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Recreational deer hunting has been an Allen family tradition for generations. “I still go hunting with my father as well as my brothers and now my young son is very interested,” Matthew Allen said. After the Stag season opened at the end of February: every weekend thousands of hunters went out stalking game. The season runs until April 2 and reopens in mid-May through until the end of June. “It’s been a bit hot (this year) which isn’t the most helpful thing for hunting but some nice bucks have been shot despite the weather conditions,” Mr Allen said. The vice-chairman of the Tasmanian Deer Advisory Committee said hunting was a popular pastime in the state, and there were just over 5000 licensed deer hunters in Tasmania last year. “My biggest problem each season is keeping up with people who want the venison,” Mr Allen said. “We do have people in the community who don’t like hunting and don’t like firearms and that’s fine…” Tasmanian hunters are awaiting the outcome of a Legislative Council wild fallow deer inquiry, due to report on the state’s deer population in June. The committee heard the wild deer population could have grown to 100,000 but Mr Allen said it was more likely around 40,000 or 50,000. “I believe they are spreading and that’s the bigger problem rather than the population exploding,” Mr Allen said. He said hunters would hope to be able to hunt again in some areas where they used to be allowed to traditionally. He said recreational hunters were in the best position to address deer over-population, but without the access to certain places to hunt the deer had a haven. Crop damage has been estimated at many millions of dollars and there are concerns deer herds could damage World Heritage Areas. “It’s so much harder to get access to land to hunt on – after the last government locked up all those forests and they went over to the department of parks and wildlife three years ago, we’ve been locked out of it all,” Mr Allen said. Last year the buck season was extended a week. Hunters can now take one buck and two antlerless deer or three antlerless deer for a total of three tags – up from one buck and one antlerless deer or two antlerless deer. Hunters also want to see the second antler season extended by three months. Mr Allen said there had been a “huge uptake of female hunters” getting involved in deer hunting in the last five to 10 years. ”For me it’s about being out there with my family and friends as much as anything else – for us it’s a good time with a good group of people.”

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