MELBOURNE, Oct. 20 (Xinhua) -- A huge increase in Victoria's deer population has prompted calls by hunters to allow them to sell wild-shot deer commercially.
A record 71,142 deer were shot in Victoria in 2015, up 14 per cent from 62,165 in 2014 and more than double the number shot in 2011, suggesting that the invasive species' population is growing rapidly.
The Australian Deer Association (ADA), a group representing hunters, is calling for the Victorian government to change laws so that wild-shot deer could be commercially processed for human and pet consumption.
Barry Howlett, the ADA's executive officer, said allowing the deer meat to be sold to the public in restaurants and stores offered hunters an incentive to kill more deer, providing a solution to "sustainably manage wild deer populations in Victoria" as well as economic benefits.
Howlett said there were "well into the hundreds of thousands" of wild deer currently living in Victoria.
Victorian farmers have supported deer population management proposals, which are now being considered by a Victorian parliamentary committee.
Kevin Sanders, a Victorian apple grower since 1976, said he had noticed a significant increase in the number of the "eating machines" around his farm, which he owns with his two brothers.
Sanders said he was forced to build a 2.2 meter "deer-proof" fence to protect his apple trees in recent years.
"It's getting worse all the time. We've got to figure out some way to get rid of them, permanently," Sanders told Fairfax Media on Thursday.
"You could easily say we've lost over half-a-million dollars, that's not a difficult number to imagine, it's just not. It's probably somewhere between there and a million dollars in lost productivity, it's just destroying it.
"Ten years ago they were a nuisance. These days they are a pest of significance. You see them all the time. Years ago you'd see them infrequently ... these days the boys shoot them in threes and fours."
