The Outdoor Gibbon
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The Outdoor Gibbon
66 Deer Management: Are we getting it right? Are the Standards Good Enough? Stalking Show 2025 BDS panel Day one
The question of effective deer management has never been more pressing across the UK landscape. In this special panel discussion recorded at the Stalking Show 2025 for the British Deer Society, we bring together an extraordinary group of experts to tackle the contentious question: are our current deer management strategies fit for purpose, and do our training standards meet modern demands?
Our diverse panel offers fascinating perspectives from different regions and approaches. From the Netherlands, Floris Lassie shares insights from a highly regulated system where training is mandatory and culling permits are government-issued. Louise Farmer from NatureScot discusses Scotland's increasingly aggressive biodiversity-focused approach, contrasting with England's more fragmented, landowner-led system. Meanwhile, Sandy Williams reveals the success of collaborative landscape-scale management through coordination between neighboring estates.
The conversation delves into critical tensions within modern deer management: the balance between voluntary and mandatory training, the economics of culling versus venison prices, and the challenge of maintaining high welfare standards while meeting growing pressure for population control. With fallow deer populations showing a 75% female bias in some areas and "sanctuary" properties complicating management efforts, the panel explores practical solutions like WhatsApp coordination groups and partnerships with food poverty organizations.
Perhaps most compelling is the debate about whether England should adopt a centralized deer management strategy similar to Scotland's. The panel weighs the benefits of coordinated approaches against concerns about one-size-fits-all regulation and the risk of ignoring regional differences in deer populations and their impacts.
Whether you're a professional stalker, landowner, conservationist, or simply interested in wildlife management, this episode offers crucial insights into the complex challenges of maintaining healthy landscapes while ensuring ethical treatment of deer populations. Join us for this thought-provoking discussion that raises as many questions as it answers about the future of deer management in the UK.
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Outdoor Gibbon podcast. As you will see, this is a slightly different format to our usual podcast. That's because these two are a very special set of episodes. There are two episodes coming up and they were recorded at the Stalking Show 2025 and we did them for the BDS, the British Deer Society. There were two panels that were run on the saturday and the sunday, and this is panel one which was recorded on saturday around about one o'clock to two o'clock with, and it was a topic about deer management are we getting it right and are the standards good enough? The session was to explore whether the current deer management strategies are fit for purpose, consider the government's role and interventions and assess whether the training standards are keeping pace with modern demand. Sporting Sandy Williams, a former deer management coordinator of High Wheeled, floris Lysis, a deer association of the Netherlands, and Louise Farmer, an independent deer management specialist.
Peter Gibbon:You'll have to bear with us with the audio. It was a great struggle to actually try and get something recorded that was clear, because the environment I was trying to record in was incredibly noisy, with dogs, people, children, all sorts of things going on. I think there was even a chainsaw going on in the background, so I've tried to clean it up as best I can. Now, realistically, this was for people that were either at the show that struggled to hear because the PA system wasn't particularly good, or people that actually missed it and really wanted to see it. I'm sure this will raise many questions and I'm fairly sure at the end of this you'll have more questions to ask. We will do some follow-up podcasts, answering some of those questions and looking into those questions, because I know it raised questions with me that I need to get answers to and dig deeper on anyway. So have a listen, see what you think and we'll catch you at the end so Right, good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.
Hugh Van Cutsem:Thank you all for joining us for this panel discussion today. The main topics for today are really to talk about dear management strategies and training here within the UK. I've got an illustrious panel. We had a couple drop out which, looking by the season plan, is probably a good thing. Otherwise we'll be getting very cozy. But I'd like to welcome all the panelists who have joined for today's discussion. We're all looking forward to hearing your thoughts and insights on the topic of deer management here in the UK and I think also from deer management experience from Holland as well. So I think I can ask you all to introduce yourselves, just get a little bit of background on yourself and also just your understanding of deer management strategies, because clearly we have differing approaches even within the UK, and we're seeing Scotland is much more advanced on this, I think, than England is at the moment. But I'm going to hand over in no particular order Paul your order, paul.
Paul Childerley:Good afternoon everybody, paul Chudley from Chudley Sporting. Obviously I do a bit of filming as well, but a lot of people don't realize, probably, that we actually curl and manage a lot of deer with clients. So we're doing about over a thousand deer, plus my own stalking as well with compliance. Um, it's a lot ahead of okay um deer to shoot in the season. I've been doing this for 25 years with clients.
Paul Childerley:I've seen a lot of uh changes of your industry for the better to be fair, uh, whether it's training or whether it's more people like yourselves getting into it and the the growth in the whole industry with shows like this. So, yeah, um, can I pass on or do I keep on going? Thank you my name is Sandra Weirton um.
Sandy Williamson:For the past three years I've been a deer management coordinator for the High World National Land State, which is down in Sussex. Thank you. My name is Sandra Weardson.
Sandy Williamson:For the past three years I've been the Deer Management Coordinator for the High World National Land State, which is down in Sussex, and we've had a few projects over the past few years, one in particular which was DEFRA funded over a total of 26 square kilometres of ground where we actually got some DEFA funding to get thermal drain surveys undertaken so that we had a better idea of the numbers of deer present, and we also had funding for carpenters payments to try and help offset the cost of shooting deer and we've got some data that shows for fallow deer it costs you about 50 pounds per deer when you take out your time and expenses and, as we all know, game deal prices fluctuate.
