Interesting article in the Daily Telegraph today.
You would think that this would be preaching to the converted, yet the comments in the online article contain the usual guff about predator reintroduction - like that would work in Savernake!
Experts say 750,000 of the creatures must be culled each year to tackle overpopulation.
By Steve Boggan
Tim Weston lowers his rifle and walks through the undergrowth to his 39th kill of the season, a sleek female roe deer. She was dead before the sound of the shot reached her ears.
The doe is probably pregnant but, thankfully, we don’t find out because Weston, 47, has left his field knives in the Ford pick-up, so her innards will stay where they are for now. And, as a pathetic city slicker, all I can think of is Bambi.
“You have to remember that animals aren’t sentient in the way humans are,” says Weston.
He is one of about 200 professional deer stalkers in England, a solid, jovial chap in a camouflage jacket and – to my delight – a deerstalker hat. On average, he will kill about 100 animals between Nov 1 and March 30, the season for hunting female deer. For him, that amounts to good countryside stewardship.
“Deer don’t know you’re shooting at them. You can tell by the way they react. They don’t spot you and tell their friends to stop eating the grass for their safety – they just run. It’s fight or flight, not reasoning. Once you get it into your head that they are not Disneyfied mini-humans, you’ll be fine.”
Weston’s attitude is one we’d do well to adopt because, according to the Government and just about every environmental group, charity and quango, Bambi here is something of a pest. In the UK, deer numbers are out of control – partly owing to a lack of natural predators – and the creatures are causing serious damage to woodland and farms.
Nobody knows exactly how many there are, but the Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs (Defra) estimates that there may now be two million, an increase from about 450,000 in the 1970s. That scale of population has not been seen since the time of William the Conqueror.
In order to deal with the explosion, the Government has announced a 10-year strategy aimed at drastically cutting back their numbers. Currently, some 350,000 deer are hunted or culled each year, according to the Country Food Trust. But experts argue that number will need to rise to 750,000 to keep the population in check.
The doe is probably pregnant. As a pathetic city slicker, all I can think of is Bambi
The Government’s plans will lead to the identification of priority culling areas and a loosening of restrictions on licensed night-time and closed-season shooting. Farmers may also be given new rights to kill the animals to protect their land.
This, according to Defra, is a necessity because as much as one-third of all woodland is affected by deer damage. Flowering plants, bird nesting habitats and saplings are all destroyed in the process. For all their natural grace and poise, deer also trample, dig up and eat crops, causing millions of pounds in damage for hard-pressed farmers.
In particular, efforts will be focused on reducing the muntjac population, which is officially listed as an invasive species. Non-native sika, fallow and Chinese water deer are also of concern, and are deemed to be causing the most damage. Only two of the six species present in England are indigenous to Britain – the red and the roe.
As well as his deerstalker hat, Tim wears two other metaphorical ones. One is as director of Savernake Sporting, a business named after the 4,500-acre estate we are on in Wiltshire, which manages the deer population and distributes venison across the region.
The other is as director of policy and politics at the National Gamekeepers’ Organisation (NGO). The NGO doesn’t agree with everything in the Government’s strategy. It argues that the plan could focus on other pests too (such as grey squirrels), that it is too geographically broad and ought to be more targeted at problem areas, and that aspects of the policy risk creating disputes over shooting rights.
But, tiptoeing through Savernake’s ancient oak and chestnut forest with his £6,500 German Blaser rifle, there is one matter on which Weston is in full agreement – many more deer must be culled.
“The deer problem has come about over many years,” he says. “We’ve got a perfect storm. We have a bigger human population and more development on land that deer would once have occupied. This means the remaining countryside is overpopulated [by the animals], and that’s where we have most problems.
“Not all regions have a problem, and the six varieties of deer we have don’t all breed at the same rate – a female roe deer will have up to three young a year, a muntjac will have one, a fallow will have one, a sika will have one, a red will have one and a Chinese water deer will have up to five. But in order to maintain the population, you’d have to cull 50 per cent of the females each year.”
While that might seem bad news for deer, the Government wants us to see it as good news for our stomachs. Wild venison is regarded as being healthier than other red meats, with higher levels of protein, fewer calories, and significantly less fat than beef or lamb. It is rich in iron, zinc, and B vitamins, making it a nutritious and healthy alternative that’s free from added hormones or antibiotics.
Venison, which is mainly farmed and imported from New Zealand, is currently regarded as a niche product with a high price point, and in supermarkets, it’s usually more expensive than beef. However, part of the Government’s strategy is to promote wild venison as an alternative that would probably become cheaper as supply increases.
