Bag of antlers produced in court as sex of deer shot in field is disputed

A bag of deer antlers was produced at a sitting of Kenmare District Court yesterday in a vigorously-contested case over whether a wild deer shot in a local field was male, female, or a male without antlers.

John Foley, aged 47, of Tullig, Kenmare, Co Kerry, denied hunting an exempted mammal without a licence, a Sika stag, out of season, on February 1, 2015. The season for male Sika with antlers closed on December 31, but that for female or antlerless deer closed at the end of February, the court heard.

The court was told that a Cork hobby hunter, Barry Raymond, sitting “in” a hedgerow to stalk female deer risking a newly- sown field, heard a sudden shot after a young stag entered the field. The shot came from the public road and after it came a man with a knife, he alleged.