Sandy Williamson:So that is one of the issues that we try to address with that. Something that we found throughout project, and one of the main benefits of it, is that we've managed to get some really serious collaborative deer management going across the area and that's mailing through setting up whatsapp groups with stalkers to try to get the working all together so that you can do coordinated days when you're all out with your own individual bits of ground, moving deer around and, you know, making the most of your time spent on the ground. We've found, over that three-year project, that we've doubled the number of deer that are being culled, and one of the interesting things with the drone survey is that it shows that there's a massive bias towards female deer. So we've probably got 75% female, 25% male and, as we all know, if you're trying to manage a population, that is a major issue.
John Thornley:Hi, I'm John Thorne. You'll notice I've picked the prime position on this stage between two lovely ladies. I'm chair of DMQ. I also chair currently the Deal Initiative Partnership. I'm author of one or two books on deal management and, way back in the 80s there's co-author of an old book called Fair Game, protection of wildlife and country sports.
John Thornley:So I've been involved in deer-related issues for a long time and was a member of the original group that put the England and Wales best practice together, and I'm currently, in view, involved in the review of Wales best practice together and I'm currently involved in the review of that best practice as well. In terms of my views about deer management, my own opinion is one size doesn't fit all, depending on the species and the area. Clearly, we've got a problem with fallow deer, particularly difficult to manage for lots of reasons, as many others will well know. So I look forward to talking with you and listening to some of you speak as well in terms of whether we've got it right in terms of one of my pet subjects in terms of training and qualifications. Thank you.
John Thornley:Good afternoon. Always a bit loud, sorry, louise Farmer. I work for NatureScot. I am the wildlife management best practice officer that covers the whole of Scotland, so lots of different species, lots of different habitats and my role is to facilitate and deliver the development of best practice. And the biggest project that I work on is Wild Deer Best Practice, which have been going since 2003, and so I've got the time and the position and, luckily, the funding through Scottish Government to be able to put events on and develop best practice further. So before working for Nature Scots I was with BASC and before that I was teaching 10 years, lecturing in Dainty Deer Management. So my roles over the last 20 years have all been focused on improving standards and education.
Floris Leyssius:Floris Lassie from Holland, from the Dutch Deer Society. I've been stalking through the UK since 1984 and in Holland it's a completely different game because it's very small. Small. We've got a lot of infrastructure, we've got a lot of rules and we've got not not too many deer, but to get them properly is a challenge, especially in our. The antis are very heavily disturbing our shooting programs. So it's interesting to talk with you about how to arrange your programs after all the internal problems of what beats the killer and when and how.
Hugh Van Cutsem:Right, thank you all for that introduction. I think, as an interesting starting question, it would be good to get the perspective from the panel, particularly given your experience in Holland, your experience in Scotland, on deer management strategy, because there it's much more centralised and clearly here in Ingoos we don't yet have a centralised deer management strategy and I suppose, leading on from that, do we think we need one here in England or do we feel we're doing a good job already. I think it would be interesting for us just to hear a little bit more about how the Deer Management Strategy is led by government in Holland and how it's enacted.
Floris Leyssius:Yes, thank you. For starters, I think it's very important to make your goal clear. Why do you want to manage deer populations? And is it because you've got too many? You want natural regeneration? Is it because you like to stop? You would like to make a business out of it? Is it because you want more biodiversity?
Floris Leyssius:That's a hot topic in Holland, probably here in Britain as well. We, as British Deer Association, we are changing our view because what we now want to do is see what brings, what does the deer bring to the environment and what does the environment bring to the deer, and get a proper interaction. It's very easy to say, very difficult to realize. The other thing is and that's a big problem we get tickets for deer to shoot, so we have to count, especially count casualties, damage, stuff like that. And then we have to explain that to our local county and they give us a certain amount of tickets to shoot roe deer, red deer, wild boar. We don't do it.
Floris Leyssius:One check, and seagulls, of course, and the antis they try these applying. So they just say now you haven't proven enough that deer are an issue in Holland. They're not doing as much damage as you say. And then they bring it to the judge and the judge says, well, as long as it's under the hammer, you can't shoot. So you've got large areas in Holland where we can't cull our deer and that's very disturbing and that's mostly to do because we get the allowance, because we look for damage. Damage is our goal, our drive to call there to manage them, and we want to change that to a dear management, population management. Is that the set your apprenticeship question answer.
Hugh Van Cutsem:And Louise, maybe you could just give a little bit of a perspective, a little bit of perspective from Scotland, because clearly there's been much more government-led initiatives in terms of deer management. I think they're well advertised, but the sort of direction of travel you see happening in scotland, because I think, as we sit here in england, there's definitely a view that could be coming down the track, and is that something that we we want to see adopted? Um, and also, just what is the basis for cull targets that they said in scotland, because we all hear they're very aggressive, but what is that based on?
John Thornley:Thanks very much. One thing we chatted to earlier Hugh and I had a chat before we started. I think one of the main things that are important to identify is just how much change has actually happened in Scotland over the last five years or so. I've been in my current role for two and a half years and I've seen change in legislation. We've seen new bills, we've seen consultations. There's been there's a lot of change, and making sure that that we have our practitioners, that we have our dear managers on board with that, has certainly not been easy. So communication has been really, really important. We are only ever going to see more change.
John Thornley:I think in Scotland that seems to be coming month after month potentially new proposals when it comes to looking at the reasons for for shooting more deer. Obviously, scotland have got a huge focus on biodiversity improvement and that message seems to be coming louder and louder from Scottish government. Unfortunately, deer are without the pun. They're in the crosshairs. Unfortunately, populations are going to have to change and certainly when it comes to the policy in Scotland you mentioned about one of one size doesn't fit all when it comes to management in Scotland, possibly Simmons in England, but you know, we've got open hill stalking. We've got stalkers, recreational stalkers, potentially in forestry areas in the borders.
