to feed or not to feed

This is one question that we've been pondering lately. Our home is nestled in the Ozark woodlands and we had a late frost this year that managed to cripple many of our fruit and nut bearing trees. As such, the birds, squirrels, deer and other animals are going to have a hard time finding food this year. On one hand, we have experts telling us that this is natural selection, and that if the deer population,for example, were to die off a little, that this is okay. However, I can't help but wonder if the strange late frost that we saw could somehow be part of the effects of global warming or other man-made environmental problems.

We decided that we will, at least, try to feed the birds a little this winter. If the squirrels get into it, that's okay. I'm sure that they can use it, too. As for the deer, I don't believe that we will go out of our way to provide food for them, but we will continue to compost our vegetable waste as we have been doing, and if our method isn't quite deer-proof, then so be it.