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How a deer invasion is plaguing South Koreans on a remote island

Article (news)

Reuters

<div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">By day, South Korea&#x27;s island of Anma is deceptively peaceful and scenic, where people live in a village nestled beside peaks and a rocky shoreline.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">But after nightfall, Anma is overrun by herds of deer that destroy crops and damage trees during their nocturnal wanderings.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">People on the island say they have resorted to living behind fences, penned into homes and fields, as the animals outnumber them seven to one. They have all but given up their fight against the deer and say the only option now is to cull the herd.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">&quot;I&#x27;m sorry that I&#x27;m saying this, but at this point, we need to get rid of them which is our intention, even if that means we have to kill them,&quot; said Jang Jin-young, 43, one of the village leaders.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Since South Korea&#x27;s laws ban such efforts, Jang says the government is now weighing a petition by the villagers to designate the deer as &quot;harmful wildlife&quot;, rather than livestock, clearing the way for the herd to be thinned by hunting or other measures.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">The deer were first introduced to the island around 1985, when three farmers brought in about 10, hoping to harvest their antlers which shed annually and are highly prized in traditional medicine.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Prescribed along with ginseng and medicinal herbs, they are boiled in water to make a traditional remedy, whose cost grows with the quality and number of antler slices in the brew.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">But dwindling interest in such medicines dried up the market for antlers very quickly after the mid-1980s, leading the deer farmers to abandon their animals and leave.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">An unchecked population growth led to an explosion in numbers, turning the deer into a menace that plagues the island&#x27;s residents. They are now estimated to number 1,000, spread over an area just slightly larger than Central Park in Manhattan.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">&quot;I can&#x27;t stand it. I&#x27;d be happy if somebody could please catch them and take them away,&quot; said 80-year-old Han Jeong-rye, working in her vegetable garden surrounded by a mesh net that is 1.8 meters (6 ft) high, yet presents no obstacle for the deer, which jumps over or rips through it and eats all her crops.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">Kang Dae-rin, who runs a deer farm and trades antlers near the capital, Seoul, has made several visits to Anma to gauge the island&#x27;s potential as a source.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">He discovered the deer have a severe tick infestation that makes it hard to ship out the animals, or their antlers, and said it was futile trying to sedate the deer.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap">&quot;It is impossible to catch them by using anesthesia. The deer have already gotten immune and all of them can just run away,” said Kang.</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;text-align:justify;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:10pt"><span style="color:#000000;background-color:transparent;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap"><strong>(Production: Hongji Kim, Daewoung Kim, Heejung Jung, Sebin Choi)</strong></span></div>

<p>After nightfall, Anma is overrun by herds of deer that destroy crops and damage trees during their nocturnal wanderings.</p>

After nightfall, Anma is overrun by herds of deer that destroy crops and damage trees during their nocturnal wanderings.