John Thornley:It's such a diverse selection. It's a mass melting pot of people with different land interests, different species, a different access. Some people have got access to larder, some people haven't. It's just such a variety and that has been I've called it one of the hardest conversations to have is to make sure everybody's on board with the changes that are happening. There's quite a few projects that have been going on in Scotland. The Common Ground Forum has been very successful, which has been an open forum for dear managers to actually have opportunity to, in a constructed environment, talk about their concerns and how that will be listened to by government. So it's very proactive. But it certainly hasn't been an easy to get to the stage that we are at.
Hugh Van Cutsem:Thank you. I think that's a really important point that when government's legislating from above, the people enacting on the ground actually get the opportunities to feel that they're being heard, because ultimately they're the practitioners and they need to be heard. So it's quite an interesting point that you make there and sadly just from. If we look at just england now, um, clearly here in england deer management strategy is left to land holding by land holding. Um, I meanry permission, have an input, but ultimately it comes down to the landowners and what policy they want to follow in deer management strategy. But it's just quite interesting to hear because what your role was as deer management coordinator. How did you find bringing estates together worked in terms of getting the outcome and getting the estates to work together?
Sandy Williamson:Our project we managed to get just over 80 landowners on board and obviously every one of those had slightly different ideas of what deer management should be for them. But I was reassured that you can do things, that we were dealing with fallow deer, but you can coordinate things at a landscape scale. I mean, how many people in the audience think we do need a deer management strategy for England? Yeah, a reasonable number. Personally I do, because one of the main issues that we found with the fallow deer is that you do get landowners that don't want to engage at all with deer management and you know the deer use those grounds I hate to use the word sanctuaries because it sounds so lovely and idyllic but they will use those, those areas to hide up and make deer management across that landscape very difficult.
Sandy Williamson:One of the things we did was actually invited landowners that didn't want shooting on their ground for any reason to allow us to walk the deer off the ground to do a coordinated poll, and that seemed to work with some people. But I think we do need a legislation or board and it's as John and Louisa said, it's not a one size fits all. You all. Certain species of deer are issues in certain areas. It's not right across the board and that's why you need a strategy to focus any resources in those areas where it's needed. But yeah, we did the consultation. We ended in 2022. So three years later you would hope that a strategy would come out for England, but maybe moving late and see what happens in scotland um, and then paul and john, just as practitioners on the ground.
Hugh Van Cutsem:Um, and I imagine with like, for instance, paul, you've obviously got a commercial operation, um, but in the same breath you have a deer management strategy. And how would you feel if that was being legislated for by government above, in terms of how you manage the deer on your ground?
Paul Childerley:Like you said, basically each plot of land estate farm, everybody wants their deer, managed in a separate way and dependent on species. So it really boils down, I find, to what they want to achieve at the end of it, whether it's biodiversity, the trees, or they want a commercial outlet and basically a lot of estates now want a commercial outlet for their deer, whether it's venison or whether it's people coming in commercially shooting them, whether it's syndicate or people come from abroad. For me personally, I think mud jack are a little bit of a problem and fallow deer in certain places are a real problem. There's obviously debates about going forward with night licences and trying to keep the numbers down, but I've experienced quite a few times over the last several years of the holding ground. The non-shooting areas does ruin the cold for the season, but people are now experiencing the damage and devastation of crops or their ground and they're actually coming on board. I think probably that would be a good way to start the ball rolling with problem areas, not blanket.
Hugh Van Cutsem:I think blanket will not be a good thing for me financially be a good thing for me financially, um, and then I think, sort of just because I'm aware we've we of time frames etc.
Hugh Van Cutsem:That we're working under um john, just an interesting one because it, yeah, there is obviously funding for deer management that's given to landowners, um, but I think this, the what I'm trying to unpack here is the question of is is that funding going in the right direction?
Hugh Van Cutsem:And do you think that actually, if we were going to have a deer management strategy, it's all well and good to put the strategy down from above, but actually there's a lot of blockages which would prevent that strategy from being successful. You know whether it's capacity in the market for venison and actually, could government rethink how they are spending money on deer management grants to actually ensure that we get the right outcomes? Now, whether that's just from what you were saying, sandy, about funding doe culls for the fallow deer, is that a better way for money to be spent and, importantly, to come back into the pockets of the people who are actually having to spend the time and resources out on the ground managing the deer into the pockets of the people who are actually having to spend the time and resources out on the ground managing the dirt.
John Thornley:Well, I think it's quite a concern. But money through the grand scheme actually gets to the coal phase. I think that's what you're touching on there and, yeah, that's a real concern. I'm concerned with any strategy that's likely to come. Anyway. When you look at the consultation for now that was Delbury it gets a little bit political, but the key stakeholders that entered that consultation were no more listened to than Fred in the Shed were no more listened to than Fred in the Shed, and I think that's worried because there's a lot of Fred in the Sheds out there.
John Thornley:So you know we have to be careful. What we wish for, do we not? Because if we do get a national strategy that actually affects us all in areas that don't need to be affected, we have some good areas of deer management. We're probably a bit reluctant to actually praise ourselves in many ways. We have good deer populations that are well managed in different areas. There are good deer populations that are well managed in different areas. Muntjac aren't a problem in some areas. In fact, they're very wealthy in some areas. Fallow deer aren't a problem in some areas.
