Claiming they want to preserve the deer population from fire ants,
Texas vivisectors killed more animals in two months than the ants
have in seven decades.
In 1998, at the request of Texas Tech University experimenter
Mark Wallace, 25 pregnant deer were captured from the Welder Wildlife
Refuge in Texas. The panic-stricken animals were chased down by
helicopters and caught with nets shot from guns. Their legs were
bound, and hoods were placed over their heads, then they were
trucked to holding pens. Eight does died of “capture myopathy”—the
stress of the terrifying ordeal literally killed them. Another
died of internal injuries after she repeatedly tried to jump over
the fence confining her. Three does managed to make it over the
fences, but no one knows how seriously they were hurt during their
escape.
What was the point? Experimenters from Texas Tech, the University
of Texas, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department and other state
institutions claim that the aggressive, stinging South American
fire ant, who came to the U.S. 70 years ago, can kill fawns. Not
that they have a soft spot for the fawns—they’re thinking about
the revenue of hunting ranches, where hunters pay as much as $2,500
to gun down a deer.
The 13 does who survived the capturing ordeal were placed in pens
with fire ant mounds or control pens without mounds. During the
next two months, 20 fawns were born. Eight of these died.
Wallace and his collaborators concluded, after all this fear and
death, and after spending 120,000 research dollars, that although
the fawns were stung by the fire ants—stings so toxic that they
can cause blistering pustules that last for days—fire ant attacks
didn’t kill any fawns. Another phase of the experiment is planned
for this year—and more deer will be chased by helicopters and
torn from their natural homes. We need your help to stop it.
 •Please write or call the Texas governor and ask him to pull all
funding for fire ant experiments on deer and other animals.
The Honorable George W. Bush
Office of the Governor
P.O. Box 12428
Austin, TX 78711-2428
512-463-2000
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