Fallow deer removed from Fleurieu in aerial cull

Following on from a series of operations, from both air and ground, the Hills and Fleurieu Landscape Board worked with partners to target the Deep Creek National Park.

Grazing Pressure Management regional coordinator Tom Kloeden said feral deer had been targeted in priority areas across two days.

"In partnership with the National Parks and Wildlife Service SA and private landholders, we coordinated an aerial deer control operation at Deep Creek National Park and neighbouring private properties, removing 243 fallow deer across 6800 hectares, using 10 hours of helicopter flight time," he said.

"Grazing pressure from introduced herbivores can have substantial impacts on primary production, water catchments, native vegetation and threatened flora and fauna.

"Feral deer are established across much of the region. The approach to deer management is to reduce high-density deer populations, and strategically target priority locations to protect assets including primary production, threatened species and ecosystems, or revegetation sites.

"We also aim to contain or eradicate isolated populations where possible."

A PIRSA-commissioned report showed there is as many as 8000 deer in the area, which have the potential to increase by about 30 per cent each year.

"Our coordinated activities are certainly resulting in localised reductions in deer numbers and their impacts," Mr Kloeden said.

"Continued control efforts and coordination between public and private landholders will be required over the coming years in order to achieve a landscape scale reduction in numbers of both feral deer and feral goats."

Earlier targeted approaches include a two-day aerial goat control operation at Montacute in March, which resulted in the removal of 323 feral goats and six deer, while 110 goats have been removed by trapping and ground shooting.

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"Consistency is the key to local eradication," Mr Kloeden said.

"Over the past few years more than 1900 feral goats have been removed from an initial surveyed population of over 2000.

"The positive rebound of native vegetation has been shown though monitoring and farmers are reporting fewer feral goats on their properties."

But he said goat populations could regenerate quickly, particularly with few natural predators in the region.

"There is still a lot of work to do, goats have a fast population growth rate, increasing by up to 65-70pc each year," he said.

"A sustained, integrated effort will be required to reach our local eradication target," Mr Kloeden said.

"We encourage landholders and the general public to report any sightings of feral goats and deer at www.feralscan.org.au which will trigger an alert to our team and help us understand where subpopulations are residing and how to best plan our programs."