A deer had to be euthanised after it was found with its antlers entangled in a fence and its body caught in thick mud.

The trapped and emaciated stag was part of a bigger problem at a Northland deer farm, where many animals had been starved as they were left to fend for themselves over the winter months.

Farmer Niven John Lowrie has now admitted charges relating to their neglect.

This week, Lowrie, who has a history of ill-treatment of animals, appeared in the Whangārei District Court.

According to court documents, he has been farming for most of his life and manages a 30-acre deer farm in Kaiwaka.

In 2023, he was also overseeing a dairy farm at another location, meaning his deer farm, which had 145 red deer, eight beef cattle and 60 sheep, was being overlooked.

Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) inspectors visited his deer farm on three occasions that year.

They discovered 14 dead deer and insufficient pasture to sustain the number of livestock he was responsible for.

According to the summary of facts, Lowrie had failed through the winter months to monitor the animals’ feed and they were left to fend for themselves.

The remaining animals had been separated by age or classification and all were suffering from underfeeding, leaving them in a severely compromised state of welfare.

Lowrie had only provided 49% of the deer’s nutritional requirements and ultimately, they were left starving for three months.

When MPI spoke to Lowrie in August 2023, he acknowledged there was not enough supplementary feed.

The following month, the inspectors found an adult stag at the property with its antlers entangled in fencing wire and its body trapped in mud deep below the fence line.

It was emaciated and exhausted and could not be saved, resulting in it being euthanised at the property.

Lowrie went on to be charged with ill-treatment of an animal and of failing to meet the physical needs of animals, which he admitted in court this week.

He will be sentenced at a later date.

It is the second time he has come before the courts for similar offending, with his last being in 2015.

On that occasion, Lowrie was convicted on 12 counts of ill-treatment of an animal after 12 dairy cows were found dead on his farm in September 2013.

His farm was found in a rundown state with internal fences in disrepair, broken or disconnected water troughs, and a number of deer carcasses in paddocks.

A further 13 animals were emaciated.

He was fined $4000 and ordered to pay reparation of $2808 to MPI as a result.

Shannon Pitman is a Whangārei-based reporter for Open Justice covering courts in the Te Tai Tokerau region. She is of Ngāpuhi/Ngāti Pūkenga descent and has worked in digital media for the past five years. She joined NZME in 2023.