John Thornley:My concern is that you mentioned the word sanctuary and Floris you mentioned there are areas you can't go. Well, there are a lot of areas we can't go and that is the problem, particularly with Phalae. Okay, sounds as if there's been some success in the moving Phalae of areas, that their welfare is sort of over the top, basically, and allowed to get a great density. One of the problems with fallidae is they're not density sensitive. They don't reduce their reproduction because there's too many of them, they just keep breeding, and that's a concern, whereas other species are a little bit different.
John Thornley:So I have, as I say, I am the problem with a strategy that affects us all. I mean the likelihood of the male season being totally lifted and no closed season for male veal. Well, that might be counter-reality and a lot of people are thinking well, if that's, if that's going to happen, we're going to educate all the does and the emphasis is going to be in the wrong direction. So I would say we have to be very careful. Or in terms of any national big buddha and another factory of a factory.
Floris Leyssius:Well, in Holland we've got a few examples of unmanaged areas, and of course it was. Holland is small and people want to see deer. Deer is very, very attractive. We even connect serious money to deer. For instance, during the rut the part of Holland where the rut takes place every hotel, every B&B is filled, so it has an economic value, these deer. So there is a tendency to have as much deer as you want.
Floris Leyssius:And then we had a few areas where they didn't manage the deer, and that was a disaster, complete disaster. The fallow and the red deer, for starters. They ate everything. They were barren grounds. They started eating the trees, everything was taken down and first the red moved out, then there was no food for them left and eventually the fallow deer also went out. The roe deer died, but the rest of the environment was completely killed. So there were no butterflies, there was no undergrowth, there was nothing. So you really had barren grounds and even there deer didn't want to live. Funny enough, the fallow deer stayed there in the wrongest time.
Floris Leyssius:There was another area, a fenced area, a big area in Holland, and there was a guy managing it and he said no, no, it's a natural habit. You should compare it to Africa and we shouldn't kill bees there. It should be a natural process. So each year 1100 deer horses altogether horses, deer and cows died there every year and of course the shooting community was furious, very opposed to it, but the naturalists were very happy about it because they said this is how it should go. Luckily, in the end they said no, no, this is not how she talked, because the biodiversity went Completely, went there again.
Floris Leyssius:There were no birds, there were no butterflies, there were the rental, the vegetation was gone. So I think you should have a scheme, whatever you like, and if it's managed from above, you can. In Holland, we liked it because all of the small we like to have to's managed from above, you can. In Holland, we like to, because all of the small we like to have to get the biggest area you can get, because you know animals, don't know borders, and and Holland, we like to manage our own little plot, our own little estate, and like to see so many red deer, so many road deer, so many. But they don't know the border, so they cross and where your neighbor is isn't shooting. All his deer will become to your grounds and for in the end. It's a massacre.
Sandy Williamson:That's the trouble and just one thing I'd like to add is it's not always about the numbers of deer that we're calling.
Sandy Williamson:So over the three years of our projects we found that we had deer densities ranging from about 20 per square kilometer up to nearly 60 per square kilometer in the areas and the high world is one of the most wooded parts of the country. So natural regeneration and woodland biodiversity was one of the key drivers. And whilst you know we have to accept if we want to reduce big populations of fallow, it is going to take a lot of time. It's not an overnight job You're talking about maybe a decade to start getting to where we want to get but actually just that process of, on the landscape scale, having people contributing to deer management. It's much more naturalistic behaviour of the deer that we're seeing, so it's breaking up those big brooks. The deer are staying in the areas for as long, so we're actually seeing some biodiversity improvements. Even though we haven't got the populations down to where maybe we'd like to see them, there's already those improvements because the deer are being pushed more as they would be with natural predators.
Hugh Van Cutsem:So, yeah, it's not always about the numbers um, that's great, thank you, I think now we're just going to move on to the subject of, I think, training, um and and standards. I mean, I definitely believe we as a nation um are very good on the whole at ensuring the welfare of deer is paramount in our approach to deer management. But you know, there's obviously ever growing pressure to meet higher cull targets. There's always a risk that welfare can become compromised. The welfare can become compromised. So, you know, I do think we need to continue to be vigilant in ensuring we're offering training that's relevant and clearly of the highest quality. But I think, again, just to sort of set this framework, this conversation, it would be interesting, floris, just to hear what sort of? Do you have any form of mandatory training in holland if you're going to go out and manage there?
Floris Leyssius:in holland you're not allowed to touch your rifle without the training. So you you need to do a year's course before you can shoot small animals and shoot roe deer, and when you want to shoot red deer and mostly fallow you have to do another course, which takes three years. So that's two theoretical years and one practical year, and the last year you're trained by an experienced stalker and then you're allowed to go on your own or to shoot there on the whole. Yeah, so we couldn't think, without training you can't do anything at all and your ticket is taken away very, very easily. So if you make the wrong move, if you don't attach the right how do you call it? The yellow tag to the right, the right animal, you're done, you can.
Hugh Van Cutsem:You can leave your hobbies and go start fishing or something okay, well, that's um, I mean, I think what you said doesn't surprise me and it's what we hear goes on in most of europe, and I think we're probably unique in Europe in terms of the fact that we essentially take a voluntary approach to training. But I'd be interested just to get the views of all the panelists on training and the importance of it on a voluntary basis relative to would you want to see mandatory training coming into place?
John Thornley:I did think I was going to hear that straight away. I'm in a pretty positive position up in Scotland in that Scottish government are very pro paying for wild deer best practice events and guidance development, which makes my job really easy, because that's the first hurdle already removed. I've got some money. I've got a great cohort of stalkers in Scotland you know from top to bottom that attend events. They're really keen. They are prepared to drive three or four hours to come to a best practice event and then three or four hours back. Sometimes it involves extra costs to them because they have to organise accommodation but to want to improve their own skills and their own knowledge, which I think is really, really commendable.