SJ Hunt is chief executive of the Country Food Trust, a charity that provides two million free wild venison-based meals and meat to homeless shelters, food banks and struggling families each year. She sees an opportunity to share much of this meat with people struggling to get by – people who may never have tasted venison before. “We just need the funding to get it done,” she says.
Of course, not everybody thinks that culling deer is either humane or sensible. Elisa Allen, vice-president of programmes and operations at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta), says the practice has been going on for “aeons”, yet overpopulation is still a problem.
“If lethal methods genuinely controlled populations, they wouldn’t be repeated year after year or proposed as long-term ‘management plans,’” she says. “We owe it to these gentle animals – whose habitats have been reduced by human activity – to pursue humane and sustainable options, such as habitat modification, installing appropriate fencing and limiting access to artificial food sources. The solution should not be simply to shoot deer and then treat them as filler for sandwiches.”
Some environmentalists – and the Scottish Green Party – have even advocated for the reintroduction of predators such as lynx and wolves to control deer. But Weston and the NGO think this is a non-starter, owing to the havoc such animals could wreak on livestock.
Back in the rainy Savernake Forest, dusk is deepening. Weston has been a deer stalker all his working life. His father and grandfather hunted before him. He loves his job, seeing himself and the other deer stalkers who shoot on the estate as its protectors. I ask what makes a good deer stalker. Without hesitation, he replies, “Patience. That, and the ability to read landscapes. Over time, you’ll learn that once you get to know your ground well, you’ll know what the deer will do at your approach. You become accustomed to their behaviour.”
He points behind my shoulder. “There’s a bank down there where there are usually fallow, but you can’t shoot towards them because there’s a house at the bottom of the bank. I know that if I walk towards them and scare them, they will run. I then walk around to where I know they will run and wait for them there. Nine times out of 10, they go to the same place.”
We are whispering now, and even though Weston can see the hot shapes of deer through a thermal imaging device almost permanently glued to his eye, it is too dark to confidently take a shot.
He will only fire – usually through the side of the deer into its heart and lungs, killing it instantly – if conditions are right. Inflicting pain is not an option.
We decide to call it a day, and Weston packs Bambi into a plastic backpack. This takes time, and he performs the task with care, as if it were the first deer he had ever culled. Then, in the gloom, he huffs his way back to the truck – gun in hand, conscience clear.
You would think that this would be preaching to the converted, yet the comments in the online article contain the usual guff about predator reintroduction - like that would work in Savernake!
Experts say 750,000 of the creatures must be culled each year to tackle overpopulation.
By Steve Boggan
Tim Weston lowers his rifle and walks through the undergrowth to his 39th kill of the season, a sleek female roe deer. She was dead before the sound of the shot reached her ears.
The doe is probably pregnant but, thankfully, we don’t find out because Weston, 47, has left his field knives in the Ford pick-up, so her innards will stay where they are for now. And, as a pathetic city slicker, all I can think of is Bambi.
“You have to remember that animals aren’t sentient in the way humans are,” says Weston.
He is one of about 200 professional deer stalkers in England, a solid, jovial chap in a camouflage jacket and – to my delight – a deerstalker hat. On average, he will kill about 100 animals between Nov 1 and March 30, the season for hunting female deer. For him, that amounts to good countryside stewardship.
“Deer don’t know you’re shooting at them. You can tell by the way they react. They don’t spot you and tell their friends to stop eating the grass for their safety – they just run. It’s fight or flight, not reasoning. Once you get it into your head that they are not Disneyfied mini-humans, you’ll be fine.”
Weston’s attitude is one we’d do well to adopt because, according to the Government and just about every environmental group, charity and quango, Bambi here is something of a pest. In the UK, deer numbers are out of control – partly owing to a lack of natural predators – and the creatures are causing serious damage to woodland and farms.
Nobody knows exactly how many there are, but the Department for Food, Environment and Rural Affairs (Defra) estimates that there may now be two million, an increase from about 450,000 in the 1970s. That scale of population has not been seen since the time of William the Conqueror.
In order to deal with the explosion, the Government has announced a 10-year strategy aimed at drastically cutting back their numbers. Currently, some 350,000 deer are hunted or culled each year, according to the Country Food Trust. But experts argue that number will need to rise to 750,000 to keep the population in check.
The doe is probably pregnant. As a pathetic city slicker, all I can think of is Bambi
The Government’s plans will lead to the identification of priority culling areas and a loosening of restrictions on licensed night-time and closed-season shooting. Farmers may also be given new rights to kill the animals to protect their land.
