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Deer eradication within sight on Kangaroo Island

Native wildlife are a huge drawcard for tourists visiting Kangaroo Island, which is well on its to eradicating feral deer. Photo: Flickr | robdownunder | CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
Native wildlife are a huge drawcard for tourists visiting Kangaroo Island, which is well on its to eradicating feral deer. Photo: Flickr | robdownunder | CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

Kangaroo Island, often described as Australia’s Galapagos Island, is rare for Australia in being free of many introduced species, including rabbits and foxes.

Now, after years of hard work, there is a realistic possibility that feral deer could soon be a thing of the past on Australia’s third largest island. A highly successful part of this initiative was ‘dob in a deer’, which encouraged members of the public to report any deer they spotted on the island.

A recent invader

Feral deer are a recent arrival on Kangaroo Island, entering the wild after about 300 animals escaped from a deer farm in 1999. The escape rallied the island’s cattle stud industry, which feared the potential of deer to carry strains of Johne’s disease, which can kill livestock. There were also fears the feral deer would damage native vegetation, commercial agricultural crops, cause hazards on the islands roads and destroy gardens.

Ground shooting

Deer control was predominantly by ground shooting conducted by Kangaroo Island Natural Resources Management Board staff with help from some local hunters. Deer were targeted during all seasons but with a more intensive focus during autumn, when the bucks tend to roam widely and leave ‘evidence’ of their presence by rubbing their velvets against trees in an attempt to establish and defend small territories.

What worked:

  • The small and relatively localised deer population on Kangaroo Island made the eradication program feasible and possible.
  • Good planning in association with the community early in the piece provided the framework to plan and implement actions in a well thought out orderly way.
  • Sightings of feral deer were very well reported by the community throughout the program.
  • Multiple methods of monitoring population change have provided confidence in the detected trends.

What didn’t work:

  • Use of tracking dogs was initially tried but dogs ended up dispersing deer.
  • Lures including deer feeders filled with cracked corn were initially attempted to draw out those deer that were hiding out in the scrub. This was not successful here but has worked in other areas.

Other pests

Deer are not the only feral animals in the spotlight. They are part of a much larger eradication project called Repel the Invaders. Originally launched in 2006 and funded by the Australian government, it aims to eradicate other feral pests as well, including goats, pigs, peacocks, ferrets and cats.

The program is close to eradicating feral goats from the island. Pet ferrets have escaped but at present there are no established populations. Feral cats are in its sights, with a plan to eradicate them from the island and to phase out all domestic cats by 2030. Two million dollars is being sought to undertake the feral cat eradication initiative.

More info

Related Content

Sambar Deer
Feral deer in Tasmania
Feral deer in Victoria
Feral Deer Control: A Strategy for Tasmania

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Join thousands of Australians who are standing up for Kosciuszko National Park!

The NSW government is one step away from allowing aerial control of feral horses in Kosciuszko National Park. This is huge news and a crucial step for our threatened native wildlife and the fragile alpine ecosystems they call home.

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Dear Project Team,

[YOUR PERSONALISED MESSAGE WILL APPEAR HERE.] 

I support the amendment to the Kosciuszko National Park Wild Horse Heritage Management Plan to allow our incredible National Parks staff to use aerial shooting as one method to rapidly reduce feral horse numbers. I want to see feral horse numbers urgently reduced in order to save the national park and our native wildlife that live there.

The current approach is not solving the problem. Feral horse numbers have rapidly increased in Kosciuszko National Park to around 18,000, a 30% jump in just the past 2 years. With the population so high, thousands of feral horses need to be removed annually to reduce numbers and stop our National Park becoming a horse paddock. Aerial shooting, undertaken humanely and safely by professionals using standard protocols, is the only way this can happen.

The government’s own management plan for feral horses states that ‘if undertaken in accordance with best practice, aerial shooting can have the lowest negative animal welfare impacts of all lethal control methods’.

This humane and effective practice is already used across Australia to manage hundreds of thousands of feral animals like horses, deer, pigs, and goats.

Trapping and rehoming of feral horses has been used in Kosciuszko National Park for well over a decade but has consistently failed to reduce the population, has delayed meaningful action and is expensive. There are too many feral horses in the Alps and not enough demand for rehoming for it to be relied upon for the reduction of the population.

Fertility control as a management tool is only effective for a small, geographically isolated, and accessible population of feral horses where the management outcome sought is to maintain the population at its current size. It is not a viable option to reduce the large and growing feral horse population in the vast and rugged terrain of Kosciuszko National Park.

Feral horses are trashing and trampling our sensitive alpine ecosystems and streams, causing the decline and extinction of native animals. The federal government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee has stated that feral horses ‘may be the crucial factor that causes final extinction’ for 12 alpine species.

I recognise the sad reality that urgent and humane measures are necessary to urgently remove the horses or they will destroy the Snowies and the native wildlife that call the mountains home. I support a healthy national park where native species like the Corroboree Frog and Mountain Pygmy Possum can thrive.

Kind regards,
[Your name]
[Your email address]
[Your postcode]


Dear Project Team,

[YOUR PERSONALISED MESSAGE WILL APPEAR HERE.] 

I support the amendment to the Kosciuszko National Park Wild Horse Heritage Management Plan to allow our incredible National Parks staff to use aerial shooting as one method to rapidly reduce feral horse numbers. I want to see feral horse numbers urgently reduced in order to save the national park and our native wildlife that live there.

The current approach is not solving the problem. Feral horse numbers have rapidly increased in Kosciuszko National Park to around 18,000, a 30% jump in just the past 2 years. With the population so high, thousands of feral horses need to be removed annually to reduce numbers and stop our National Park becoming a horse paddock. Aerial shooting, undertaken humanely and safely by professionals using standard protocols, is the only way this can happen.

The government’s own management plan for feral horses states that ‘if undertaken in accordance with best practice, aerial shooting can have the lowest negative animal welfare impacts of all lethal control methods’.

This humane and effective practice is already used across Australia to manage hundreds of thousands of feral animals like horses, deer, pigs, and goats.

Trapping and rehoming of feral horses has been used in Kosciuszko National Park for well over a decade but has consistently failed to reduce the population, has delayed meaningful action and is expensive. There are too many feral horses in the Alps and not enough demand for rehoming for it to be relied upon for the reduction of the population.

Fertility control as a management tool is only effective for a small, geographically isolated, and accessible population of feral horses where the management outcome sought is to maintain the population at its current size. It is not a viable option to reduce the large and growing feral horse population in the vast and rugged terrain of Kosciuszko National Park.

Feral horses are trashing and trampling our sensitive alpine ecosystems and streams, causing the decline and extinction of native animals. The federal government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee has stated that feral horses ‘may be the crucial factor that causes final extinction’ for 12 alpine species.

I recognise the sad reality that urgent and humane measures are necessary to urgently remove the horses or they will destroy the Snowies and the native wildlife that call the mountains home. I support a healthy national park where native species like the Corroboree Frog and Mountain Pygmy Possum can thrive.

Kind regards,
[Your name]
[Your email address]
[Your postcode]