the fields in the western part of the state). We have 28
streams, they tell me, that support populations of wild brook trout, while
there were only about a dozen when I was a kid.

But I don't know about the coyotes, or many details about the bears. .
..except that camping in some areas can be a little dicey. And there are many
other species, less well-known, that I read are making comebacks.

It's all pretty interesting and I'll bet it would be interesting to study
seriously. If I had another life to spare, I'd spend it learning the
subject.

--
Ed Huntress