" We in the animal welfare movement are often accused of
being emotional. This word seems to have some great power for
the kangaroo killing industry and its satraps - accuse the opposition
of being emotional and their facts, arguments and conclusions
are destroyed forever. Personally, I accept the accusation of
being emotional. When I consider the barbarity of the kangaroo
industry I become angry. When I see decent people falling for
the industry's tall tales, I am saddened. When I see a documentary
of the quality of 'KANGAROOS - Faces in the Mob' I am filled with
emotion: strange people those who see the word as a criticism.
" Dr John Auty 'The Kangaroo BETRAYED!'
KILLING
OF THE ALPHA MALES
" When a shooter enters the structured society of a mob of
kangaroos, he destroys a rich, complex system by killing the alpha
male, his immediate rivals, and the older females, who are the
educators of the mob. This selective hunting results in females
mating with young males and the loss of the inherited strengths
of the mob."
The
alpha male is critical for the social fabric of wild populations
but for decades, the kangaroo killing industry has commercially
targeted for profit, the alpha males. Night after night, kangaroo
shooters have entered their domain and attacked the mobs of 'stress
prone ' kangaroos, breaking up and destroying their family groups,
killing their joeys, leaving them stressed, frightened and fearful
. The late Dr Peter Rawlinson, zoologist La Trobe University said
that when wild populations are under such stress, they breed furiously
to preserve their species in a desperate attempt to prevent their
demise.
NSW
NPWS 2003 KANGAROO QUOTA IS IRRESPONSIBLE ; DROUGHT ADVERSELY
AFFECTS 'ROOS
The NSW NPWS has failed to take into account the Precautionary
Principle and has instead created a climate of economic opportunism
to the detriment of kangaroo populations, particularly during
this ever worsening current 2002 drought, without due regard for
the welfare and future survival of kangaroos.
NPWS
ignores the scientific advice from Dr Graham Caughley who warned
that all kangaroo killing should cease during drought to allow
the strongest to survive. This present environmental crisis warrants
an immediate moratorium on kangaroo killing to allow the strongest
of the species to survive. But NPWS continues its charade, and
issues kangaroo destruction permits to any landholder who wants
them, handing our wildlife icons over as a prize, with no questions
asked. Such action is irresponsible.
Instead
NPWS says " The Government appreciates the problems facing
the landholders in drought-affected areas. In response to concerns
raised by graziers, the Government has given an undertaking
that the NPWS and NSW Agriculture will review the skin-only
option as part of its drought assistance package…the Government
will carefully assess its potential impact on the kangaroo industry,
which is one of the most significant employers in the State's
west, and an industry worth $70 million in NSW."
NSW
BANNED SKIN ONLY SHOOTING (1997) DUE TO CRUELTY AND IT'S IMPOSSIBLE
TO POLICE
'FAST
TRACKING' NON-COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS TO KILL KANGAROOS
Letter from Terry Korn NSW NPWS Director Western 24.9.2002 ( Re-introduction
of skin only shooting)
" The NSW Government's extensive drought relief measures
announced recently, included a commitment to "fast track"
non-commercial applications to cull kangaroos. Farmers can get
a free non-commercial license from the NPWS to shoot kangaroos
that are competing for scarce resources in drought- affected areas.
The license lasts for a period of three months. This initiative
has been well received by landholders and the NPWS will continue
to give priority to this program." Terry Korn NPWS
COMMERCIAL
KILLING SEEN AS THE GOAL AND SCIENCE FOLLOWS SET PARAMETRES
Grigg and Pople refer to kangaroos
as "pests" 40 times in their "Commercial Harvesting
of Kangaroos in Australia"
The
'Commercial Harvesting of Kangaroos in Australia', written by
Gordon Grigg and Tony Pople is used as the definitive bible by
Environment Australia for kangaroo management. It provides the
basis upon which all scientific data is cynically used to justify
the killing of millions of kangaroos each year.
Grigg
and Pople provide the 'scientific' parametres for commercial kangaroo
killing.
"Harvesting
will invariably involve some injuries and protracted deaths.
To harvest a sustained yield from a population at steady density,
it first must be manipulated in some way to promote the rate
of increase. (e.g. reduce it below its ecological carrying
capacity or supplement its resources)"
"Rates
of harvest may be raised to levels at which they can cause the
extinction of the populations (Arguments will be confounded
when there are non-consumptive values attached to the resource
such as for Tourism)."
Governments
pay Gordon Grigg, Tony Pople, Peter Hale, Steve Mc Leod, Stuart
Cairns etc for their research and provide $$$ in subsidies to
prop up a brutally cruel kangaroo industry which would not survive
without such generous and on going help, to counteract growing
worldwide condemnation
ARTIFICIAL
MANIPULATION OF KANGAROO POPULATIONS INCREASES POPULATIONS
THEN THE SCIENTISTS COUNT THE ARTIFICIALLY HIGH POPULATIONS AND
SET THE QUOTAS
Australian
scientists defy natural selection and artificially manipulate
populations to accommodate the commercial kangaroo industry and
papers produced by these scientists start from their basic political
premise that kangaroos be commercially killed as a resource .
