Dan Ryan Woods

We used to go there for picnics, usually organized ones like from church or boy scouts.  There was also a boy scout camping grounds called Camp Kiwanis, and a small museum called The Little Red School House.  There were horse riding trails and a couple of stables where you could rent horses by the hour.  My sister tried to get me interested in horses, but I never became as enthusiastic about them as she was.  There were a few fishing sites, but I never caught anything there.  I think you had to be there soon after a stocking day.

The forest preserves were nice, but they didn't allow any hunting there.  The only way it would have been possible is if they closely controlled it like they did in the Berlin Grunewald, but such things were unheard of in the US in those days.  My parents moved to Palos Park, right next to the forest preserves, shortly before I got out of the army, and my dad made friends with one of the rangers.  Deer were starting to be plentiful by then, and this guy had to go pick up the road kills.  He was suppose to take them to the landfill, but my dad's friend used to call him when he found one that was still fresh.  My dad, a meat cutter by trade, would cut it up and share the meat with the ranger and his other friends.

I understand that some of the urban and suburban parks in Michigan have problems with their deer becoming too numerous for their own good.  They have tried some limited hunting, but the bleeding hearts usually raise holy hell about it, so they have been looking for alternatives.  Last I heard, they were going to capture some deer, sterilize them, and release them back into the park.  This reminds me of a story:

A sheep herder out West was having trouble with coyotes, so he called in a government agent who was supposed to take care of such things.  The agent told him that he was not allowed to kill coyotes anymore, but he could put out medicated baits that would make the coyotes sterile.  "I don't think you understand", said the shepherd, "The problem is that the coyotes eat the sheep."