The discovery of 18 deer carcasses in Sturgis is now part of an ongoing investigation with the Department of Natural Resources.

On March 16, Sturgis citizen Amy Muller Vanderpool came upon the bodies when she drove past a farm field near Fair and Mintdale Roads on the way to visit her landlord. Vanderpool told Watershed Voice she was “very disturbed” by the site, and got out of her vehicle to take pictures. She contacted the DNR’s Report All Poaching hotline and a representative told her they would notify officers of the situation.

Watershed Voice spoke to Lieutenant Gerald Thayer with DNR Law Enforcement Division, who is the local supervisor for all the conservation officers in southwest Michigan. “We received a complaint about that particular deer carcass dump site back in January, and we investigated it then and we were not able to come up with any leads or suspects,” Thayer said. “So when we received this recent complaint, we were excited that she might have some more information.” After speaking with Vanderpool further, however, officers learned she did not have any information regarding leads or suspects. 

Thayer said because the dumping site was found on private property, it complicates investigating the crime. “If we were to find a suspect and we decided he or she illegally dumped these deer here we would need to contact the farmer because he might have given permission for neighbors to dump there,” he said. “I have found in my career that a farmer sometimes says they could dump on their land, and don’t want anyone charged. At the end of this if we are able to track something down we might be able to find, if that’s the case.”

Additionally, private property makes it challenging for DNR officers to place cameras in order to catch suspects as they would need permission from all the various impacted property owners. Thayer said in most cases when the DNR places surveillance equipment on private property it is at the behest of a property owner who makes the request. “If it was a state game area or a public area like downtown we are a little bit more free, but when it’s private property we would want the property owner working with us before we put a camera out,” he said.

Thayer offered what he believed to be a potential scenario for how the 18 carcasses ended in the farm field, saying it isn’t unusual to encounter someone who processes deer meat for all their friends and family. “Sometimes it can be a hunting camp or someone processing large amounts of deer,” he said, “and then they need to get rid of them all at the same time. That’s probably what we’re looking at, but until we find leads or suspects it’s hard to know for sure.”

Officers were able to rule out disease as a reason for the deer deaths, according to Thayer, because when deer are sick with a life-threatening illness they do not all die in one specific area; rather they are found spread out and sometimes miles from each other. “We will get a call that a deer isn’t acting right, and then maybe another section of land over a week later gets another call about another deer who isn’t acting right,” he said. Thayer also revealed the deer carcasses found had been cut and processed, though several of the bodies still had a significant amount of meat left. 

DNR officers who responded to the scene spent time searching the carcasses for any leads or evidence. “A lot of times they (hunters) forget to take a deer tag off the antlers or the deer, so our officers were out there literally rummaging through all these deer and flipping them over to see if someone forgot to take their tag off,” Thayer said.

Ultimately, the only evidence officers found was a ratchet strap Thayer believed was used to hang the deer from barn or garage rafters. “It’s not much we can go on there, but if the investigation turns up a lead or suspect we can go to somebody’s house and in their garage or barn if they have that same ratchet strap in the same color, style and size, maybe we can link it.”

Thayer wants the public to be aware it is illegal to dump on private or public property without permission. “It’s litter,” he said, “and a lot of people don’t stop to think about that. In the court it is an ‘Illegal Disposal of Solid Waste’ or it’s ‘Illegal Litter.’ Those are the charges that we seek in the court when we catch people.”

Thayer said he also hopes the public will be on the look out for any suspicious behavior, especially with vehicles late at night, as he said most illegal dumping happens under the cover of darkness. Thayer also welcomed any tips or leads to aid in the investigation, like perhaps a hunting group in the area. “Sometimes it produces leads and suspects when there’s a well-known hunting camp in the area that we don’t know about. We can at least slide in and ask if they know of anyone in the area doing this. That at least gets us having a conversation.”

Call or text to report all suspicious behavior, tips, and poaching to 800-292-7800, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. 

Beca Welty is a staff writer and columnist for Watershed Voice.