GRAND RAPIDS, Mich — Andy Albertson is Kent County Road Commission's "Deer Sheriff."
His job, outside of the winter months, is picking up deer carcasses across the northern part of the county.
While there hasn't been a big increase in car versus deer pickups from last year to this year, Albertson has noticed it getting busier over time.
On Friday afternoon, Albertson picked up around 20 deer.
"It is busier than five or six years ago," Albertson said. "I think that with the network of roads, the infrastructure of roads, infrastructure growing, housing growing, population growing, I think we're squeezing these animals out of their natural habitat."
Albertson's reasoning for an uptick in dead deer was reiterated by Human and Wildlife Interactions Specialist, Jared Duquette.
"Deer are very adaptable to humans, especially in some of these urban areas, as we're seeing more people develop areas, deer of finding little refuges to hang out," Duquette said.
Leadership from the City of Grand Rapids has also noticed an increase in deer accidents and nuisance calls.
At a public safety meeting in August, commissioners looked at the amount of carcasses public works employees have picked up over the years and found the numbers went up from 129 in 2019 to 301 in 2022.
Again, Duquette said the urban sprawl, in addition to a slow decline in hunters throughout the state at a rate of about 2 percent, could be pushing the animals into areas not seen before.
"So, without that, you know, that tool for us, especially, we're seeing deer just really kind of explode in some of these areas," Duquette said.
Regardless of these increases, Albertson is still happy to do his job.
"It is what I do, it's a public service position, and this is public service with a capital P," Albertson said.
Grand Rapids is working with the DNR to see if there is actually a deer problem in the city and if there is, they'll work with the department to figure out the next steps.
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