Viva Venison!

Ten years ago we were exporting most of our wild venison and importing farmed. Now dorset venison is very much back on the menu and the theme of a local festival in purbeck.

- James Warren

VENISON, from Latin venatus, “to hunt”, originally referred to any kind of edible game. Now it refers to meat from the deer family and these vary hugely from the tiny muntjac at around 16kg to our largest land mammal in the UK, the red deer at up too 200kg.

Here in Dorset, and more specifically Purbeck, the two main species are the native roe deer, a smaller animal living in family groups of rarely more than three, and the most numerous and visible sika deer. These were introduced to the UK in the 1860’s and over time have spread throughout Dorset. Here in Purbeck and the “Poole basin” we have the perfect environment for them - large areas of land managed for wildlife through the National Trust, RSPB, and Natural England. They have thrived here and we are thought to have the largest population of sika in Europe. If you know were to go you can regularly see herds of over 50 animals, particularly in t