Bushwalk Australia

The Mercury wrote:THE State Government will allow hunting in national parks, including the South-West Wilderness World Heritage Area, it announced today.

The Parks and Wildlife Service has been asked to identify additional areas where shooters can hunt deer.

“We are delivering on our policy to provide opportunities for appropriately licensed and registered shooters to hunt wild fallow deer in national parks, the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area, conservation areas, regional reserves and/or game reserves,” the Government said in a statement.

“Responsible recreational hunters play a positive role in conservation and wildlife management, complementing professional control programs.

“Recreational hunting permits in our parks and reserves will be limited to designated areas away from those areas frequented by visitors, and informed by the statewide deer population census.”

The Government also announced the new members of the Tasmanian Game Council, which will be chaired by former Western Tiers MLC Greg Hall.

https://www.themercury.com.au/news/poli ... 1534907029

Thoughts? On one hand I can appreciate the fact they are finally doing something about the feral deer problem, I'm not sure letting hunters into our National Parks is the answer, especially in areas apparently protected for their wilderness values such as the S-W WHA.

WA looked at this issue back in 2015 and decided there wasn't enough evidence to support the claim it would help with feral pest management, plus citing public safety concerns. That said Vic has been allowing it within 'open season' for years and NSW just finished a three year trial. It also seems quite common to get hunters involved in sanctioned eradication programs, eg in WA, SA, NSW, QLD, which I can understand.

Is it because the Tas Gov had to back down on their proposed changes to gun legislation and had to offer something else to the gun lobby?

potato wrote:Is it because the Tas Gov had to back down on their proposed changes to gun legislation and had to offer something else to the gun lobby?

The timing certainly indicates that...

I can't say I'm surprised... but thanks for posting this. Hopefully there will be enough public outrage that this, like the proposed gun legislation, will be watered down.

potato wrote:Is it because the Tas Gov had to back down on their proposed changes to gun legislation and had to offer something else to the gun lobby?

Exactly this...also the state libs are undertaking a "new" review into gun law reform in the house of reps, this is designed to get the answers they want in order to change the laws.
Meanwhile there appears to be a marked increase in gun thefts from rural properties in Tas. Just imagine if those guns are more powerful, semi-automatic...

Ferguson is a nutter.

Also, until it's clear where they will allow hunters to go it's a moot point...there are no feral deer in the SWNP, a few cats but hunters aren't interested in them...no deer in the Wild Rivers or Cradle Mtn/LSC NP either....

I'd say that most hunters are genuinely nice people - they just have a hobby that is considered slighty odd in this country. When I had firearms stolen from my former property (well they stole the bolted down gun safe with the guns inside), it wasn't hunters who the police recovered the guns from.

Anyhow, this move is outrageous. More people need to know about it so the Tas Gov backs down. Pity the Feds have created the perfect smoke-screen in Cbr at the moment.

Same thing has happened in NSW. Liberal Party again... and to make things worse, they are refusing to tell you where the hunters are!!!

Must remember not to wear antlers while hiking....

Penguin wrote:Must remember not to wear antlers while hiking....

you should be ok with these flashing ones.....https://www.amazon.com/Christmas-Reinde ... B002Y3ESY0

Antlers! Might want to avoid wearing a headlight as well, or brushing your teeth or staying at a campground.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/4607426/Hunter-sentenced-over-death

I've said this in other places, but there is very little scientific research on the impact that feral deer have on the environment. The numbers may be out of control, but until we know where and what the real problems are, nothing will change. It is just a band-aid fix to keep a small portion of voters happy. Pay someone to do the research before making changes to legislation!

crollsurf wrote:Antlers! Might want to avoid wearing a headlight as well, or brushing your teeth or staying at a campground.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/4607426/Hunter-sentenced-over-death

Thanks for posting the link. I mentioned this in a comment on the muckery article (will I never learn?), one response was that the hikers must've ignored signs indicating hunters and were therefore at fault. "Play stupid games, win stupid prizes" was mentioned which I agree with but have a feeling we were having two entirely different conversations.

Anyway, I have no problem with hunting for utilitarian reasons like food or feral animal control (although personally I think killing any living thing purely for 'recreation'/fun is creepy af) - but this is clearly a dumb move and 100% a poorly thought through olive branch to the lobby groups.

Bob Brown recently noted 'MANAGED eradication rather than recreational shooting of the deer now invading the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area is the key to confronting a problem which, if not checked, will cost taxpayers and the Tasmanian economy millions of dollars in the decades to come.' while linking to this article, that is sadly hidden behind a pay-wall: https://www.themercury.com.au/news/opin ... b1c1529e9a

From behind the Mockery's wall...

MANAGED eradication rather than recreational shooting of the deer now invading the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area is the key to confronting a problem which, if not checked, will cost taxpayers and the Tasmanian economy millions of dollars in the decades to come.

