Exotic animal species and invasive species management

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Kifaru Bwana

Well-Known Member
15+ year member
I came across this report in The Guardian on feral deer in Australia inner-city areas and what national authorities are doing right now. This encouraged me to create a thread in the zoo Australia community as I could not find anything on invasive species (over the last 10 pages of zoo news in the header).

Link: Feral deer in the headlines: Australia’s ‘slow-moving plague’ is finally being noticed

I would be interested in your observations and the local perspective on the feral deer issue. However, not restricted to feral deer, but more in general invasive species occurring in Australia and their impact on the landscape and what conservation and administrative authorities are doing to confront the issues with them.

I welcome all your contributions.
 
Kifaru Bwana said:
I came across this report in The Guardian on feral deer in Australia inner-city areas and what national authorities are doing right now. This encouraged me to create a thread in the zoo Australia community as I could not find anything on invasive species (over the last 10 pages of zoo news in the header).

Link: Feral deer in the headlines: Australia’s ‘slow-moving plague’ is finally being noticed

I would be interested in your observations and the local perspective on the feral deer issue. However, not restricted to feral deer, but more in general invasive species occurring in Australia and their impact on the landscape and what conservation and administrative authorities are doing to confront the issues with them.

I welcome all your contributions.
Click to expand...
There are actually 6 species of deer in Australia, with sambar the most problematic. There is a substantial deer hunting lobby who want the population "managed" for their interests, and certainly don't want them exterminated, if that is even possible. For this reason the law in this State actually provides some protection to deer.

To give an example, I've been going to Bunyip State Park occasionally over the last year as the closet place I can spotlight for greater and yellow-bellied gliders. We see sambar deer every trip, they are as easily seen as kangaroos and wombats (both common there). There are also meant to be fallow deer in that Park but I am yet to see any.

With deer invading urban areas there is greater awareness of the deer problem, and most people pretty attuned to the problem of invasive species in general. However there always seem to be special interest groups not to mention the "compassionate conservationists" who always come out with totally impractical solutions, whatever invasive species is mentioned. And we have a lot of them.
 
MRJ said:
There are actually 6 species of deer in Australia, with sambar the most problematic. There is a substantial deer hunting lobby who want the population "managed" for their interests, and certainly don't want them exterminated, if that is even possible. For this reason the law in this State actually provides some protection to deer.

To give an example, I've been going to Bunyip State Park occasionally over the last year as the closet place I can spotlight for greater and yellow-bellied gliders. We see sambar deer every trip, they are as easily seen as kangaroos and wombats (both common there). There are also meant to be fallow deer in that Park but I am yet to see any.

With deer invading urban areas there is greater awareness of the deer problem, and most people pretty attuned to the problem of invasive species in general. However there always seem to be special interest groups not to mention the "compassionate conservationists" who always come out with totally impractical solutions, whatever invasive species is mentioned. And we have a lot of them.
Click to expand...

So the so called "compassionate Conservationists" do actually have some power and influence in Australia ?

I find that quite surprising
 
In my local area, Central West NSW, deer numbers have increased significantly. Last year, 654 deer were culled.

Deer, wild dogs targeted in record numbers, but pest council fears cull isn't working

I personally have only come across one wild Fallow Deer, that was in Mullion Range State Conservation Area in April 2019.

Fallow Deer (Dama dama)

Fallow Deer (Dama dama)

Mullion Range, NSW. April, 2019

I also saw one roadkill Fallow Deer just west of Cobar in 2019. People I know who go hunting out that way have said there are lots of deer out there too.
 
akasha said:
In my local area, Central West NSW, deer numbers have increased significantly. Last year, 654 deer were culled.

Deer, wild dogs targeted in record numbers, but pest council fears cull isn't working

I personally have only come across one wild Fallow Deer, that was in Mullion Range State Conservation Area in April 2019.

Fallow Deer (Dama dama)

Fallow Deer (Dama dama)

Mullion Range, NSW. April, 2019

I also saw one roadkill Fallow Deer just west of Cobar in 2019. People I know who go hunting out that way have said there are lots of deer out there too.
Click to expand...
I've hunted Chital between Cobar and Nyngan.
 
Deer numbers are definitely on the rise. I had only ever seen one sambar around 20 years ago, but in the last few years I have seen sambar on multiple occasions around Whittlesea and Broadford as well as roadkill on the Hume Freeway a few times. I also saw a group of young red deer stags only about 1km from the main street of Whittlesea and my wife has seen fallow deer regularly out the back of Wallan.
 
I enjoyed seeing a group of 6 red deer calmly grazing mid afternoon at a public reservoir in SE Melbourne a few weeks back. I managed to take several photos of them before they wandered off. I didn't realise red deer were living wild in this area, I only knew of samabr and fallow deer
 
Astrobird said:
I enjoyed seeing a group of 6 red deer calmly grazing mid afternoon at a public reservoir in SE Melbourne a few weeks back. I managed to take several photos of them before they wandered off. I didn't realise red deer were living wild in this area, I only knew of samabr and fallow deer
Click to expand...
Can I ask which reservoir?
 
Deer numbers still seem to be on the increase. I saw 4 Fallow Deer in Conimbla National Park between Cowra and Grenfell a couple of weeks ago. It’s a real shame because Conimbla’s main conservation aim is it’s incredible wildflowers. I informed national parks, so hopefully they can manage the issue before it becomes a real problem.
 
A friend recently almost ran into a sambar stag on the road to Phillip Island, while a deer died on a nearby property recently. They now seem to be everywhere.
 
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