Fear that thousands of deer have starved to death

Deer(Hjort). Photo wikipedia.com

The long and snowy winter has caused several thousand deer to have starved. At the Norwegian Hjortesenter, is feared that near 10,000 deer have died from starvation this year.

 

“We are talking about thousands, maybe even 10,000. It’s bad to see that so many animals suffer. It is part of nature, but also something to think about when managing the flocks,” says Johan Trygve Solheim, the Norwegian Hjortesenter to NRK.

The situation means that large flocks of cultivated deer, enter agricultural areas.

“I have counted over 100 animals in a 90-acre area,” says farmer, Ingebrigt Kyrkjeeide, from Stryn.

Environment leader Odd Rønningen from the Stryn municipality says they receive many reports of dead deer. When deer gnaw the bark of trees in the forest, the animals have no reserves left. Even though spring has come, the danger is not over.

“No, we often see that they die right after they finally find food,” says Rønningen.

Farmers in Stryn believe the only solution is to hunt more animals. Solheim points out that its people who have created what he denotes as a wild wildlife growth in recent years.

– “These animals grow in population easy when they have no natural enemies like wolf and bears. It is the people who decide,” says Rønningen.

A total of 42,541 deer were killed this past year’s hunting season, figures from Statistics Norway (SSB) in March showed. Thus, this deer hunt passed the record from 1999 when 39,400 moose were hunted. The quota was 57,200 deer and the hunt rate yielded 74 percent. Most of the deer, a total of 12,850 animals, were shot in Sogn og Fjordane.

 

© NTB scanpix / #Norway Today