John Thornley:I know that there's a number of best practice events that have been taking place in England over the last 12 months as well. If you're getting sell-out events, I can't do enough in Scotland. I wish that my role was 100% wild deer best practice because you know, if I could get that extra time to deliver it, we could be putting on a huge program. I mean ready. We're doing pretty well and it's very well supported. Um, so, yeah, when it comes comes to training, um, I think if you actually want to maybe take a a full um survey of people that are involved in deer management. I don't think too many would be against actually doing some form of training.
John Thornley:Well, this mandatory training and mandatory qualifications. Personally, I'm against the idea and I'll tell you why. It's going to be counterproductive to what we want to do in the UK If we want to manage deer more effectively in the future. Intra-industrial mandatory training is going to restrict the people that are going to manage the deer, and that's a big problem. And apart from that, why would you want to try and put something right when it's not broken?
John Thornley:Because our system isn't broken, hugh, it's very much an excellent example of self regulatory body where you look at all you people in the audience and in these halls you're all here voluntarily. Nobody's forced you, unless you're on a panel out here, to come here, and I think that's a great example. And I think, from a training point of view, we're ahead of the game, so much so that we've withstood for a number of years now any mandatory requirement. Ok, you could say, well, there's a bit of a backdoor way to that by some police forces insisting on serving qualifications, but that's not mandatory. It's probably a good thing encouraging people to get some qualification and to be to be fair, most people that use firearms would be very supportive of some mandatory training requirements, a basic safety requirement, but I would warn against it. It's going to be counterproductive.
Sandy Williamson:I think a majority of stalkers that I know have voluntarily done some sort of training, whether it be DSC or PES, and I know where we've provided courses such as reliquing and inspection to provide best practice. We've been inundated with people that want to do it, and these are experienced guys that are putting stuff through game dealers that are still happy to come and pick up a little tick here and there. You know, talking about training and deer welfare, I think one of the main issues is gamekeepers now demanding more head and neck shot deer, and I think that's putting pressure on people to do that, and so you know, maybe we should look at training the gamekeepers about sorry game dealers, about what they should be requiring for their venison. But there's a lot of good training out there and a majority of people involved in deer stalking are more than willing to do it, and I think if we're trying to push that, we're better off doing it in a voluntary way, of providing that training to be as accessible and affordable as possible to people.
Paul Childerley:Training is important. I think it starts at the roots, basically, whether it's your mind, that your mentor, you first go with your first stalk or you go and do a bass course or do another one of the organization courses. But I think it's something to enhance, especially if you're applying for your first firearm, if you're getting a variation, anything to basically prove that you're doing anything professionally. I think helps and helps the whole industry. I think there's a few sort of like areas that could be improved on, but I think in a whole, I think everybody's actually, you know, I bet most people here today actually have done a course, going to do a course or actually generally interested in it, because it's not just about getting a certificate, but actually interested to go to the course, meet some new people and actually probably learn something.
Paul Childerley:That's what I found anyway. So no, I think it's a good thing. We've done quite a few like training days for beginners, just on simulated uh targets, which I think work really well. Just gets guys out there. It's like used to putting the trigger on a silhouette rather than an around gong.
Hugh Van Cutsem:But I think any form of training is a good thing yeah, I think I mean it's really interesting to hear all your views because I wouldn't disagree with any of them, because I do think we, we are, as a sector, really good at wanting to improve ourselves and I think we, we we see that desire. In terms of what you were just talking about, sandy, I was involved in our local group with 2B in wildlife and we just saw there was a huge demand from people involved in deer management to actually get practical physical training, and I think you know that's, I suppose, the next question, which I don't know if any of you could provide the answer, but you know it's brilliant, people go out, they do DSC1, dsc2. But, as we all know, you know, there's a great starting point, but it's again it's the opportunities for experience and that's the real challenge. And, as we all know, in too many cases to get experience it's expensive. As we all know, in too many cases to get experience it's expensive.
Hugh Van Cutsem:And how do we find a way to get people experience in a way well, which is cost effective? I mean, paul, you were saying you know, just in terms of shooting experience, doing those sorts of days with you or other organisations, not just a private people, but but then also, I mean, do we not all need to look at doing more to give people hands-on experience? I don't know. If yeah, how do how do you get you know? Clearly, one of the things we hear about is is caucus handley? Yeah, because it then becomes a food product and if we are going to stand any chance and we'll talk more about this at the panel tomorrow but to improve venison sales in this country, we need to improve standards. But you know, how do we get people the opportunity to physically get their hands on the caucus and be taught? You know, I think this is where we all as a sector probably need to work much better together to get more people, more experience. But I don't know if any of the panel have ideas or thoughts on that.
Floris Leyssius:I mean, Well, again, here's Holland, again small and over-regulated, but we've got a course for carcass handling and you're not allowed to sell an animal to a gang dealer unless you're a qualified person. And to become a qualified person you have to take some lessons, a few evenings. It's not that long, not that difficult. But you have to recognize, for starters, several diseases and of course, you have to know how to open a beast and how to, for instance, clean it. I don't know if it's an issue here in this group, but when I was young we used to clean animals, get the holes out and rinse them properly, because that was when they were looking properly.
Floris Leyssius:Well it's in Holland. It's completely forbidden now. Water shouldn't be used on any animal anymore now. So there you are. And there's another thing. I um, I want to emphasize that in in I don't know how it is in in uk, but in holland we're under a magnifying glass. The shooting people are really under a magnifying glass and the antis are taking every opportunity to say what is done. And that's why training and all these well, extras are becoming quite handy, because we all can say no, no, we're trained, we're specialized, we can do this.
