Formosan sika deer period with a switch to Japan as the major export market. The intensive hunting of sika during the Dutch era must have severely decreased the population of sika. Sika populations continued to decline over the next few centuries as the human population expanded—the natural habitat of sika in the lowland plains was steadily converted to farmland, and later urbanized, as the human population increased. Hunting also continued. As a result, wild sika populations decreased steadily, and in 1969 the last known wild sika was killed. However, deer are easily kept in captivity and there were a number of captive populations
Formosan sika deer the 17th century immigration from the Chinese mainland increased dramatically in response to political instability in China and economic opportunities on Taiwan, which from 1624 until 1662 was controlled by the Dutch East India Company (VOC). The VOC, operating from the port of Taoyuan (modern-day Anping, Tainan) in southwestern Taiwan, established a trading post whose main business was the export of sika skins to Europe. During the six decades of Dutch activity two to four million sika skins were exported to Europe. Exporting was reduced when the Dutch were forced out of Taiwan in 1662, but continued throughout the Qing