Thousands of deer will be shot by farmers if hunting is banned, according to the group which controls deer on Exmoor.

The Exmoor Deer Management Society (EDMS) is warning that if hunting is banned, farmers will then treat the 3,000 deer as pests.

The creatures will eat and trample crops and damage hedges, with no hunt to control them, the society says.

EDMS chair Hugh Thomas, said: "It's not an immediate threat, I think people will be very restrained.

Farmer Roger Webber: Threat is real

"But we're talking about a reduction over 10 years to about 10% of what we have now."

Exmoor farmer Roger Webber said: "My feeling is that there will be a loss of deer.

"What percentage I do not know, but talking to my neighbours, we are talking about quite considerable numbers indeed."

Peter Anderson of the League Against Cruel Sports said: "How can they be sure that deer numbers would be decimated in this way?

"There is absolutely no evidence at all. It is pure speculation.

"You cannot retain a cruel activity such as deer hunting, on the basis of what might happen in the future."

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Deer hunting is already banned on part of Exmoor, the Holnicote Estate.

The 20 square mile estate in West Somerset is owned by the National Trust which banned hunting on all its land in 1997.

The Trust now culls deer on the land because tenant farmers are banned from shooting them.

Estate manager Richard Morris accepted that a hunting ban on private land could put deer at risk.

He said: "The government must include deer management arrangements or compensation in any bill on hunting, or it would be very dangerous for the deer."

The hunting bill is currently being considered by a committee at Parliament and a ban could become law in two years.