Eradication of deer requires professional shooters and is a managerial, not recreational, task. Dedication to the goal and professional management are priorities over recreation (which the Macquarie Dictionary defines as “refreshment by means of some pastime, agreeable exercise or the like”): eradicating deer is a nasty and brutish requirement without enjoyment in many people’s thinking.

Eradicating deer to protect our world-famous wild environment is no more recreational than fire-fighting, weed control or acting to prevent the spread of root rot.

An essential requirement of recreational shooting is to restrict the kill so the deer population is maintained rather than eliminated. That is contrary to the needs of national parks.

I knew when I advocated culling of deer to check their invasion of the TWWHA that this would create a prime shooting gallery for feeble-minded politicians who want to make environmentalists rather than the environment their target. So be it.

However, the prospect of deer infesting the whole island of Tasmania is real and requires an above-politics resolve.

Deer create chaos and destruction for natural ecosystems. They are big feral herbivores which replicate quickly, can range over long distances and eat large volumes of plants with no discrimination for the rare, the beautiful, or the essential feedstock of native wildlife. They cause great damage to crops and eat no less in hidden wild places.

Good government policy would aim to stop the spread of deer into protected areas and eliminate infestations. Premier Hodgman’s stated aims will do neither. Nowhere in the Liberals’ election policies (which flagged shooting in national parks) or in last week’s announcement does the Government spell out protecting Tasmania’s greatest economic asset, the TWWHA, from deer as a priority or even a goal. Recreational (having fun) shooting is front-of-stage but keeping the TWWHA deer-free gets no call at all.

However Premier Hodgman, who has appointed himself minister for national parks and the TWWHA, can claim consistency of policy in handing Tasmania’s natural realms to a growing line-up of profiteers and exploiters. He mounted an international tour-de-force with prime minister Tony Abbott, rebuffed by the World Heritage Committee, to open Tasmania’s World Heritage Area to logging. He has opened wilderness heartlands to be degraded by favoured commercial tourist operators. Now he backs recreational rather than managerial shooting to control rather than eliminate deer.

For this premier and government, Tasmania’s wild and scenic country is like the goose that laid the golden egg — available for instant gutting rather than prudent long-term protection.

At the heart of this ideology is the disintegration of Tasmania’s once world-leading National Parks and Wildlife Service. Starting with an embittered premier Robin Gray after he lost the battle to dam the Franklin River, the service has been serially defunded (except for rare Greens-won windfalls) and repressed even though it is responsible for managing more than one third of Tasmania. The Greens rescued NPWS from early oblivion by insisting it remain a distinct department in premier Michael Field’s Green-Labor Accord years (1989-92) but Liberal and Labor governments have since emasculated the service and turned it into a servant for private tourism, logging and, now, shooting.

Last week’s press release from Will Hodgman, about opening national parks for recreational deer shooters, was a confused melange calling the Greens hypocrites but labelling me, the darkest Green, as having common sense.

Let me clear this Liberal fog.

Here’s a set of guidelines to protect the TWWHA from the deer invasion which has already spread the full length of the Great Western Tiers and into the Central Plateau lakes district.

PARKS and Wildlife Service (PWS) to have full control of the TWWHA and national park deer management.

URGENT funding, including monitoring deer spread.

A PLAN to eliminate deer.

PWS authorised and supervised eradication.

KEEP ban on recreational shooting in national parks.

CLEAR and defensible containment line, for example the Lake Highway (though some deer have already crossed west of the highway).

CLOSE areas to the public when culling is under way.

KEEP areas near national parks free of further deer farms.

To labour a point for Premier Hodgman, there is a difference between shooting for recreation and using recreational shooters for management. Recreational shooters may well have the professional skills, under PWS supervision, to help remove deer. Otherwise, they have no place in protected areas.

As it stands, the Hodgman Government’s policy fosters the idea of introducing shooting to the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area with no goal of ending it — ever. This is a colossal loss for everyone who thought the Tasmanian wilds were protected to safeguard nature and to provide the ultimate place for true recreation and refreshment for the human soul.

Dr Bob Brown is president of the Bob Brown Foundation and a former Greens senator.

Thanks for digging that out and sharing it stepbystep. Hard to disagree with anything Bob said.

It must mean "land managed by PWS" I assume. I don't think there are many National Parks that would be of much interest to deer hunters (maybe Apsley??). There's plenty of land manged by PWS that hold deer though. Anyway it will be interesting to follow and I personally don't think it's anything that bushwalkers need to be getting upset over. Everyone seems to like tramping around the South Island and there are hunters all over the place.

Joel wrote:It must mean "land managed by PWS" I assume. I don't think there are many National Parks that would be of much interest to deer hunters (maybe Apsley??).

Wedge. Thin end. It's about getting more people with guns and having them shooting in far more places. This is just Hodgman and his ilk kowtowing to the Shooters and Fishers Party to protect their own agenda.