Hearty Hunter's Stew
• Prep: 25 min. Cook: 2 hours 50 min.
• Yield: 8 Servings

Ingredients
• 2 pounds boneless venison or beef chuck roast, cut in 1-inch cubes
• 2 tablespoons canola oil
• 4-1/4 cups water, divided
• 1/2 cup tomato juice
• 2 medium onions, cut in wedges
• 2 celery ribs, sliced
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• 2 bay leaves
• 2 to 3 teaspoons salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pepper
• 6 medium carrots, quartered
• 1 large rutabaga, peeled and cubed
• 6 medium potatoes, peeled and quartered
• 1 cup frozen peas
• 1 tablespoon cornstarch
Directions
• In a Dutch oven, brown meat in oil over medium heat. Add 4 cups water and scrape to loosen any browned drippings from pan. Add the tomato juice, onions, celery, Worcestershire sauce, bay leaves, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and cook for 2 hours, stirring occasionally.
• Discard bay leaves; add the carrots, rutabaga and potatoes. Cover and cook for 40-60 minutes.
• Stir in the peas; cook for 10 minutes. Combine cornstarch and remaining water until smooth; stir into stew. Bring to a boil. Cook and stir for 2 minutes or until thickened.

A deer hunt absolutely has to happen in town, and Mike Rauschenberger offering to conduct this for free is a good place to start. Between the accidents all over town from those avoiding or hitting deer and our properties becoming feeding grounds for these animals the time has come to act.

sounds good count me it deer hunting my whole life expert archer yeah we need it but this is a problem we kinda created ourselves but i will help out any time frank sciacca

I am a self professed nature lover, and the first time I saw a deer in our backyard six or eights years ago I was thrilled. Little did I know they would overrun our town and pose a threat to safety, health and my property! On countless occasions I have seen them grazing on the Jefferson School play field as well as others around town leaving behind their droppings for the children to step in. Worse yet, they carry ticks which can infect children and adults alike with Lyme Disease as well as many more tick borne diseases. I hope the town will finally face this issue and completely eradicate them from our town!

"Free" offer to hunt deer. How nice of them. Free offer to kill. Don't tell me it's "sport". Hunting is not a sport. Guns and arrows against animals who do nothing but walk around and eat (yes - everyone's "precious" plants). We have ruined their natural environment by building on every square inch of available land and now we want to kill them for trying to live. There are other ways of controlling them, but the towns don't want to pay for it. So I'm sure they will choose the lovely "free" offer. This will bring all kinds of crazy comments and attacks at me. Who cares. p.s they are not the only wild animal that carry ticks.

Jelsa, I can appreciate your passion as an animal lover and advocate for the deer. I too am an "animal lover", but I fully support a deer hunt as the most humane way to cull the deer overpopulation. If you ask any wildlife biologist, they will tell you it is more inhumane to allow the herd to get overpopulated, resulting in starving, sick and desperate animals. Unfortunately there are not, as you said, "other ways of controlling them", again ask any wildlife biologist. I would much rather have a deer quickly and humanely dispatched by an expert marksman than to think of deer starving and freezing to death in the middle of February. As with many things in life it comes down to the lesser of two evils.

I too was thrilled when I first saw deer in yard. Now after cleaning up deer dropping daily and losing $100s of plants a year I'm ready for a full blown deer hunt and eradication.

If the town doesn't approve a hunt, I would support the following alternatives:
1) Deer cage fights - the town would capture deer and host UFC style cage fights were willing participants could fight deer to death. 2 men enter, 1 men(or deer) leaves.

2) Deer Bullying - Repeated mocking and name calling until the deer kill themselves or transfer to a new town

On second thought just hunt them and use the meat to supply homeless shelters.

I'm not a big animal lover or huge nature lover, but I am against any unnecessary killing of anything. We are all God's creatures and all have a right to be here.
PS. I'm not a very religious person either, I just use my common sense when it comes to in human suggestions like this. There has to be a better way then just killing them.

The deer use the grassy area around the power lines as a highway throughout town. My husband often sees them standing in the middle of Bloomfield Avenue near Stop and Shop at 5:00 am on his way to work. They cross there to get to the wooded area off Kirkpatrick. A deer jumped over my car in November on Bloomfield near Passaic. He was trying to avoid my car, but his hoof caught my side window behind the driver (me), causing the window to shatter. Does anyone track their movement through the towns? You will find a pattern.

There is no other way then a control kill.. This has been a debate for years and the population keeps growing. The other night I saw 5 of them on my front lawn on Dodd Rd.
I am an animal lover however I don't want to see them hit by car's That breaks my heart to see them in pain. Let me ask this question, If they have a control hunt and you don't see or hear it will you miss those deer? Are they pet's? NO.. So lets thin the heard and within 2-5 yrs we will be having this debate again..

I agree with Jelsa 100%. I certainly do not want to see any creature hit by a car,but I have an idea, SLOW DOWN on Bloomfield and Passaic Avenues. I walk with my two yr. old granddaughter in her stroller, and people beep at me impatiently when I have a green light and they want to make a right on red! Are we so spoiled that any annoyance in our "busy" lives must be "taken care of" regardless of loss of life? AND, by the way, I worked for a Dr who treated Lyme Disease and it does not occur in Essex or Morris counties as much as Sussex in NJ. These are excuses to handle this in the cheapest manner possible. I NEVER see deer since these "hunts" have started. So, to all the brats in our area, enjoy your flowers, and I will pray you don't hit a child flying down the major roads.

I understand everything you say Scott and I thank you for remaining courteous in your post, while I, on the other hand, went a bit far. I do love children and animals very much, and feel we must be a voice for them and protect them, with children coming FIRST of course. Honestly Scott, I worked for a Dr who treated Lyme patients, and the cases in our area are few and far between as far as Lyme tick carrying deer. But, the droppings and other issues are certainly something to think about. I cannot and will not ever condone thinning the population by hunting. (Stubborn Irish woman!) Thank you for your insight.

Your comment was fine in the first place and I would probably starve before I hunted one myself. But perhaps we agree that SOMETHING has to be done as much as we love animals, and I do. But , in my view, people's health---your grandchild---come before the deer. Even one case of Lyme can be really bad for the person who has it and e coli can be deadly. There are more expensive alternatives to hunting,too. In any case, we will all slow down and happy St. Patrick's Day to you!

You know St. Patrick rid Ireland of snakes...Ya never know, he might help out with the deer. :)

Touche!!! LOL I know he suffered greatly in his lifetime, in many ways. He sacrificed for others throughout his life. It is a very interesting biography.

It looks like some posters here don't remember what they should have learned in middle school -- that prey animals (including large herbivores like deer) do not control their own numbers. That is the job of predators in a balanced eco-system, including large (dangerous) ones like cougars, wolves and black bears. If the hysteria surrounding last summer's sighting of a single female bear and her cubs is any indication, we in West Essex are not willing to live with large predators -- that means man needs to replace the predator function to bring deer numbers back in balance with their habitat. Whether by hunting or surgical sterilization (using birth control hormones like GonaCon is ridiculously expensive and worse, is not effective enough to reduce the deer herd), it still needs to be done.

And by the way, Rauschenberger presented a number that should have perked up everyone's ears (at least those who are biologists and / or have managed wildlife before) -- the local deer density is 50 per square mile -- that's at least TWICE what it should be, particularly if you value other wildlife species in addition to deer. And since an uncontrolled herd can double within size in 3-4 years in our area, the problem will only get worse. So if you're interested in ecological balance, and in using taxpayer dollars wisely, support annual hunts to bring deer numbers down, then evaluate other methods.