Morrow Mountain State Park offers media access for deer relocation project

RALEIGH -- Morrow Mountain State Park will hold a media access day Jan. 23 for a project to relocate white-tailed deer from the park to reservation lands of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, according to the N.C. Division of Parks and Recreation.

Biologists and other officials of the state parks system, the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission and the Cherokee will be available for media interviews, and some limited access to the deer processing and transport preparation area will be available from 12:30 p.m. to 3 p.m.

In each of the next three years, between 25 and 50 white-tailed deer will be relocated to the 56,000-acre Qualla Boundary in western North Carolina to augment the reservation's existing herd. In the collection process at the state park, biologists tranquilize the animals with darts, collect data on age and health, and fit each animal with a radio collar and identifying tag. At the Qualla Boundary, the deer are kept in a four-acre pen and closely monitored for about four weeks before being released.