John Thornley:Floris, you clearly, before we left the Union, you stole that regulatory bit, that mandatory requirement, before you were supplying very soon into the food chain. You seem to have done well from us. The problem we've got here particularly is that whilst there are all these safeguards with food hygiene and trained hunter status supplying the main dealers, there is a big leap up because if you look at the game lead guide, fred in the Shed can still supply direct to the final consumer small quantities without any qualifications at all. So we've still the potential for the hotel clients to be poisoned overnight.
Floris Leyssius:Have a nice meal.
Paul Childerley:You're right, but I bet everybody in this room have got pride of what they shoot and it's growled and it's put out and it's hung up and it looks the part and I find a lot of stalkers and I've been to a lot of countries and I've seen a lot of very, very, very interesting growlicking and meat handling and I would say that uk and scotland are really good if they are really good at their their meat hygiene and their their carpets prep.
Sandy Williamson:Just one of the or a couple of things about getting more people access to get out and store. So where we've set up these deer management groups and we've got more people working together, it's raised awareness for the landowners as to what they want to achieve through deer management. One of the problems before was you're frightened to take somebody else or mentor somebody. Do you think they're going to try and nick your bit of ground? Well, it's all about building relationships and trust. So where we've got these groups working, they're now taking people forward that are interested in participating and bringing those on. You know, and especially you know, I know myself now I've got a bit older if I've got someone younger with me to help lipothiopathy about and more than more than happy to help mentor somebody. So there are opportunities there.
Sandy Williamson:But I think maybe um, I know there's a little bit goes on, but the public forest estate surely should be able to provide more opportunities for peaking to affordable stalking. But also there's absolutely there seems to be, I think, a lot of pressure on people not to charge for taking people out stalking. You should be able to. There's absolutely nothing wrong with making money out of taking people out to shoot deer and that's. That's one way of funding your deer management and you know you ought to applaud that, not put Pickle down for it.
John Thornley:Can I just add, when it comes to certainly what we talk about, carcass handling standard of carcasses that are going to eat. So game dealers, something that's been raised a few times recently with me in Scotland is the quality of the carcasses. There are a number of. I mean, everyone here would have their own views on their game dealer and quite often some game dealers will try and reduce how much they are prepared to pay for the carcass depending on damage. But what some of the feedback did come from a number of game dealers was based on the fact that the carcass handling, the standards, were core and the carcasses were poor quality. They're dirty.
John Thornley:These were individuals that now can't settle to that game dealer and they are level 2 qualified. Some of them apparently were AW memes as well group releases. So do we need to have refresher training? Some of these individuals did their DSC1, their large gain handling was part of their DSC1 15, 20 years ago. But if they're not taking it upon themselves to keep themselves up to date with standards by coming to best practice events, how do these people ensure that they're creating carcasses and putting them into the food chain that are of the right standard?
Paul Childerley:Because they won't last, they won't be able to sell the deer. It's like self-policing. A lot of these things are self-policing. It's not even managing the deer on the ground. It's self-policing and I think it is important to have a professional course, or I think. Basically, we could talk all day about game prices and heads and pices, but I think a lot of the time it's actually if the game dealer is raw, you touched on the neck and head shots. It is important to them to get the best amount of meat, but they obviously can't hit your coal target if you're just doing that. So it is a long conversation and I'm not going to talk about it chickens.
Hugh Van Cutsem:I think we're going to sort of wrap it up here, but more and more just to have questions for many of the audience. But just before we do that, it would just be interesting just to get a view from those of you who've been listening. Just yeah, if there were high quality, you know, hands-on, I mean like this best practice days, but but other more specific focused training courses for continuous professional development, call it what you will, but I mean, would you feel that you you'd be interested in going on these courses?
Hugh Van Cutsem:I'd just love to be interested to see a show of hands from everyone here, yeah, which is great to see, um, because I do believe that we, on a voluntary basis, want best adverts and we're following that, which is fantastic. Um, I'm going to throw the thread into the floor. I might have to move very fast. You're not getting the first question in, because I'm sure I won't like that afternoon everybody.
Speaker 10:Um, I just got two questions. Well, one is more a statement and I'll leave the thought with everybody in the room. But the first one. I'm part of Cow Deer Management Group on the West Coast, work with the organisers here that we all know and we have a regular attendance by nature Scott.
Speaker 10:It's no secret that mandatory training is coming in in scafland. But a lot of topic is about is funding. You want us to create, decrease the deer density, but there's a cost associated with that fls forestry land, scotland forestry hunt. They are heavily subsidized with the game dealer and what price they get from highland game. So there's got to be a contribution, whichever way you look at it, whether it's training, whether it's the Venison Prize and, as you say, we could chat all day about that but certainly mandatory training. I'm all for that. A lot of the members are, will be and have already gone through it. But in order to get that encouragement and bring people through, they need assistance and Scott Gove has to step up and bring people through. They need assistance and scott gov has to step up both in terms of training on sponsorship, availability, nature scott I'm the chap that helped bring in sporting race in scotland.
Speaker 10:I'm ex-assessor, I jumped from one side to the other. Nature scott have a lot of land holdings and significant land holdings that they could give access to a training scheme and sponsor trainees, stalkers etc and bring them through. But it's a question of cost. But the cost, when you look at the overall picture, is insignificant to what the obligations that they're looking to impose now and, as we all know, with the first section, 8 being exercised. And the second one I just want to leave is who regulates the game dealers? We're heavily regulated and expected to deliver it through our training, but who regulates the game dealers? Because I'm sure everybody in this room has got a lot of stories about game dealers and mischief that goes on. It's a very murky world.
