April is Hog Deer hunting season in Gippsland and a time when hundreds of local, interstate and even a few overseas hunters converge on the area to hunt this very challenging and highly valued game animal.
Hog Deer are the smallest and least-common of Australia’s six introduced deer species. They were introduced to Gippsland by the Victorian Acclimatisation Society in the 1860s from India and have maintained small populations in coastal Gippsland ever since.
To hunt for Hog Deer, it is necessary to hold a firearms licence, a Victorian game licence endorsed for deer and to have obtained tags from the Victorian Game Management Authority. The bag limit is one male and one female deer per hunter during the April season.
Hog Deer have been hunted during April on private property with landowner permission, as well as on some areas of public land managed by Parks Victoria (several State Game Reserves and parts of the Gippsland Lakes Coastal Park).
A ballot system also gives limited access to a small number of lucky hunters to three additional areas of public land at Blond Bay and Boole Poole Peninsula to the south of Bairnsdale and Snake Island in Corner Inlet.
In recent years quite a few hunters and syndicates have bought land to manage it for Hog Deer and to provide hunting for themselves or for family and friends. A number of landowners also provide hunting access for a fee under a Victorian Game Management Authority program, making as much as $7000 for each trophy stag harvested.
Managing private property to produce Hog Deer usually entails reducing livestock numbers along with increasing cover, providing a secure water supply and reducing fox numbers – a win for an often neglected and fragile low-lying coastal environment.
Spending time in nature, the challenges of the hunt and the possibility of some very tasty venison and a set of trophy antlers as a reminder of the hunt are factors that draw hunters back year after year to the haunts of this most-challenging
game species.
