Bambi To Police – ‘Don’t Tase Me Bro’

by John Laforet
posted on November 25th, 2009 at 00:25:04 am

I have to say watching the media, police, Toronto Zoo, and Toronto Animal Services reaction to a deer wandering downtown makes me oh so proud that I grew up along the Bluffs in the very natural community of Guildwood in Scarborough – a place where seeing a deer results in a smile and a heartwarming moment as one reflects on how lucky they are to live this close to nature, not a frantic call to 911 and a tasering.

Imagine answering ”what is the nature of your emergency Sir/Ma’am?” with this particular incident.

When I heard the Emergency Task Force was on the scene and had set up caution tape and a parameter around the resting deer, I was waiting for the crisis negotiator to come work out terms of surrender… Instead the police were waiting on backup from Toronto Animal Services and an ‘expert’ from the Zoo (hey, perhaps they could create an urban deer exhibit and stop fighting about pandas…)

Where was the army in all this? Had someone put in the call to Ottawa in case things got out of hand? I jest, naturally (no pun intended), but calling in someone from North America’s third largest zoo to consult on how to take down a resting doe is about as embarrassing as asking the army to shovel out bus shelters.

This is why the rest of the country thinks we’re idiots. A deer walks into downturn anywhere in Central Ontario… Is it news? Does a Zoo get involved?

I get that deers and downtown streets don’t mix. It sounds like the deer got that memo too.  Between hydro fields, ravines, rivers, strips of parkland and rail lines, there are a number of options for how a deer could get in and out of the core from a wilderness area.

It just seems to me this whole thing turned into a gong show over something that folks who were using some common sense they could have fixed by guiding the deer to the rail lines – and out of the core. Heck, run it toward Guildwood and it can join the couple that appear in the bluffs and on the surrounding backyards and streets.

Instead the police, animal services and the Zoo turn it into an epic production that saw Bambi tranquilized, tasered, trapped, transported and presumably released somewhere.

It’s like they saw a deer and hauled out the contingency plan for a man eating bear an went to town.

Growing up in Guildwood I saw a lot of deer whether up on Hillcrest, in the intersection at Prince Phillip and Catalina or in Sylvan, South Marine or Guildwood Parks. I recall once as a kid, a friend and I tried to see how close we could get before it would run when we found one in a wooded portion of the Guild Inn grounds near Spencer Clark’s old office. I can tell you from that experience, deer run fast and away from the person behind them.

There are Deer Crossing signs on Morningside and Ellesmere, both busy, populated areas where a deer visit doesn’t result in the Emergency Task Force coming out.

The fact that the 2.5 million of us and over two hundred years of human inhabitants hasn’t driven away the wildlife  is amazing.

I can tell you when I see a deer in my community in what is surely the prettiest part of Toronto I’ve never thought of phoning the police, the Zoo, Animal Services or felt what that deer in question really needed was a good tasering.

Downtown types should be appreciative the glass, steel and concrete community they’ve carved out hasn’t choked the life entirely out of the natural environment and come up with a better plan than shocking and drugging a mostly harmless (unless you’re in a car) animal.