Steering the impacts of ungulates on temperate forests

Ungulate game damage to growing forest stock is recognised as being part of a larger landscape-forest-ungulate-human problem to be tackled on a landscape as well as a forest scale. Whether ungulate impacts are seen as “damage” or not depends on the targets of the different land users. Possibilities for a flexible, integrated pattern of ungulate, forest, hunting and landscape management are highlighted. pacts of forestry practices on food supply and food-independent settling stimuli for ungulates affect (1) the habitat quality, (2) the density, structure and dynamics of wildlife stocks, (3) the predisposition of forest to game damage, and (4) the scale of game damage that arises. Though silvicultural measures are seen to be of prime importance in controlling game damage, they alone cannot sustainably solve the problems of wildlife management; complementary inputs are required from all stakeholders – foresters, hunters, farmers, tourist authorities, conservationists, regional planning authorities and local communities – with plans coordinated over large enough regions to be relevant for the game species of interest. nagement tools for steering ungulate behaviour and forest-ungulate interactions derive from field research. However, communication of results to stakeholders appears to be a major weakness. Suggestions for improving collaboration between stakeholders and researchers are presented, along with future research needs.