Deer on the agenda at Senate inquiry

Wollongong City Lord Mayor Councillor Gordon Bradbery AM has spoken of the challenges feral deer present for our community at the Senate – Environment and Communications Reference Committee.

Cr Bradbery spoke on behalf of Council at the inquiry into the impact of feral deer, pigs and goats on Wednesday 22 July 2020.

His commentary provided detail on the continuing impact of feral deer across the city, even as Council works to contain the growth of the pest species.

“It’s well documented that our city has a problem with feral deer and it was important to take the opportunity to share our first-hand experience with the Committee,’’ Cr Bradbery said.

“It’s an issue that’s particularly challenging between May and August when the annual rut is on and the deer move down from the escarpment and into more urban areas in search of a mate and to establish territory.’’

Council works with partners under on a South East Local Land Services-managed program to employ professional contactors to humanely euthanise deer. In the last financial year more than 770 deer were culled through the program.

“Since 2011 the program has seen at least 3500 deer culled and while this is working to reduce the population of this species, it’s not going to eradicate them completely,’’ Cr Bradbery said.

“We and our partners are working hard but the scale of this issue is too big, and the challenge of working in an urban environment far exceeds the resources available to us. We need additional funding to provide additional culling operations to ensure this program is sustainable moving forward.

“We also need to continue to partner with others to continue our ongoing research into deer to understand herd distributions, environmental impacts and to improve deer control methods.’’

The Senate inquiry into the impact of feral deer, pigs and goats in Australia and national priorities to prevent problems worsening for the natural environment, community and farmers is ongoing. For more information visit https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Environment_and_Communications/FeralDeerPigGoat2019