Sika deer killed in Alabama positively identified as young stag

(ADCNR/CEO Allen Yates)

STEVENSON, Al.
A Maryland deer study leader has confirmed that an odd-looking deer killed by a bowhunter in Jackson County, Alabama, on Halloween morning is a yearling sika stag.
Brian Eyler with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources said he is 100-percent ceratin the deer is a sika.
Craig Bradford of Stevenson, Alabama killed the spike just after daylight Monday. Alabama wildlife biologists originally identified the animal as a melanistic whitetail buck.
Melanism results in animals with fur that is often jet black. Cases of semi-melanism also exist in nature where the animal will have lighter patches of fur.
After additional inquiries were made concerning the identification, Alabama deer study leader Chris Cook sent pictures of the animal to his counterpart, Eyler.
Eyler said on Thursday that the state now has sika population of between 7,500 and 10,000 animals, and he handles quite of few of them in the course of his work.
The deer spread predominantly to three counties on Chesapeake Bay's marshy eastern shore, Eyler said, after escaping over the years from where they were introduced onto Jones Island by a private landowner between 1912 and 1918.
Today, Maryland hunters can kill six sika deer, two each during separate gun, archery and muzzle-loader seasons that run concurrently with regular whitetail seasons.
Since Bradord's deer was estimated to weigh about 110 pounds on the hoof, Eyler said it is most likely a larger subspecies than the Japanese subspecies found in Maryland. Bragging-size stags there only reach 100 to 110 pounds.
Alabama officials are not sure where the sika deer came from and Bradford said there are no known enclosures with exotic animals in the area around Flatrock where it was killed.