23/10/2012

Minister Bans Hunting Of Kerry Red Deer

Minister for Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht Jimmy Deenihan has banned the hunting of female red deer in Co Kerry.

The ban, coming into force just one week ahead of the open season for hunting, is due to “a significant” decline in numbers of the special deer, the Minister said yesterday.

The follows the banning of hunting curlew because of a similar “dramatic ” plummeting in numbers here and across Europe.

The move to protect the red deer comes amid growing concern about the future of the “unique” Kerry red deer herd, Ireland’s oldest strain of red deer.

The hunting of the male of the species – prized by poachers for their 16-point antlers – has long been banned.

The deer herd is concentrated in and around the 10,000-hectare Killarney National Park, but has dropped to just 500, Noel Grimes, chairman of the Kerry Deer Society, which saved the Killarney reds from extinction in the 1970s, revealed this summer.

To be sustainable the herd needed to be up to double this, according to the findings of four years of research presented in Killarney at the weekend. Threats from in-breeding and the danger of mating with other species were also outlined.

(H)


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