Sika deer invasive EU-wide: hobby hunting fights back

The EU classifies the sika deer as an invasive species across Europe and orders the complete dissolution of all enclosure populations by August 2027. Thousands of breeding operations in several member states are affected, around 250 in Austria alone, and of all people it is the hobby hunting associations that are fighting back against the species protection measure.

What the EU regulation provides for

The basis is Regulation (EU) No 1143/2014 on the prevention and management of the introduction and spread of invasive alien species, supplemented by the associated implementing regulation containing the so-called Union list. The sika deer was newly added to this list because it crosses with native red deer and can form hybrid populations. The rule applies across the Union: keeping, breeding, transport and import of the species will in future be prohibited. As early as August 2026, male and female animals are to be kept separately in order to prevent further reproduction. By the summer of 2027, all populations across the entire EU area must be completely dissolved, even though the concrete figures and reactions available to date relate primarily to Austria. The regulation does not provide for any compensation for the operations.

In Austria, estimates suggest that around 7’000 animals and more than 250 operations are affected; an official overall EU statistic covering all member states is not yet available. Reliable figures for other EU states with sika breeding operations are not yet available in the sources analysed.

No direct relevance for Switzerland, but documented populations

Switzerland is not an EU member and is therefore not bound by Regulation (EU) No 1143/2014. For invasive alien species, the Hunting Ordinance (JSV) and cantonal enforcement powers apply here; there is no Union-wide obligation to completely dissolve populations as there is in the EU.

But this does not mean that Switzerland is untouched by the issue. As a report by the Canton of Zurich documents, permanent sika deer populations exist in the border region with Germany in the cantons of Zurich and Schaffhausen. These stem, among other things, from animals that escaped from private enclosures. This shows that fenced enclosure keeping offers no reliable guarantee against the spread of a species classified as invasive into free-living wild populations, not even outside the EU.

Hobby hunting associations position themselves against nature conservation law

It is remarkable who is taking a stand here against an EU measure to protect biodiversity: above all Jagd Österreich and the Österreichische Wildtierstiftung. In Austria, the president of Jagd Österreich, Anton Larcher, and the president of the Österreichische Wildtierstiftung, Max Mayr Melnhof, are demonstratively siding with the farm game keepers. Larcher announced that he would support exemption applications by affected operations, provided the animals are marked with ear tags.

This positioning fits a recurring pattern: as soon as the economic interests of hobby hunters and associated breeding and marketing operations are affected, the otherwise cultivated narrative of «responsible population regulation» is suddenly turned against species protection itself. The meat of the sika deer is marketed by breeding operations as a delicacy, with a correspondingly high economic interest in the continued existence of the populations. The association of sika breeders estimates the looming damage in Austria alone at around 16 million francs.

Double standard: for the raccoon the opposite applies

How contradictory the attitude of hobby hunters towards invasive species is becomes clear when compared with the raccoon. It too is on the EU Union list of invasive species, yet here the same lobby that campaigns for the preservation of the population in the case of the sika deer demands the most intensive hunting possible. In Germany alone, in the 2024/2025 hunting year, according to the German Hunting Association 282’499 raccoons were killed, with a rising tendency from year to year. Germany is, however, unable to provide reliable figures on the actual economic damage caused by the raccoon.

Scientific studies also put into perspective the dangerousness of the species as propagated by hunting associations. Several years of research by Dr Berit Michler showed that raccoons feed primarily on earthworms, snails and fruit, and that threatened species are hardly part of their prey spectrum. Furthermore, population-ecological studies demonstrate that high hunting pressure leads to a higher reproduction rate in raccoons, so that losses from hunting are compensated for or even overcompensated.

The difference from the sika deer is obvious: for the raccoon, its classification as an invasive species serves hobby hunters as justification for practically unlimited hobby hunting with no proven benefit for species conservation. For the sika deer, which is economically attractive as commercially marketable farmed game, the very same classification is suddenly criticised as «divorced from reality» and «excessive». What is evidently decisive is not the actual ecological threat, but the question of whose economic interests are affected in each case.

Scientific basis of the EU decision

The EU justifies the classification by the risk of hybridisation between sika deer and red deer, which can lead to genetic mixing and, in the long term, to the displacement of pure red deer populations. This phenomenon has been documented in several European countries where free-living sika populations have become established. Critics do point out that no documented cases of displacement of red deer have so far been recorded in Austria. That does not, however, alter the fact that the EU regulation follows the precautionary principle of European species conservation law and takes preventive action before escapes from enclosures give rise to an irreversible mixing of wildlife populations, as has already occurred elsewhere, for instance in the border region with Switzerland.