This, according to Defra, is a necessity because as much as one-third of all woodland is affected by deer damage. Flowering plants, bird nesting habitats and saplings are all destroyed in the process. For all their natural grace and poise, deer also trample, dig up and eat crops, causing millions of pounds in damage for hard-pressed farmers.
In particular, efforts will be focused on reducing the muntjac population, which is officially listed as an invasive species. Non-native sika, fallow and Chinese water deer are also of concern, and are deemed to be causing the most damage. Only two of the six species present in England are indigenous to Britain – the red and the roe.
As well as his deerstalker hat, Tim wears two other metaphorical ones. One is as director of Savernake Sporting, a business named after the 4,500-acre estate we are on in Wiltshire, which manages the deer population and distributes venison across the region.
The other is as director of policy and politics at the National Gamekeepers’ Organisation (NGO). The NGO doesn’t agree with everything in the Government’s strategy. It argues that the plan could focus on other pests too (such as grey squirrels), that it is too geographically broad and ought to be more targeted at problem areas, and that aspects of the policy risk creating disputes over shooting rights.
But, tiptoeing through Savernake’s ancient oak and chestnut forest with his £6,500 German Blaser rifle, there is one matter on which Weston is in full agreement – many more deer must be culled.
“The deer problem has come about over many years,” he says. “We’ve got a perfect storm. We have a bigger human population and more development on land that deer would once have occupied. This means the remaining countryside is overpopulated [by the animals], and that’s where we have most problems.
“Not all regions have a problem, and the six varieties of deer we have don’t all breed at the same rate – a female roe deer will have up to three young a year, a muntjac will have one, a fallow will have one, a sika will have one, a red will have one and a Chinese water deer will have up to five. But in order to maintain the population, you’d have to cull 50 per cent of the females each year.”
While that might seem bad news for deer, the Government wants us to see it as good news for our stomachs. Wild venison is regarded as being healthier than other red meats, with higher levels of protein, fewer calories, and significantly less fat than beef or lamb. It is rich in iron, zinc, and B vitamins, making it a nutritious and healthy alternative that’s free from added hormones or antibiotics.
Venison, which is mainly farmed and imported from New Zealand, is currently regarded as a niche product with a high price point, and in supermarkets, it’s usually more expensive than beef. However, part of the Government’s strategy is to promote wild venison as an alternative that would probably become cheaper as supply increases.
SJ Hunt is chief executive of the Country Food Trust, a charity that provides two million free wild venison-based meals and meat to homeless shelters, food banks and struggling families each year. She sees an opportunity to share much of this meat with people struggling to get by – people who may never have tasted venison before. “We just need the funding to get it done,” she says.
Of course, not everybody thinks that culling deer is either humane or sensible. Elisa Allen, vice-president of programmes and operations at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta), says the practice has been going on for “aeons”, yet overpopulation is still a problem.
“If lethal methods genuinely controlled populations, they wouldn’t be repeated year after year or proposed as long-term ‘management plans,’” she says. “We owe it to these gentle animals – whose habitats have been reduced by human activity – to pursue humane and sustainable options, such as habitat modification, installing appropriate fencing and limiting access to artificial food sources. The solution should not be simply to shoot deer and then treat them as filler for sandwiches.”
Some environmentalists – and the Scottish Green Party – have even advocated for the reintroduction of predators such as lynx and wolves to control deer. But Weston and the NGO think this is a non-starter, owing to the havoc such animals could wreak on livestock.
Back in the rainy Savernake Forest, dusk is deepening. Weston has been a deer stalker all his working life. His father and grandfather hunted before him. He loves his job, seeing himself and the other deer stalkers who shoot on the estate as its protectors. I ask what makes a good deer stalker. Without hesitation, he replies, “Patience. That, and the ability to read landscapes. Over time, you’ll learn that once you get to know your ground well, you’ll know what the deer will do at your approach. You become accustomed to their behaviour.”
He points behind my shoulder. “There’s a bank down there where there are usually fallow, but you can’t shoot towards them because there’s a house at the bottom of the bank. I know that if I walk towards them and scare them, they will run. I then walk around to where I know they will run and wait for them there. Nine times out of 10, they go to the same place.”
We are whispering now, and even though Weston can see the hot shapes of deer through a thermal imaging device almost permanently glued to his eye, it is too dark to confidently take a shot.
He will only fire – usually through the side of the deer into its heart and lungs, killing it instantly – if conditions are right. Inflicting pain is not an option.
We decide to call it a day, and Weston packs Bambi into a plastic backpack. This takes time, and he performs the task with care, as if it were the first deer he had ever culled. Then, in the gloom, he huffs his way back to the truck – gun in hand, conscience clear.
