URGENT! Stop the Sidney Island Deer Cull

Deer on Sidney Island, a small island off of Canada’s west coast were in danger of complete eradication by Parks Canada. The agency’s plan was to kill every single deer on the island, including both Fallow Deer and native Black-tailed Deer. Many island residents took action to prevent the slaughter. Animal Alliance of Canada supported the effort, took up the issue, and Canadians joined the call to urge the Minister who oversees Parks Canada to have the eradication program called off.

Thankfully, the eradication program has not taken place as planned, and it appears that at least for ...

Deer on Sidney Island, a small island off of Canada’s west coast were in danger of complete eradication by Parks Canada. The agency’s plan was to kill every single deer on the island, including both Fallow Deer and native Black-tailed Deer. Many island residents took action to prevent the slaughter. Animal Alliance of Canada supported the effort, took up the issue, and Canadians joined the call to urge the Minister who oversees Parks Canada to have the eradication program called off.

Thankfully, the eradication program has not taken place as planned, and it appears that at least for now, Parks Canada is standing down.

Parks Canada has announced that they are ‘pausing’ the eradication program while they continue to consult. Yet, there is no guarantee that the culling program will not be reinstated at a later date.

In November 2024, Parks Canada erected net fencing around the island to trap the deer into zones to make it easier to shoot them. The net fencing led to at least six deer becoming entangled, leading to the death of two. Island residents released video that showed an entangled deer in distress, and AAC demanded that all net fencing be removed entirely from the Island. We published a petition urging Minister Steven Guilbeault to direct Parks Canada to call off the eradication program and to employ non-lethal ‘management’ practices instead, such as Immunocontraception. The net fencing was removed, and the eradication program did not proceed.

Since then, island residents report that there has been no further activity related to the intended cull. There was a great response to the petition that we posted. Many of the Sidney Island residents worked hard to ensure that there would be no lethal deer cull as Parks Canada originally intended. For now, the deer appear to be safe.

It's important to remember that Fallow Deer, a species who had been intentionally introduced some years ago to provide hunting opportunities, and the native Black-tailed Deer were both slated to be entirely wiped out on the island, an extreme action that came with a cost of more than $6 million tax dollars if completed.

But the work to protect the deer is not over.

There has been no statement from Parks Canada declaring their future intentions for the deer of Sidney Island.

It’s essential that Parks Canada is directed to change tactics, and we ask for your support by signing and sharing our petition directed to the minister who oversees Parks Canada, the Honourable Steven Guilbeault, Minister of Environment and Climate Change Canada.

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Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault: STOP the Sidney Island Deer Cull

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Dear Minister Steven Guilbeault,

I am writing to you as the Minister of Environment and Climate Change. I urge you to direct Parks Canada to undertake an agency-wide policy change to cease the widespread lethal management of wild animals, and to adopt non-lethal means of population control as first action.

A broader philosophical update is also needed to align Parks Canada with the modern understanding of the relationship among humans, wild animals and plant life on natural lands.

Parks Canada managers have too often displayed an easy acceptance of the killing of wild animals as regular practice to achieve what they describe as ecological balance. The deer eradication program that was proposed for Sidney Island in British Columbia is the most recent example.

I strongly urge you to direct the agency to adopt a more progressive policy approach, where by ecosystems managed by Parks Canada are allowed to evolve without lethal intervention.  Too frequently Parks Canada declares a species to be “hyperabundant”, thereby triggering culling of wild animals and birds. Lethal wild animal control occurs in many of our parks across the country.

Canada’s national parks are valued as recreational spaces for Canadians, but these natural and protected lands are more than that. The importance of these natural lands and the role they play in climate and environmental protection is better understood than when the original mandate for Parks Canada was written. The climate and environmental crisis require us to change our perspective, understanding that in some cases the lands may need to be protected from human use, instead of being protected for human use.

Parks Canada has demonstrated a desire to see federal parks kept in static states, which is contrary to the natural ebb and flow of nature. Unfortunately, humans too often see these natural regenerative processes as undesirable, and Parks Canada’s policies have interfered with these processes as they either seek to maintain forests and natural lands in static states, or attempt to return them to previous points in time. To achieve what they term ‘balance’, which appears to be a model of their own design, wild animals, mammals and birds, are killed in vast numbers across Canada on lands that are managed by this federal agency.

I urge you to direct changes to Parks Canada’s operations, including:

 Adopting a new mandate that better reflects a modern understanding of the relationship among humans, wildlife and plant-life;
 Ceasing the culling of wild animals as part of ongoing wildlife management practices; and
 Ensuring that when seeking to reduce or control wildlife populations, all non-lethal methods must be explored and fully applied before any lethal action can be considered.

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