Continuing our environmental coverage,
we turn now to our very own backyard, Staten Island,
where Mother Nature is fighting back.
Desi Lydic reports.
Staten Island, a place famous for mob wives,
spray tans and cheese sticks.
But there's more to the wildlife here
than just beefed up sleeve-haters.
So I met up with park ranger Sarah Aucoin to find out more.
There actually are a lot of wild animals here.
We have a big population
of deer, actually, in Staten Island.
You may have heard of deer when they went viral last August,
or from that popular Snapchat filter.
Adorable, right?
Wrong.
You know, in this case,
there-there can be too much of a, of a good thing.
The deer population can grow larger
than the environment can support it,
and that's something we definitely want to control.
LYDIC: In six years, Staten Island went
from 24 deer to nearly a thousand,
leading to Lyme disease, property damage,
and the destruction of several souped-up Nissan Maximas.
All right, so how we gonna take care of this,
Kentucky style? (mimics gun cocking)
-No, we're not gonna... -Chicago style?
Pew, pew, pew, pew, pew.
-No. No. -Texas style.
(mimics machine-gun) Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
We're not taking any legal action.
We're gonna be performing vasectomies.
Sure. That's the...
Yeah, that's the obvious solution to the problem.
That would be the first thing that one would think of.
Well, honestly, it is, it is a little bit outside of the box.
LYDIC: Way outside the box.
And this raises one pressing question.
Woman to woman,
when you cut their dicks off, does it feel good?
Actually, I have to correct you, we're not castrating them.
And, in fact, we're not gonna do it.
We're hiring a contractor who has expertise
in this area, Tony Denicola.
Oh, so you got a guy Tony.
-I got a guy Tony. -You got a guy Tony.
-Is it Check and Loan Tony? -No.
Free Gas for handies Tony.
Not the same Tony.
Thirsty Thursdays karaoke night Tony?
-This is not the same Tony. -Different Tony.
LYDIC: So, I met up with dick slayer Tony,
Tony DeNicola.
Did you always know that you wanted to neuter deer,
or did you lose a bet?
Uh, no, it's a lot more complicated than that.
LYDIC: Uh, yeah.
Tony's plan involved cameras, tracking
and-- yes, I knew it-- a gun.
Is it pretty precise when you shoot their dicks off?
Um, we're not that good.
LYDIC: Ugh, turns out they're gonna tranquilize them
and give them operations.
There's just one problem.
This idea is nuts.
LYDIC: Meet deer expert Al Cambronne.
For this to work,
we'd need to capture nearly all those bucks.
And if only, say, 20% remain,
then we'll still have lots of fawns next spring.
So they're gonna still...
Yeah.
And one buck can happily breed many does.
-Well, Staten Island. -Yeah.
Another problem is that deer can swim.
Bucks are going to be coming from New Jersey.
Bridge and tunnel deer are the worst.
-Ugh. -And we'll be right back where we started.
LYDIC: And it gets worse.
This is gonna cost $2 million.
That's, like, over $5,000 a dick.
Relative to the cost of not doing anything,
we think it's a really wise investment.
One more problem with the vasectomy plan.
-Oh, Jesus. -Every fall,
there's deer mating season, what we call the rut.
Those that don't become pregnant,
they'll be back in heat.
Things get wild out there.
-Like a two-month (bleep) frenzy. -Exactly.
-Or like summer Bible camp. -Yeah.
LYDIC: Time to come up with a more realistic solution.
Have you thought about introducing
Japanese deer sex dolls?
Well...
that's a possibility.
Worked for my husband.
-Hmm. -Won't even look at me now.
-Nothing. -Deer are, during the rut,
-interested in only one thing. -It's like, I just had a baby.
And your body changes,
and biologically, things are a little bit different.
And when you nurse, things happen to your body,
and you don't even want to know
-what happens down there after having it. -Yeah.
It's like, sometimes a woman just needs attention.
Sure, Al was a great listener, but he had no solutions.
But you know who might?
Good, old-fashioned, salt of the Earth Staten Islanders.
Take down those (bleep) with a baseball bat.
Bring them back to Jersey.
-Do you have a guy? -I know a couple of guys.
But no guys that move deers.
We should get some (bleep) mountain lions over here.
This plan is gonna cost $2 million.
$2 million?
Give me and Rob a million, we'll take care of it.
We'll take care of it ourselves.
Every deer on Staten Island.
I'll wait in a tree stand every night.
-I'll get every deer. -I'll put 'em right in a headlock.
-Guaranteed. -With my arms.
You look like Christina Aguilera.
Are you her?
-No, I'm not Christina Aguilera. -Oh, okay.
-I got a few solutions. -What are they?
Me and you jump in my car,
go back to my place...
LYDIC: That's when I realized
we had the perfect solution this whole time,
just for a different Staten Island problem.
Finally, time to cut some dicks off.
(cheering and applause)
Desi Lydic, everybody.