Feeding deer in Colorado is illegal. Here’s why it’s also dangerous.

This is the time of year when Jeff Yost didn’t envy the wildlife officers working in the Denver metro area.

Yost worked as a biologist with Colorado Parks and Wildlife for years, and every year, he’d hear about the problems caused by residents feeding deer. This was especially true in the winter, when more deer wander off the snowy mountains into populated areas to find easier food and habitat. Residents would see deer in the snow and cold and feel sorry for them.

“The worse the weather was,” Yost said, “the more they’d want to feed them.”

He worked as a terrestrial biologist before retiring, so he didn’t have to do enforcement, but he was thankful he worked and lived in the Steamboat Springs area anyway. Rural folk, he said, generally didn’t feed deer or other wild animals.

“Residents in the rural areas have grown up with deer,” said Yost, who now sits on the board of directors of Keep Routt Wild, an organization that works to preserve wild animals and places in Routt County. “They realize, for the most part, that they will survive on their own.”

Many others in the Denver area don’t seem to understand that, making it a busy time of year for CPW wildlife officers, especially during the rut, aka the deer mating season, when bucks are friskier, and meaner, than usual. In December, CPW had calls about conflicts between deer and dogs across the Front Range. That’s partly because of the rut, which ended in early January, and partly because of a year-round problem with residents feeding deer and, therefore, making them reliant on humans for food.

“If you’re feeding deer, you are bringing a wild and potentially dangerous animal into close contact with yourself and pets,” CPW Area Wildlife Manager Matt Martinez said in a press release. “You’re not only jeopardizing your own safety, but you’re also putting your neighbors at risk.”

CPW doesn’t specifically track the number of dog and deer conflicts, said Kara Van Hoose, spokeswoman for the CPW’s northeast region, but this year felt worse than usual, as housing developments continue to creep into deer habitat. This not only increases the chance that deer will wander into a backyard, it means more residents who haven’t lived close to deer and may be tempted to feed them.

“You do find communities that think deer are a part of their neighborhood and they just live there,” Van Hoose said.

Those deer may become familiar with humans, Van Hoose said, but they still present a danger, especially to pets.

“Those are still wild animals,” she said. “They’re not tame or pets, and anytime you put dogs in close contact with wildlife, conflicts are going to happen.”

Neighbors should take video

Feeding deer is illegal in Colorado, and wildlife officers will give out citations. 

At first glance of the citations, you wouldn’t think there was too much of a problem. Since 2019, officers have given out 30 citations total in the Denver area region and the Park and Clear Creek regions for feeding deer. Out of elk, fox, deer or bear, deer were fed the most. Bears were the second-highest, with 23 citations issued.

Some citations don’t necessarily reflect intent, Van Hoose said, given that sloppiness also feeds wildlife. This is especially true for bears, as they can get into grills, knock over trash cans and eat food left out for feral cats. But in many cases, officers prefer to first warn and educate residents, so many citations would reflect outright negligence.

Deer also generally won’t eat trash (they might eat cat food), so if a resident was cited for feeding a deer, the intent was almost always there. Officers will also occasionally give out more than one ticket in the worst cases, as someone scattering grain on their front lawn would also, in theory, feed a bear.

Those citations don’t really reflect how many people are feeding deer, just the ones who have been caught in the act.

“It’s a hard citation for us to write,” Van Hoose said.

Frustrated neighbors should take photos and videos, Van Hoose said, calling the documentation “key” to a citation being written. Wildlife officers do patrol areas, but they have huge swaths of land to cover, and hunting season takes up most of their time in the winter.

“Photos and videos are important,” Van Hoose said. “It’s way more powerful coming from a neighbor.”

No guts for grain

There are many reasons why the state issues citations, but one of the biggest is the fact that feeding does the opposite of what residents intend. They’re actually harming the deer, and, eventually, killing them, Yost said. 

Deer don’t have the guts —  literally — to digest the grains, hay or other stuff left out by residents, who sometimes  even toss leftover cinnamon rolls along with pieces of bread. In the winter, especially, wildlife officers sometimes pick up dead deer in neighborhoods that literally ate themselves to death.

“They die with a full stomach,” Yost said.

Another unintended consequence stems from the food chain. Here’s a hint: Deer aren’t at the top, and mountain lions won’t always discern between a deer and a poodle.

“Deer are 90% of a mountain lion’s diet,” Van Hoose said. “If you attract deer to your property, you will attract other animals as well.”

That includes bears, and though they tend to be asleep right now, they will emerge in spring hungry and ready to eat anything, including old cinnamon rolls.

Even feeding animals that could be construed as pets is dangerous this time of year, Van Hoose said, and may not attract the intended targets.

“When you’re leaving out food for feral cats,” Van Hoose said, “what you’re really doing is feeding coyotes and bears.”

Eric Martinez, the director for both the Kansas and Colorado regions of the Mule Deer Foundation, doesn’t want people feeding deer, but he doesn’t see evil intentions from it. His Colorado neighbors do it, he believes.

Yet he wants the deer to remain wild, without the interference of humans, and believes, as Yost does, that feeding them reflects a homeowner’s inexperience in living with wild animals.

“It comes down to the relationship people have with wildlife,” Martinez said. “If you grew up a hunter and angler, if you understand what wildlife go through on a day-to-day basis and what they’re capable of, you have a different respect for them.”

Deer, like most wild animals, are resilient, in other words, and don’t need help from humans, at least not with dinner. They do need help, Martinez thinks, in habitat preservation and improvement, which is a more important mission than discouraging people not to feed deer, he said.

“Rather than putting out some feed that you think is beneficial,” Martinez said, “you’re much better off coming out to volunteer for one of our projects or one of the multitudes of projects put on by organizations like ours.”