WASHINGTON — The government sharpshooters worked so efficiently in the dead of the night in Rock Creek Park that by the end of this year’s short killing season, they had shot 106 white-tailed deer.

Make that 3,300 pounds of local venison turned into meatloaf, burgers and more for the surprised directors of homeless shelters and other charities across the capital.

“I don’t think of Rock Creek Park as a hunting ground,” said Michelle Durham, program director of Rachael’s Women’s Center, speaking of the expanse of forest and ravines where President Theodore Roosevelt once rode horses. She said she was shocked to learn that a recent batch of venison served at the center came from deer in the park, just two miles away.

But such are the eat-what-you-kill sensitivities as the National Park Service struggles to manage proliferating deer that gorge on seedlings and threaten the abundant vegetation in the 2,000-plus-acre park that bisects Washington.