Campaigners call for darted contraceptives to be used in Royal Parks instead of a deer cull

The cull, which takes place every six months, saw an average of 90 deer from Bushy Park killed from 2004-2014 and 203 from Richmond Park in the same period.

Selling the deer meat from both of the borough’s royal parks generates an average annual revenue of more than £36,000 from 2010-2014, an FOI request made by the Richmond and Twickenham Times has revealed.

In 2014, the revenue from deer meat from Richmond Park was £39,910, while the cull from Bushy Park raised £15,447.

A Royal Parks spokesman said regular, controlled culling was necessary because the parks only had enough grazing to sustain a finite number of healthy animals.

But some campaigners are calling for more humane ways of keeping the population down, such as deer contraceptives.

Stop the Deer Cull activist Lesley Dove said the cull was cruel and caused a huge amount of stress to the surviving animals.

She said: “I have spoken with somebody who does the treating of ponies who tried to contact the Royal Parks about his services darting with a contraceptive called GonaCon but they have not responded to him.

“It is not just the deer who die that suffer, it must be very traumatic for the animals that survive the cull.

“They have used a humane contraceptive method in America and I keep pushing the Royal Parks to consider a more humane alternative.”

A Royal Parks spokesman said humane culling was necessary to ensure the well-being of the animals.

He said: “Without population control, food would become scarce and more animals would ultimately suffer.”

He said the Royal Parks does not give contraceptives to the deer through feed or injections and there are none licensed for us in the UK.

He added: “In consultation with our veterinary advisor, however, we are carefully monitoring the worldwide development of technology to limit deer populations and will continue to keep our policies for the management of deer under review.”