Public Perceptions of Deer Management in Scotland

Darragh Hare,Darragh Hare,Darragh Hare,Bernd Blossey,Bernd Blossey,Mike Daniels

doi:10.3389/fcosc.2021.781546

Abstract

In Scotland, large deer populations are associated with negative ecological and socioeconomic impacts, such as damage to peatlands and forests, agricultural and commercial forestry losses, Lyme disease transmission, and road accidents. Increasing the annual deer cull might help address these negative impacts, but could be ethically controversial. A stratified sample of adults living in Scotland (n = 1,002) responded to our online questionnaire measuring perceptions of deer management, including the acceptability of increasing the deer cull if doing so would help achieve a variety of ecological and social objectives. Overall, respondents indicated that it would be acceptable to increase the deer cull if doing so would serve public interests by reducing negative impacts of deer, with deer welfare, environmental conservation, and public health and safety being the most relevant ethical considerations. Although rural and urban respondents reported significantly different experiences and perceptions of deer, their values (i.e., attitudes, beliefs, and policy preferences) regarding deer management were very similar. Understanding values of the general public, beyond vocal interest groups, can help inform decisions on contentious wildlife management issues.

Highlights

Public health and safety) relevant to how people think about deer management? On average, do answers to these questions differ between people who live in rural versus urban areas?
A majority of respondents indicated it would be acceptable to shoot more deer if doing so would reduce the spread of Lyme disease (75%); reduce the number of deer that starve in winter (74%); allow forests to recover (73%); allow other animals to survive and thrive (70%); allow peatlands to recover (68%); reduce road accidents (68%); address climate change by storing more carbon (61%); and provide free or low-cost venison (59%) (Figure 2)
We found no significant differences between rural and urban responses to items measuring acceptability of shooting more deer to reduce the spread of Lyme disease, allow forests to recover, allow other animals to survive and thrive, reduce road accidents, address climate change by storing more carbon, provide free or low-cost venison, or create more stalking opportunities for people who like to shoot deer (Figure 3; ordinal logistic regression models, all p-values ≥ 0.06)

Summary

INTRODUCTION

Many private landowners experience economic and cultural incentives to maintain large deer populations on their land despite deleterious impacts of high deer numbers at larger spatial scales, frustrating efforts to coordinate deer management at landscape levels and excluding many local people from decisions that directly affect them (MacMillan and Leitch, 2008; Davies and White, 2012; Mustin et al, 2017; Glenn et al, 2019). We asked: How acceptable would it be to increase the deer cull if doing so would help achieve various ecological and socioeconomic objectives (i.e., allow forests to recover, allow peatlands to recover, address climate change by storing more carbon, reduce the number of deer that starve in winter, allow other animals to survive and thrive, reduce the spread of Lyme disease, create more stalking opportunities for people who like to shoot deer, provide free or low-cost venison, and reduce the number of road accidents involving deer)? Public health and safety) relevant to how people think about deer management? On average, do answers to these questions differ between people who live in rural versus urban areas?

METHODS

RESULTS

DISCUSSION

ETHICS STATEMENT