By Jeremy Varner
If you fall off the ladder cleaning gutters you can call the ambulance. If your water meter is leaking you can call Watershed Management. But who do you call if a coyote is eating your chickens? It turns out that the Georgia Department of Natural Resources (DNR) has a team dedicated to wildlife in Metro Atlanta.
I sat down for coffee with Ellie Hanson who is a Wildlife Technician Supervisor with the DNR’s Urban Wildlife Program. The program is a team of four people who responded to human-wildlife interactions in Cobb, Clayton, DeKalb, Fayette, Forsyth, Fulton, Gwinnett, Henry, and Rockdale counties. They also have one team member in the Savannah area. The program began in 2019 and is still growing. Hanson has been with them for three years and they are looking to add another team member this year.
Since 2019, the program has received 18,803 total calls. Ms. Hanson said the two species they get the most calls about are deer and coyotes, with foxes and raccoons close behind. But they get calls about all kinds of wildlife, including bears, alligators, bobcats, geese, opossums, hawks, and skunks. Many times, the team can resolve a call over the phone by providing education about wildlife, but will come out if needed.
An example of this is if someone finds a deer fawn on their property. Folks unfamiliar with white-tailed deer may think the fawn was orphaned, but doe deer generally leave their fawns for long periods of time during the day. The fawn lies very still on the ground while the mother eats nearby, returning occasionally to nurse and to check on the fawn. Fawns are exceptionally well camouflaged and lying quietly keeps them safer than walking around the woods, since they aren’t fast enough to escape predators. However, if a doe is struck by a car and dies, orphaning the fawn, then the DNR team may come out to collect the young deer.
Human and wildlife interactions are unavoidable. It doesn’t matter that you don’t go into the woods messing with the animals, or that you’d like the animals to return the favor. We are in “the woods” already. There is no hard boundary between the city and the forest. Atlanta is built in the forest and keeps growing farther into it. Increasing human population and development means that there is decreasingly suitable habitat for wildlife. At the same time, there are habitat corridors like the Chattahoochee River, the creeks of the South River, or the transmission line corridors that allow animals to move throughout the region searching for new homes. Young-adult animals need to move out of their parent’s house just like our own children. Sometimes these animals find a comfortable place to stay in our own backyards.
Hanson said the best way to get rid of an unwanted animal hanging around is to remove all the benefits that your yard provides. Bird feeders, trash cans, or pet food bowls can provide a buffet that is hard to pass up. But if there is no food then the critters will usually move on to other places where they can find something to eat.
Check out the DNR’s website for more information, a cool map, and several informative graphs: https://georgiawildlife.com/urbanwildlifeprogram.
