Figure 2. Number of fallow deer recorded on the annual counts in Epping
Forest 1896-1977 (from Chapman (1977) plus recent information from Epping
Forest Conservators).
racial purity of the Forest deer attempted by elimination of light coloured deer.
The hunting of a white buck in the 1960's caused a public outcry and a popular
protest song.
Many animals died in road accidents and many others may have died as a
result of poaching or disease. In a sample of 14 animals killed (13 of them in
road accidents) between March 1963 and May 1964, every deer contained shot-
gun pellets and many had diseased bones, possibly the result of gunshot
wounds, (Chaplin & Chapman, 1964).
An annual count of Forest fallow deer has been carried out from 1896-
1977 (see figure 2), the count usually being made on the first snowy day of
January. Deer from outside the forest boundaries may have been included and
thus the dramatic decline in Forest deer obscured. The 1965 total was about 70
but the following year the keepers could only find four (perhaps seven) deer in
the Forest on the same day that a group of naturalists counted a minimum of 61
deer on the adjacent Copped Hall estate (Chapman, 1977).
Since 1965, figures for the Forest alone are available (see figure 2) and
these show that in most years deer were absent from the Forest. Qvist (1971)
17