Hugh Van Cutsem:We've got a game dealer coming tomorrow, so you can ask that question again.
Speaker 11:Uh ian uh, thank you. Thanks, panel. Uh, my name is ian burl, I'm chief exec of bass and I'm also vice president european hunting association um, just adding to your conversation there. So we are all for self-regulation and lots of training and in some of the areas we've talked about, we've already been talking about how we up our game as far as mandatory and imposed regulation.
Speaker 11:I just want to pose a question to everyone when did you last see any regulation from any of our governments or from the EU that gave us more freedoms, as opposed to telling us what we can't do? So where we look for mandatory elements enforced by government, we just need to be careful what we get, because they're not going to ask us. They're going to ask us and loads of other people. So my line and the line of the organisation that I represent is it's all about self-regulation. It's all about demonstrating massively high standards but not asking to be regulated. And just one quick follow-on point for that I'm already having discussions with the licensing element of nation scotland where they are looking. So mandatory regulation for deer stalking not yet in, but coming. They're already looking at how they can expand that beyond deer and into other areas of shooting. I'm not sure we want that, but you might thank you thanks in um.
Hugh Van Cutsem:The idea is to us if you want questions to the panel. So if anyone has questions to the panel on any subject, hello there, I'm Alison.
Speaker 12:I wanted to ask. It was quite clear from the audience that there's appetite for more practical training and a lot of people in here will be qualified to the same level. But then this kind of an appetite for mandatory training of people in here will be qualified to the same level, but then this kind of um appetite for mandatory training and people in here wanting more practical training, it sort of seems that there's not the confidence in the training that we already have and those sort of people that are on the ground and tap people in government as well. How do you think we can bridge that gap? I know, certainly as someone who would be looking for that kind of practical training it's difficult to know exactly how to sort, you know, the sheep from the goats, if you will, so you know. Is there any sort of suggestions of how we can play that better?
Speaker 11:Anyone want to take that?
John Thornley:Well, there is a couple of good schemes, mentoring schemes actually. Both the Basker Mentoring Scheme and the BDS did for people to get in touch with qualified stalkers and be taken on and get mentored in that way. I'm not so sure as there's a lack of practical training. Certainly when it comes to firearm safety and shooting test situations, you can't do that online. It's got to be practical and there is, you know, the qualifications and the training providers are out there that do provide practical training. Maybe the training providers should offer some basic rifle skill training, short, of say, the DSC-1. But certainly, you know, within the DSC-1 you've got the shooting test and you've got the practical element.
John Thornley:Dsc-2 is all practical really, but of course it's quite possible for somebody to achieve DSC2 and only have shot one deal in their life and that is a problem in terms of people looking at experienced people to take on, probably to achieve a license to shoot somewhere, take a lease. They're looking for the qualifications. There's the individual offering the dsc1, dsc2 with with little experience. It's merely a stepping stone. And yeah, I like to use the comparison of the driving test. You know, when you pass your driving test, if you look it first time, you're pretty dangerous for quite a while, and you're pretty dangerous if you haven't had a re-test for 30 years as well. So at both ends of the scale there's an issue and of course that leads us back to professional uh, coutier's professional development whether we shall be introducing more training and more courses to keep people's skills up to press.
Hugh Van Cutsem:Just to be clear, I haven't lost my driving licence. I know John looked to be in that way, but I haven't. I think it's quite interesting. Just touching on the point that you made Paul and Louise also raised about Venison carcasses, I do think that's one of the things we do need, maybe slightly drawing on what you were saying about who regulates the game dealers.
Hugh Van Cutsem:We need, if quality is poor, at least to get rejected, because that is the only way people will learn, and it's no good if they can just get rid of carcasses to the game dealer which are poor quality.
Hugh Van Cutsem:So, you know, I do think there needs to be a bit of a rethink on on that approach. But that's for the game dealers, um, but it's sort of heartening to hear that people, you know that there is a desire for voluntary training and improvement, because I think that's what we all want to continue to ensure that we are doing, that we're delivering best practice Welfare of deer is paramount when we're managing them and that ultimately, you know we're producing a really high quality product. Because, as I think, as we all know, we'll be talking more about this tomorrow and we need to be able to sell more venison in this country if we're going to be able to manage a higher cull and you know there's a myriad of ways we're going to do that, but most important is quality. So I think, if there's any more questions from the floor, yeah thanks you.
Speaker 9:Um, yeah, I have got a list but I won't go through too many of them. I think tomorrow might be. But about quality. So, um, most people know me, paul, you know me, a few of you I set up a scheme with supermarket and I think the issue is is that shop placement's a big thing?
Speaker 9:It's not in my remit, but I don't quite understand why they allow a four inch ball to be a good enough target In my field of practice, where I have an inch bull is only satisfactory. So if you think of four inch bull and then the variance of that can be eight inches and that's where we get damage of carpets. So our standard that I teach supply and supermarket for about 20 different areas of about 3000 carpets, our shot placement is only an inch. So if there's any variance on that, it's only two to three inches. So that's one thing maybe where we can improve a little bit on standard practice. Also, when we have a carcass that's not shot, well, the supermarket, every carcass is looked at quality and if there's a bad carcass, pictures are taken everywhere and if it's bad placement, those pictures are sent to the stalker and then the stalker is talked to by me or the supermarket. There's no that we don't get this from the game dealers. They're not learning at all and a lot of stalkers are used to just selling skin on carcasses and not actually seeing where the shot placement is.
