Britain’s deer are thriving. It’s a nightmare for the countryside

[Mike1979]

As a recreational stalker the biggest barrier to culling more deer is moving on the carcass. If it was easy to drop a carcass off at a larder I would go out more.
For me the financial aspect is secondary to that. We need a joined up route to turn deer into meat and dispose of the waste.

Setting cull targets and management would be easy if the whole process was easy too.

I shoot a few deer in Devon and the first thing was to find a game dealer. MC Kelly at Crediton accept deer 24/7 and its just so easy.

I looked closer to home for the few fallow I shoot and its the usual "we dont collect from your area" but I could drop them off during normal business hours monday to friday...not much good for me.

 

[palmer_mike]

Not sure. You might see some shoot their ground out, and those with 20 farms and a full time job in investment banking still do nothing

No it that I’m advocating unlawful behaviour, but I’m sure there were an abundance of deer on said land someone would be cashing in (after dark with NV)

 

[John Gryphon]

Open public land and get rid of the contractors. Issue a guaranteed minimum price per kg for venison, subsidies from government via game dealers of say £6/kg.
Make it illegal for landowners to take payment for deer leases. Landowners must report deer cull numbers annually or face fines.
Government initiatives to provide venison to prisons and schools, military, etc and other large consumption bodies via supply cm tracts.
Rejoin the EU
Allow stalking related costs to be tax deductible even if hobby basis

many landowners here complain non stop but refuse entry to hunters

 

[Norfolk Deer Search]

No it that I’m advocating unlawful behaviour, but I’m sure there were an abundance of deer on said land someone would be cashing in (after dark with NV)

Brain dead chimp can get a night license these days!

 

[Twodogs]

Thank heavens I meet all 3 criteria...just lack any deer close to home

I should also add "modest" to my list of traits

There appear to be many who meet these criteria, I and a number of stalkers I know amongst others, who are equally frustrated by the lack of opportunities.
I see the lack of opportunities as being one of the many hurdles to effective management.

 

[Mike1979]

There appear to be many who meet these criteria, I and a number of stalkers I know amongst others, who are equally frustrated by the lack of opportunities.
I see the lack of opportunities as being one of the many hurdles to effective management.

No easy answers .... To be fair to landowners they are free to do what they see fit. There are lots of good people with little ground and lots of people with lots of land who dont manage that land properly. Very much a case of who you know rather then what you know but that isnt likely to change.

I'm very luck in that I have some really good friends who let me shoot deer on their ground...but the closest is 3 1/2 hours away. However I can shoot foxes within a couple of meters of my front door ... so cant really complain

 

[Shabz]

I was recently talking to someone about a deer management group area. He was telling me that the deer density averaged around 15 deer per square kilometre which is higher than required for browsing pressure to be low enough to allow natural regeneration of trees but isn’t actually that bad when you hear of areas being 40+ deer per square kilometre.

As the conversation went on, I asked him how many of the square kilometres within the DMG area actually had deer. 18% was his answer! 82% of the area the helicopter had covered had zero deer and 18% held all of them. He went on to tell me that most (I think he said about 80-90%) of the deer seen were in groups of at least 200 animals and usually the groups had more than 300 animals.

I stalk red deer over a tiny part of this area. Only about 400ha, and when I get there, there’s either nothing to see or there’s a group of 250 stags. You can’t do anything on that ground to encourage natural regeneration of any kind of habitat. You could kill 75% of the deer and still have a huge resource for whatever sporting business you want to run and I don’t personally think there’s much argument against it other than being properly resourced to do the work. It would be a huge operation to get those sorts of numbers to be lower and (I think) the government needs to put its money where its mouth is and get on with it.

As for non native conifer woodlands being a reason we have high deer numbers. For years I was told, when I was a woodland officer, that species other than Sitka cannot be planted because of high deer numbers. Nothing else would survive. Which is it?

 

[Ronin]

If the government were serious about protecting the public from collisions, the National Forest etc there would be a bounty per animal killed

Landowners who are not engaged in reducing numbers - especially fallow in critical areas should be brought to account.

Deer controllers - appointed to assist in areas where there is active management or no management to assist poor performance or no performance

There should be national schemes to aid the consumption of venison to the food chain

Prisons - hospitals - schools could all make things easier for right minded folk to get carcasses into the food chain

Education at primary / secondary school to widen culinary horizons

Et al

 

[wytonpjs]

Sadly won’t load for me

Opened on PC, not my iPad

 

[Jh1986]

The Hundred Acre Wood, Winnie the Pooh’s fictional home, was inspired by Ashdown Forest in East Sussex. Pooh’s adventures feature many creatures; noticeably missing are any deer. That would not be so were they written today. The forest is now home to 15 deer per square kilometre. Walk its hills and there’s a decent chance you’ll spot a 30-strong herd

Funny enough, I'm sat here right now in one of the car parks overlooking the Ashdown Forest having a bite to eat.

Trusty 8x42 in the truck and I can see a herd of 25 fallow in a horse paddock on the other side of the valley. The horses are in the next paddock but I bet neither paddock will be shot because of the proximity to the horses.

 

[Mike1979]

Funny enough, I'm sat here right now in one of the car parks overlooking the Ashdown Forest having a bite to eat.

Trusty 8x42 in the truck and I can see a herd of 25 fallow in a horse paddock on the other side of the valley. The horses are in the next paddock but I bet neither paddock will be shot because of the proximity to the horses.
View attachment 474847

Horses dont really seem to mind a CF rifle going off. Shoot on one livery as the fallow eat all the grass. Its amazing to see a group of fallow ignore people coming to feed their horses, or collect them for a ride...rifle in hand the fallow seem to know ... crafty devils.

 

[mike308]

It's not always about not allowing others on the ground. It's finding stalkers who are willing to put in the effort to cull the deer. I took on an extra piece of forestry from which the forestry company wanted 40 deer shot, mainly red and sika, I took on two stalkers. In the first year I culled 18 deer as well as the normal cull from my other grounds. The 2 stalkers 0 deer, the excuse was that the rides were difficult to walk down. I'm 74 and managed, dragging out the deer, yes hard work but if you're willing it can be done..
We now have a syndicate of 3 who are hitting the figures.