DEAR SIR: I’m a sheep farmer living and farming in the hills of east Wicklow. Generating an adequate income from a mainly mountainous farm is difficult at the best of times but this is made even more challenging due to the competing presence of a large population of deer in the area.

Large herds of deer roam the hills of east Wicklow and compete with sheep for the available grazing, pasture land which requires considerable effort to develop and maintain. It seems to me that the deer population is thriving as they pick and choose the best pasture on which to graze.

The periodic culling of the deer population and recreational hunting of deer during hunting season never seems to be effective in the management of the deer population. Indeed, I routinely see herds of 30-40 deer roaming my hill pastures. Maintaining adequate and suitable pasture requires on-going expenditure on fertiliser, a commodity whose cost continues to increase and has almost doubled in price since the mid-2000s.

The Department of Agriculture published guidelines state that one single deer will graze the land required to satisfy three sheep. This fact negatively affects the number of sheep I can farm as my farm is, in reality, a mixed farm with both sheep and deer.

The only appropriate method of managing the native deer population is for a Government agency, such as Coillte, to leave an appropriate amount of land in grass to provide adequate grazing for the local deer population or alternatively, for the Department of Agriculture to provide an adequate subsidy per tonne of fertiliser used by the hill farmer thereby recognising the fact that these farmers are being asked to feed the local deer population on behalf of the general public.

Hopefully, this letter will provoke others to respond with their experiences and to offer other possible approaches to the effective management of the native deer populations.