Immunocontraception offers a non-lethal alternative to culling for managing overabundant deer populations in parks, islands, and suburban areas, reducing welfare harms of both overpopulation and lethal control.
Culling of deer populations through shooting has significant welfare costs: wounding rates, stress from pursuit, and orphaning of dependent fawns. In suburban areas where public shooting is impossible, deer populations may grow until starvation or vehicle collisions become the primary mortality causes - both involve significant welfare costs. Immunocontraception prevents these outcomes through population stabilization without lethal intervention. Individual animals receive a brief capture or darting stress, but this is time-limited. Long-term, effectively managed contraceptive programs produce stable, healthy populations without the chronic welfare costs of overpopulation.