A regular occurance around these parts.
£2.40/Kg isnt helping either.
I am surprised at that, I would say there was a lot less at least in my area than there used to be still get the one for the pot guys but can more or less live with that
Commercially not much plenty guys with dogs but not many reach my area they can find deer closer to their home turf don't need to come as far as me.
Most guys with legit rifles are not going to risk it tickets gone if they are caught
Some body mentioned Hotels thats not so easy either these days venison can legally only be sold or bought to or from a registered venison dealer in Scotland
No doubt there are those that would buy illegal venison, however hotels etc have to account for where they acquire their ingredients so could only put it on the menu
if they are buying elsewhere legally and even then only a limited amount if they were purchasing on a regular basis a discrepancy would soon show between what they are buying legally and what they are selling.
Which leaves two options sales to private individuals or dealers who are knowingly buying illegal venison the later raises the issue of tags etc
There is also the stalker who leases a small area and develops elastic boundary's he can get away with it for a while but will get caught eventually
Or on one estate where I was the stalker I had a farmer who marched with us he farmed a little over a 100 acres each year he planted around 10 acres of turnips on the boundary and shot the stags each winter [night shooting] when they came on them [crop protection] the turnips were planted with the sole purpose of drawing the deer though impossible to prove .
Estate I was on at that time was around 12,000 acres and we shot forty five stags per annum the farmer shot more than double that on his 10 acres of turnips
not illegal but more of a problem for me than somebody getting away with one for the pot.
Now I know that poaching goes on and some areas will be worse than others as to how big a problem it is I am not sure certainly in my area a lot less than it was thirty or forty years ago