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The forestry commission in my opinion were wrong and should be dismissed for there actions here. COLLABRATIVE DEER MANAGEMENT is the new in word and seems to work well if the FC get there own way but if they need to sustain hard ship for a small while to benefit other land managers / Help with deer welfare and keep the public happy with everyone's actions they go in and slaughter behind every ones back. If an arrangement has been made because of a current problem the FC should stick to the agreement. F /in Clowns is what they are and this is what we are going to get in the central belt well you can keep your collaboration. :eek: ;)
 
This is a hugely emotive subject and I've bee on both sides of it over the years and I'm afraid I've never seen everyone walk away happy.

The question regarding sheep is quite simple, it's down to the law.

Plenty of foresters would love to be able to shoot sheep I'm sure, but sheep are livestock and are owned by someone therefore to shoot someones livestock would not only cover many animal slaughter laws but also be criminal damage.
Deer in Scotland are wild therefore there are no ownership issues only the rights to kill.

I think we have to watch how we word these arguements, the word slaughter often rears it's head in these situations. DCS, FC , NTS "slaughter" deer, private estates and recreational stalkers cull!

Depending on my hat , I seem to do both, if I'm wearing a baseball cap in the wood I'm a slaughtering b******* :evil: BUT if I'm wearing a fore and aft the next day on the hill with a guest I'm a "character" and a professional doing a wonderfull job ;) .
Deer Management , what a wonderfull job!!!!!!!!!!!!
Keeps the forums busy :D
 
The question regarding sheep IS simple.

The only difference between sheep and deer is that one can be openly and legally exploited(to their and the people who are managing them's detriment) by (sometimes) unscrupulous people with varying agendas, the other cannot.

I fully accept the policies that forest managers have to adopt to create and preserve woodland habitats (in part because of the benefits that will come to our deer populations in years to come), I like woodlands and the biodiversity they support, too!

However, there is a difference between sticking to a strict culling regime (which might rightly be different to your neighbours) and blatantly, opportunistically, and indiscriminately hoofing a load of deer that have, due to exceptional circumstances found their way into a forest where they were doing no harm at all. Add to this the fact that the forest perimeter was not secure and that no alternative solution (of which there was) was even discussed and you have a recipe for an unsavoury situation.

Hmmm.....I did say I wasnt going to say anymore on this one.
 
Just a quick note to say this is the first discussion on this subject that I've been involved in and hasn't turned into a slagging match or turned personel.
 
like has already been stated the trees are an asset a crop and thats there future profit 25-35yrs down the line. as i have not actually been on the ground i cannot say wether or not the deer were causing any damage, but i would take an educated guess to say they most likely would be. because of the extreme weather the ammount off grazing would be severely limited if not non existant. this has forced a larger number than normal into the woods for shelter and food. i would probably say that even over a fairly short time the deer could have a massive impact on the trees dependant on the age off the timber. if the trees are below 6ft ish(up to 8ish years) and the deer browse the lead shoot that tree will be virtually worthless in 25 years time and would possibly only make a low grade timber product due to twin/multiple stem growth, this could mean a whole compartment making o loss. or the could be stripping the bark killing mature or semi mature trees again making them worthless

put yourself in the foresters/forest managers shoes, i'm sure they take no pleasure in carrying out such big culls in the weather and will feel a lot of sympathy and compassion for the deer but bottom line is it's costing the owners money and if they do nothing they are not fullfiling there job and possibly putting there job on the line
 
This one i feel is different in that an arrangement was made and all concerned had made a effort to spare the animal. Now while the forestry Commission make money from public funds that go back to the public fund .I feel there is a bigger issue here and that is they obviously don't care what the public think. This will go deeper than a few deer this will go down as slaughter against reason. It is a fact that any Red deer that has more than 8 points in the borders is left because its a representative deer and the public want to see them around. See the public bring millions and millions of profit into the country side. The forestry Commission make Millions and Millions of debt. Some were you need to consider the assets against the losses.
If i had to make a decision and lucky i don't i would have made sure i stuck to the arrangement and put up with a small amount of damage against the damage do to the DCS and the FC For shooting these animals. ;)
 
I've spoken to a couple of people involved in this incident over the last couple of days, 1 private Estate and 2 fc and I must admit I was shocked at how FC behaved in this instance.
I wont recount the whole thing as I would probably not be 100% correct on all the facts. 1 of the FC staff told me that the whole incident made him ashamed to be an FC employee!!!
As a forester I dread to see the future of forestry deer management if our leading body the fc are going to act like this.
As many of you will have guessed from earlier threads I am not adverse to shooting deer, but FC in this instance I feel have overstepped the mark, they should be leading the field in partnership working not tearing it apart.
 
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