B.C. agriculture minister says she supports deer cull

Fruit growers to debate request for cull at AGM

A cull to reduce the number of urban deer is something B.C. Agriculture Minister Lana Popham is willing to consider.

Members of the BC Fruit Growers’ Association will debate a resolution at their annual general meeting next weekend calling for measures to reduce the deer population.

The deer, farmers say, are eating their way through many newly planted fruit crops, causing considerable damage and economic losses.

On a tour of Okanagan farms this week, Popham acknowledged the problems caused by deer, and said she was open to the idea of partnerships with hunters and aboriginal groups to organize a cull.

“The deer can get in through a fence and devastate a crop overnight, and so it’s a serious problem,” Popham said. “It’s not something politicians like to talk about because when you talk about controlling local deer, you do get a lot of blowback.

“But if you support local farming and local food, you can’t be afraid to have that conversation, and I’m certainly not,” Popham said.

Any decision on a cull would be a decision of the Ministry of Environment, Popham said.

“We have started talks on ways to lessen the conflict between wildlife and agriculture,” she said. “If we came to a way of humanely controlling the deer population — you can use the word cull or controlling — yeah, I would be supportive of that,” she said.

“We can also look at deer as a food source,” Popham said. “There are ways that you can harvest deer without making it a wasteful situation. Venison is delicious.”