Speaker 9:I can talk and talk about this, but I think it's education, education, education. I also do a mentorship. I know Paul does as well and I think, like you said, there's a lot more. Like we said, the driving license, it just gets you through it. I think we should do more mentorships because that's exactly where you learn. If I'm doing 40 carps in a day, I teach people you know just to do the legs or just do the head, so instinctively they get really good at those one things rather than just doing two or three carcasses every so often. They're never getting any better, so I'll leave it at that.
Hugh Van Cutsem:Thanks, simeon. Any questions for anyone else?
Speaker 13:I just wanted to ask a question regarding the prevalence of head and neck shooting and also extended range shooting. Ultimately, we know that this is something that is more prevalent, particularly with the increase in cull targets. We see more and more people choosing to take extended range shots, and the game dealers are asking for head and neck shooting. Is this not placing this in a more underground scene where deployment teams themselves, rather than being educated in proper places, why are we seeing organizations shying away from this, refusing to take the mantle of providing proper training on this?
Speaker 9:yeah, I think just as I was saying as well. The only reason they've been asking for head and neck shot is because placement's so poor in a chest shot. I think we need to educate people on better. They don't even know where the heart is a lot of people, so we need to maybe training again. That's the only. I spoke to all the microphone. Yeah, it is an issue, and it is an issue with venison.
Paul Childerley:I mean, I deal with a lot of smaller deer, so heart shots are not a problem because the front end there's not much venison on it, so it's basically the lorry, the back straps and the haunch. When you're trying to basically reduce big numbers, head and neck shot probably isn't the best because part shot you need to get the shots off, to get the animals on the deck, so as anyone shot fallow, you know, if you shoot one in the head the rest will go, whereas if you shoot them in the heart you'll get that second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, whatever it is. So I think that's probably. You know it's a difficult one really, because I think if you can try and have a certain amount which are plainly shot and the, the second amount which are not quite as well shot, and have the sale for the second amount to the private sales or the people that take them off you, and then you have the higher end which goes straight to the gang dealer.
Paul Childerley:Um, I've been processing for a lot of years now, but about six, seven years ago the gang dealer was I think they had a problem with muntjac and chinese water deer and basically they're only given 25 pence, 50 pence a kilo and they then they basically refuse them because it's just a small carcass meat, bone density is is so poor. So I took it on myself and basically we skin and process all the chinese water deer and muntjac and we'll do this year. It's just short 700 chinese water deer and about two and a half three hundred mud jack and I find a home for them. I don't have a problem, but it is a lot of work.
Paul Childerley:I think it's a fallow deer situation. I think what would be quite a good idea in my mind was there be a subsidy from a government to a game dealer that they would pay a game dealer X amount which would go on to the stalker. Then if you, everybody knows if there's value in something, it get it works. So, fallow deer, if a fallow deer is worth 80 pounds instead of 40 pounds, I'll tell you now they'll be shot Because somebody's going out and shooting one. They'll shoot three or four, but as long as it's done correctly, you know, so on and so on. But that's my take on it.
Sandy Williamson:So one of the other things we've done is work with the Country Food Trust. So we know we've got too many fallow deer and there's a lot of people in food poverty in our area. So we've got together and we have focused just on fallow does and. But this year the high wield supplied them with 750 fallow domes. That entire carcass was going to mince which might break your heart a little bit but it was going to mince and then that mince was either going to make up their ready meals or going into food kitchens and places that need it.
Sandy Williamson:And the stalker was guaranteed, from the very start of the season to the very end, a fixed price per kilo, which is around £2 per kilo. That wasn't going to change at all. So you know when you go out shooting how much you're going to get back for your carcass. And again, you know they're only accepted suitable carcasses. So you know it had to be fit for purpose. But, as Paul said, you know if you get a decent return, there's plenty of people, as we can see from this room, who are willing to go out and shoot deer. So you know, between us we have got a means of getting to grips with our deer population and hopefully the government can recognize that and support us all to do it.
Floris Leyssius:Headshots and neck shots. It sounds so easy and I always hope that game dealers are stalkers themselves, because I think animal welfare should always prevail above food, and when you shoot a beast badly, we always can do something with it. We can eat it ourselves, you can run a bad situation, you can even feed the dogs with it. They have a nice day. But I think and we're all very experienced gentlemen here and probably here in the audience as well we have seen lower jaws being shot off. I've even seen upper jaws being shot off, filled with heather and very, very nasty filled with heather and very, very nasty.
Floris Leyssius:So I would strongly oppose to head and neck sauce because of the meat. Another thing is and that's interesting, holland what we now do in our shooting community is when we shoot a beast a poor beast, or we shoot it poorly, then we just leave it in the wood and it's very interesting how it improves the biodiversity again. So the, especially the bottom, the bottom life is, uh, enormously increased for the better by a carcass being left there and it's gone in a week, absolutely, and you see all interesting beetles and I can go on with it.
Hugh Van Cutsem:But welfare very important and I think that's a very good note to finish on, we I'm afraid we're out of time, ladies and gentlemen, but first of all, thank you all very much for coming along, listening contributing Flores, louise, john, sandy, paul. Thank you all very much for being our panelists and we'll call it a wrap yeah so again, I'm going to apologize for the audio.
Peter Gibbon:Hopefully you were able to listen and it wasn't too bad. I am sure it has raised many questions and we will. As I said at the beginning of this podcast, we will try to dig to the bottom of them. If there are questions you have, please feel free to drop me an email. It's peter at the outdoor gibboncom, or you can get in touch with the bds as well and ask them those questions directly. But stay tuned, because sunday we talk about venison and everything to go with that. Anyway, we'll catch you on the next one.