They then produce facts and figures to accommodate and support
the need for a commercial kangaroo killing industry.
In
the 2002 Kangaroo Management Program, 'damage mitigation' was
removed because it could not be audited, as the sole cause of
killing kangaroos and kangaroos are killed as a resource to provide
profits.
Official Policy of Environment Australia
"Australian
native wildlife is a renewable resource. If managed in an ecologically
sustainable manner, wildlife can provide a perpetual source of
economic benefits for all Australians."
AUSTRALIAN
SCIENTISTS ARTIFICIALLY MANIPULATE KANGAROO POPULATIONS WITH AN
UP TO 80% MALE BIAS IN COMMERCIAL KILLING, THUS DEFYING NATURAL
SELECTION SO ESSENTIAL TO WILD POPULATIONS, AND CAUSING A CONSTANT
EROSION OF THE GENE POOL
Letter
from SA Environment Minister David Wooten 24 March 1982
"The
Department is encouraging the increased harvesting of smaller
kangaroos including females, as there is concern at the effect
of preferential harvesting of larger kangaroos. Male kangaroos
are generally larger than the females and the continued taking
of the elite males could result in a deterioration of the quality
of the population as a whole, because the smaller and less robust
males would tend to be conserved while the larger, healthier
animals would be shot out. The reduction in the number of female
animals would also reduce the breeding rate of the overall population
and therefore reduce the need for such high killing rates as
is necessary at the present time"
'
ROO SLAUGHTER FEAR' LOSS OF GENE POOL
The Sydney Sun Herald 5/1/1997 by Fia Cumming :
"A WILDLIFE expert has warned
of a dramatic crash in kangaroo numbers because commercial culling
is killing off the biggest and most healthy animals. Wildlife
gene researcher claims legal culling of millions of kangaroos
each year leaves only smaller, weaker animals to reproduce - causing
a constant erosion of the genetic pool."
"And
he says the annual quota of kangaroos to be killed - more than
3.7 million in 1996 - is based on false information about their
numbers." Dr Ian Gunn said "The evidence is indisputable.
If left to continue, (it) has the potential to result in reduced
genetic viability, lower reproductive efficiency and a radical
reduction in the populations density below sustainable numbers
in certain regions "
Dr
Gunn says "
..one obvious result of years of shooting the largest animals
will be a reduction in the overall size of the animals. Removing
the dominant males who did most of the breeding would allow less
healthy males to become the main source of the genes. Really we
don't know, no-one knows, the effect of killing a high percentage
of the larger males or females of the population."
'FROM
CONSERVATION TO EXPLOITATION IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA'
Doug Reilly ( Macropod expert Chinaman
Creek Environmental Research Station SA)
"In any wild animal, if you disrupt
in a short period of time the normal reproduction processes that
have evolved over tens of thousands of years you are in danger
of putting the species at risk. Precedents have been set in other
parts of the world where large populations of a species (seals,
bison,wolves) have faced extinction after widespread and destructive
'culling' programs. Many of these species suffered incursion of
exotic bacterias and viruses when their populations contained
a critical and unsustainable gene pool."
PROFESSOR
DAVID CONOVER STATE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK
(Science magazine SMH July 8, 2002)
FISH THROWM BACK MEANS SMALL FRY
Professor
Conover says that size is genetically controlled, as well as being
associated with age. "We need to pay more attention to what
the evolutionary impacts are. We just can't look at the ecological
effect of harvesting. We have to add the Darwinian effect."
(Darwin's theory of natural selection)
Dr
Peter Hale
Queensland University, states that inappropriate and destructive
'culling' practices have no bearing on genetic loss or threats
to kangaroo populations. But his research does not take into consideration
emerging wildlife diseases, caused by viruses that are totally
new to science . Professor John Mac Kenzie, University of Queensland
said, " It is important scientists have the resources to
look for agents that cause all major outbreaks of disease in Australia,
such as kangaroo blindness and pilchard kills." The ability
of kangaroos to adapt to climate change and disease threats is
ignored by Hale. Floods follow drought and kangaroos face the
terrible choroid blindness disease as well as other ignored bacterias
and viruses. AWPC does not accept Hales' assurances nor do several
other scientists that there is no loss to the gene pool by the
present artificial manipulation of kangaroo populations and inappropriate
'culling practices.
But
Environment Australia's Jonathan Miller A/g Assistant Sec Wildlife
Australia 29 September 2002 supports Hale:
" In regard to the genetic impact of kangaroo harvesting
there is currently no information coming from the harvest data
collected by the States that indicates that commercial harvesting
has had any deleterious impacts on the genetic fitness of kangaroo
populations. However, kangaroo management plans allow for adaptive
management, and should such information arise, changes to harvesting
procedures could be implemented in response."
We
condemn their lack of concern and what if Peter Hale and Environment
Australia are wrong? The survival of kangaroos is being used as
a political football.
- Further,
NPWS totally ignores the inherent cruelty to kangaroos, in-pouch
and ex-pouch joeys…
- Where
is the implementation of the Precautionary Principle or is the
NSW NPWS merely the marketing arm of the kangaroo industry?
