LANSING, MI - Rep. Triston Cole, R-Mancelona, was a hunting ranch guide, raised his own deer and was qualified to tranquilize deer before joining the state legislature. Based on his experience, he's trying to stop deer sterilization efforts like the one in Ann Arbor.

"It's not the answer to controlling wildlife populations. It hasn't proved to be effective or work," Cole said.

His House Bill 5321 would put an end to the practice by prohibiting the Department of Natural Resources from issuing permits for the sterilization of game species, like white-tailed deer.

Currently only one such permit exists, for a private contractor managing the deer population in Ann Arbor, said DNR spokesman Ed Golder. It allows a mix of lethal sharpshooting and non-lethal sterilization, he said.

"This is a unique circumstance and the only such permit the department has issued," Golder said.

Golder said it was too early to say whether the combined lethal and non-lethal techniques would prove effective in Ann Arbor.

In Cole's deer-tranquilizing days he learned about the pure fear that can cause permanent damage when a deer is captured. Deer who have never been handled before and are tranquilized often aren't actually put to sleep, he said, just paralyzed. And when they tense up due to extreme stress, he said, they can develop capture myopathy, sometimes called white muscle disease, which can prove fatal once they're released.

In other words, capturing deal to sterilize them and non-lethally control the population can prove lethal anyway, he said.

When Ann Arbor launched its sterilization effort last year, he got an earful.

"They did one last year and I can't tell you how many phone calls I got. People were mad, the sportsmen were absolutely livid," Cole said.

Another option is a controlled hunt, he said, where hunters can cull the deer population and harvest a lean, healthy protein.

Plans released for Ann Arbor's 2018 deer population control show it still plans to use sterilization as one method of deer control, along with lethal shooting from a hired contractor.

Last winter the city's contractor sterilized 54 female deer by tranquilizing them and removing their ovaries. In 2018, the contractor plans to capture and remove the ovaries of up to 26 deer.

Tom Crawford, Ann Arbor CFO and 2018 Deer Management Project Manager, said in an emailed statement a law preventing sterilization would affect the city's efforts.

"The City is utilizing the sterilization approach (under an MDNR research permit) because there are locations that are difficult to access in a dense urban environment like some areas in Ann Arbor. Were the proposed bill to become law, there would be areas in the City where the browse impact from deer could only be addressed via fencing, planting, etc.," he said.

But Cole wants to stop the idea from spreading.

"We're just trying to nip this before it becomes something that gets a little bigger than it is right now," Cole said.

The bill was referred to the House Natural Resources Committee.