By Corina Jordan, Chief Executive, New Zealand Game Animal Council
New Zealand has an opportunity to lead the world in progressive, evidence-based deer management that benefits indigenous biodiversity, hunting and communities. However, we remain stuck in a decades-old fight over whether deer and other game animals are pests to eliminate or a resource to value. This binary debate divides rather than unites us and distracts from the real solution – adaptive management that maintains healthy, low-density deer herds and healthy, resilient ecosystems.
We only need to look overseas to see how deer management can be done well.
Adaptive management is emerging in the United States and Europe as a successful and effective way to deliver conservation outcomes and improved hunting and recreational opportunities. In these jurisdictions wildlife managers use science, monitoring and active hunter participation to reduce browse pressure on vegetation while enhancing the quality and sustainability of the hunting resource.
The roots of modern game animal management can be traced back to the early 20th century in North America. In the wake of widespread overhunting and habitat destruction, species like white-tailed deer, elk (what we know as wapiti), and bison had been pushed to the brink of extinction. The response was the emergence of a conservation movement driven, in part, by hunters themselves, and made famous by American President Theodore Roosevelt.
The North American Model of Wildlife Conservation was born, a framework based on the intersection of hunting and wildlife conservation that incorporated principles like the public ownership of wildlife and the use of science in policymaking. Since about 1975, this model has embedded hunters as essential conservation partners.
Where this model is used, deer are not managed down to zero. They are managed to appropriate ecological and social carrying capacities. Hunters are critical in this work, and the focus is on managing the number of female deer in a population to achieve desired environmental and animal health outcomes. This is known as ‘population-level management’, or ‘quality management’ and it is highly effective.
Across the Atlantic, adaptive management is also taking root. In the UK, management of female deer to control population growth and mitigate environmental damage is promoted with programmes producing clear improvements in biodiversity as well as animal and habitat health. In continental Europe, systems integrate population monitoring, harvest data and community and hunter involvement as collaborative elements of an adaptive management model.
So why hasn’t New Zealand embraced this approach? Part of the answer lies in our history.
Once introduced and protected by law, deer have, since the mid-20th century, come to be seen as invaders to be eliminated. Venison recovery, helicopter and ground culling became the dominant control tools. While these methods temporarily reduced populations in some areas, they also created conflict as many resented private profits being made from a public resource. This undermined public support and meant the opportunity was missed to develop a more thoughtful and sustainable management approach.
An additional barrier to progress is the outdated and inflexible conservation law framework, which enshrines binary thinking where indigenous is good and introduced is bad. Valued introduced species are therefore managed for control, eradication or extermination. This has made it difficult to explore more balanced, adaptive management strategies, and it’s becoming more obvious that New Zealand needs a different agency to provide leadership when it comes to managing game animals, including deer.
The current system limits New Zealand’s ability to pursue outcomes that reflect the diversity of landscapes, ecosystems and values across the country. The current challenges with increasing populations of deer in some parts of New Zealand are clear evidence that our current system has failed. New Zealand doesn’t have a game animal problem, but it does have a game animal management problem.
In 2013, the Game Animal Council Act was established. It is the first piece of law in New Zealand to recognise game animals as valued introduced species and the role of hunters in management. Within the Game Animal Council Act, there’s a legal tool called Herds of Special Interest (HOSI). HOSI enables collaboration with hunter-based groups and provides an opportunity to embed a modern management framework based on the intersection of hunting and conservation.
A HOSI is a high-value game animal herd on an area of public conservation land that has been formally recognised (designated) by the Minister for Hunting and Fishing. It is based on adaptive management techniques used successfully overseas, applying this within a New Zealand context to enable coordinated, long-term, place-based management that adapts to changing environmental conditions and population dynamics.
Two herds are currently being considered for HOSI – the Fiordland wapiti herd and the Central North Island sika herd. The Fiordland Wapiti Foundation and Sika Foundation are already carrying out management activities for these herds, utilising aspects of adaptive management such as integrated monitoring, hunter participation goals, habitat protection goals; and promoting animal health while reducing herd numbers and the herd’s ecological impact.
This work offsets the cost of conservation to the taxpayer, while giving back to communities through the provision of wild venison into social distribution channels such as food banks. They focus on the right metrics – reduced browse pressure, controlled population density through female harvest, and improved health and quality of animals. They offer a win for conservation, a win for hunting and a win for communities.
Research by Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research has shown that the impacts of deer are highly variable across New Zealand, our different landscapes and vegetation types. This reinforces the need for a management solution like HOSI, where localised, adaptive approaches are taken, rather than a one-size-fits-all national model. We must match management to local ecological need, and that requires monitoring, modelling and feedback loops – core features of adaptive management.
New Zealand faces a fundamental choice. We can continue to follow a binary path of division and reactive responses to game animal populations, or we can enable the systems, partnerships, and policies needed for evidence-based, adaptive management. The tools already exist. The models are proven. Now is the time to apply them and support our communities to deliver sustainable solutions for the management of wild deer while achieving ecological health outcomes.
The NZ Game Animal Council is a statutory organisation working towards the sustainable management of game animals and hunting for recreation, communities, commerce and conservation.
Contact:
Corina Jordan, Chief Executive Officer – NZ Game Animal Council
0274287772