If so, perhaps an overt declaration to the general community
would be appropriate.
- Do
we wait to see if there is a threat and then act, hoping it
will not be too late?
-
Do we wait to see if the gene pool has been depleted or that
kangaroos populations crash beyond the point of no return? Wake
up please NPWS to the enormous threats to kangaroo populations.
AUSTRALIA'S
SHAME
There are almost no areas left where kangaroos are safe from shooters.
Nothing has changed since 1982.
92% of NSW has been drought declared. and the NSW NPWS has set
a commercial kill for 2003 of 2,,107, 620 kangaroos with a Proposed
special quota of another 134,000 kangaroos for farmers. This so-called
non-commercial kill becomes a commercial kill which is then part
of the quota. How mischievous!
LEAVING
THE YOUNG RECRUITS ( FISH STUDIES WARN AGAINST DEFYING NATURAL
SELECTION)
Dr Stuart Cairns
"All of Mulyungarie is easily accessible to a professional
shooter, enabling him to cull predominantly mature males. This
means that the Mootooroo Pastoral Company is turning the 'roo
into something resembling a domestic animal, culling any surplus
males and topping up each night with a few does. It is the nearest
thing to sustainable farming in Australia. Essentially, they are
lifting the food resource base for new recruits - animals just
leaving the pouch and the young at foot. It is certainly a sustainable
harvest"
TOTAL
GRAZING PRESSURE DAMAGE BY KANGAROOS EXAGGERATED BY UP TO 500%
Professor Gordon Grigg
The damage done on grazing lands by kangaroos has been overestimated
by up to 500%. "This would mean that kangaroos are a much
smaller component of the total grazing pressure than is generally
accepted. The hope of getting a significant improvement in wool
production by pest control of kangaroos is probably doomed to
failure." Grigg says that kangaroos should be regarded as
a resource.
GLOVE
BOX GUIDE TO KANGAROOS AND THEIR MANAGEMENT IN THE MURRAY - DARLING
BASIN
Translated, this means finding more and better ways to kill
kangaroos
Dr Steve Mc Leod
'Culling during drought, when the need seems greatest from a pastoral
perspective, may be less beneficial in the long run than culling
in the immediate post-drought period. Culling during drought simply
removes animals that would die in any event and, paradoxically,
favors survival of those remaining. Culling in the immediate post-drought
period, when the population is beginning to rebuild from a low
base and food is plentiful (so that culled animals represent a
genuine reduction in the populations) will have longer lasting
effects." Page. 18
'
In most situations, establishment of self -mustering yards is
probably the best way to ensure that waters can be closed to kangaroos
when required.' Page. 17
''The
impact of harvesting or culling on kangaroo density depends greatly
on the ratio of males to females taken. If only males are taken,
little if any long term reduction in density will result from
harvest rates that would rapidly lead to extinction if the harvest
were balanced. Conversely, a harvest that is strongly biased towards
females will achieve a much greater reduction in density than
would otherwise occur. Careful selection of the animals targeted
may thus make a substantial difference to the overall result achieved."
Pages. 17 & 18
'When
animals are taken under shoot and let lie permits, greater opportunity
exists for selective harvesting. Carefully targeted shooting under
these conditions could be expected to have much greater impact
in the long run than hasty, indiscriminate culling" Page
18
MANAGING
KANGAROOS IN THE MURRAY - DARLING BASIN SEPTEMBER 2002
Ron Hacker, Steve Mc Leod, John Durhan, Brigitte Tenhumberg and
Udai Pradhan
Scenarios for kangaroo killing
'A major outcome of this collaboration was the Committee's decision
to recommend that additional funding be provided to support
both a sub-project related to the effects of kangaroo harvesting
on population genetics and the production of an expanded range
of publications." Page 3
"
A spatial model of kangaroos harvesting was developed to examine
the likely distribution of the commercial harvest effort over
the landscape. The model assumes that the level of profit required
by a harvester determines the density at which harvesting will
cease in a given area under specified assumptions regarding operating
costs and commodity price.." page 7
"
The best overall combination was an annual harvest rate of 10%
male only harvesting. The preferred options for the kangaroo industry
were also strongly male biased. The best overall combination was
male-only harvesting at an annual rate of 40%. Pastoralists' preferred
options, in contrast, were characterised by harvest rates greater
than 30% made up of at least 30% females. The best overall
combination was an annual harvest rate of 90% made up of 70% females".
Page 9
The above would cause the extinction of the species.
The
above reveals a hatred of and contempt for kangaroos which is
deeply imbedded in the Australian psyche . The pastoralists want
kangaroos dead. These are OUR taxes at work…on how to kill
off kangaroos in Australia. The Rural Research and Development
Corporation (RIRDC) and other agricultural bodies have been subsidising
this type of research for many years. The Kangaroo Industry Association
of Australia (KIAA) works hand in hand with Australian scientists
such as Grigg, Mc Leod, Hacker, Tenhumberg, Pople, Cairns, Hale,
Pradhan, Druhan, Archer, Hopwood etc
Maryland
Wilson
President
