The Deer Cull

[Smiler.]

Was out walking the dog on Saturday when a heard of about 20 deer ran across the track from one section of the woods to the other.

Then, last night on Coutnryfile was an article about the growing issue of overpopulation & the methods of control (annual culling of between 150K at present & a proposed 500K).

Why are those killed not supplied to the food chain?

Or perhaps are they, but no mention was made of what happens with those culled.

Surely there is a market for Venison?

[tomw2000]

We have deer locally (Lincolnshire) and I also saw Countryfile last night.

IIRC it _did_ mention that at least some for the officially shot ones being sold as venison.

But I forget which organisation they were referring to and what the numbers were.

[AdiT]

In the Country File piece where they were out stalking in the snow, they specifically said the deer shot were sold for venison.

[Japveesix]

Smiler. said:

Why are those killed not supplied to the food chain?

Or perhaps are they, but no mention was made of what happens with those culled.

Surely there is a market for Venison?

The vast majority are as far as i know though usually to more niche farm-shops and the kind of restaurants that specialise in locally sourced/seasonal stuff. Otherwise the meat goes directly to the people who shoot them (have a couple of friends who cull deer occasionally).

There's not enough venison culled in this country yet to supply larger supermarkets and chain places (that's all from farmed venison here or abroad). So i think in general each individual cull area just sorts/distributes it's own meat usually in the local area.

Deer culling is needed, from what I understand all deer species in the UK, except possibly Chinese water deer, are expanding their ranges and growing populations every year. Roe deer especially are more numerous now than they have been for hundreds of years (hunting almost wiped them out) and when they were last this common the landscape and amount of woodland was totally different.

[Smiler.]

I missed the bit on Countryfile where they mentioned sold for venison.

Doh!

[y2blade]

AdiT said:

In the Country File piece where they were out stalking in the snow, they specifically said the deer shot were sold for venison.

This^^^

Ours are all sold to the game dealers (As are all the Pheasants, Partridges etc etc).