During 1966-1971, muntjac were reported at Patmore Heath, just 1 km
west of the Essex border, at Hadham Park, Bishop's Stortford and at Poplars
Wood, Hatfield Broad Oak. An animal was also killed in May 1967 on the A505
road at Fowlmere, Cambridgeshire less than 2 km from the boundary with
Essex. There were reports of muntjac from the Copped Hall estate near Epping,
from Round Thicket in Epping Forest and from Latton Park and Mark Bushes
(Plate II) on the southern edge of Harlow New Town in 1967-1968 and a young
male was killed in a road accident at Chingford in April 1970. Muntjac deer
were also killed in road accidents in Epping Forest in 1973 and 1975. In 1971,
muntjac were recorded at Rowney Wood to the south-east of Saffron Walden
and at Scales Park to the south-west and a flourishing population was present in
the former area in 1976. At the other end of the county a young male muntjac
was seen in a garden at Kirby-le-Soken in March 1973 and later that month a
muntjac, presumably the same animal, was found dead on the beach at Walton-
on-the-Naze, the most easterly part of Essex.
To summarize, muntjac deer are now widely distributed in that part of
Essex lying north of a line stretching from Manningtree through Brentwood to
London. In only one area, namely Latton Park and Mark Bushes, have young
fawns been recorded but breeding populations are probably present also in
many of the other woods.
Fallow Deer
Pre-1965 records
The pre-1965 records of fallow deer are shown on Map 3 and summarized
in Appendix 2. The locations given by Whitehead (1964) are imprecise and so
have been plotted on the map as if the deer had occurred at the centre of the
village in question.
Fallow deer have been present in Epping Forest since time immemorial and
their early history has been covered by Fisher (1887), Harting (1887), Waller
(1906a,b) and Whitehead (1964). The deer declined to very low numbers,
approximately 10, in 1860 (Buxton, 1897) but by 1897 they had risen to about
200 (Anon., 1898). Even at that time, the deer were also present in woods on
estates adjoining the Forest. For example, 186 fallow were seen in the Forest in
the census held in January 1901 but it was estimated "that in addition about 50
fallow were hiding in coverts of estates adjoining the Forest" (Anon., 1904).
The official census figure for that year was 228 fallow (Whitehead, 1964). Over
the intervening years, the numbers of the Forest's fallow have declined (Fig. 1).
Although in the 1940s, the deer were still frequently seen in the southern
part of the Forest, sometimes a dozen or more being seen together near the
Cuckoo Pits at Chingford (Anon., 1945, 1948), they were spreading even further
from the Forest onto estates lying well to the north. Fallow deer were reported
for the first time at Parndon in the summer of 1944 (Dent, 1945) and were seen
again in 1945 (Dent, 1947). In October 1946, a number of fallow deer were seen
in the woods near Aimes Green (Pratt, 1947), presumably Galleyhill Wood.
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