Deer cull in Dandenong Ranges National Park

[sambar358]

You pose an interesting question Icefest....and "yes" I am a keen wildlife photographer as well and have won a number of awards for my deer images and had many printed in magazines and books. It is quite difficult to explain to someone who is a non-hunter how a hunter can spend a lifetime learning about an animal which is in my case the sambar deer, revere them and yet hunt and occasionally kill one. I have a great respect and admiration for the animal and appreciate it and the environment in which it lives but I also see the occasional kill as part of the hunting and as long as I take the animal quickly and cleanly and do justice to it by recovering and utilizing the venison then I am satisfied and have no sense of conflict with my actions.

My view of the sambar deer is that is has adapted well to a variety of our mountain terrain but their numbers need to be managed to minimize the impact that they may have on the environment and that's where the hunting comes-in I guess. Last year recreational hunters in Victoria harvested an estimated 46,000 deer which were mostly sambar but with some fallow, hog and red deer. My part in this was a small one but each year I usually take 4-6 sambar and a few fallow deer all of which are used by my family and friends. So hunting is part of the management of the deer and in the absence of any other form of control does have some effect on their numbers and helps minimize their impact on the environment. I certainly feel that as a hunter I can still appreciate the deer as a fine animal and when I take one I always feel a sense of sadness and regret for taking the life....but this soon passes and is the way of the hunter really and if I didn't feel anything after a kill then it's probably time to hang up the boots ! Hard to explain really....and I've tried many times in the past with non-hunting friends and work collegues...probably didn't do much of a job here this time either.

I'll leave you with a few of my live sambar deer images taken mostly at quite close range while I've been hunting.....always have the digital camera on the belt and use it often. Cheers

s358

[walkon]

For me "firing a shot" often spoils a good walk in the bush and I'm sure those sentiments are shared by many other hunters who enjoy their bush experience just as much as anyone else in the forest....so in essence Earwig I think that many hunters would share your view that "I don't feel I have to kill something to participate in nature"......as often we are doing just that. Cheers

s358

So why not take photos of animals instead? You have all the necessary skills to stalk them and get some incredible shots, I'm sure.

It still leaves the problem of feral animals running around in the Bush, we have uncontrolled populations of wild pigs, cattle, deer, horses, goats. .... How else are we going to stop the damage that these animals cause. Regardless, it is not a crime or morally wrong to shoot/hunt with a gun.

That said the only the conservation that the shooting organizations partake in is the preservation of their 'game species', at least in Victoria by persisting in actively promoting 'management' of these feral animals.

[neilmny]

There is some serious BS in that Age article. Like it is sad for a deer to die of old age without palliative care all alone in the bush. What a load of.............My god are these guys saviours of the lonely aging animal now.
Plain and simple they like to hunt, it is most important to respect what you hunt be it fishing or shooting. But please
at least be honest.
The cull is necessary, safety is imperative as is obeying the firearms and game regulations.

[sambar358]

Walkon : "That said the only the conservation that the shooting organizations partake in is the preservation of their 'game species', at least in Victoria by persisting in actively promoting 'management' of these feral animals."

That's seems to be the popular misconception but hardly factual.....I am a member of both Field & Game Australia and the Australian Deer Association and members of both organisations actively participate in conservation-based activities in the broader sense. Field & Game is very active in wetland restoration in Victoria via tree planting and nest box erection exercises across many public and private wetlands to provide habitat for nesting birds and shelter for other animals. In the past few years it has purchased several large degraded private wetlands and spent close to a million dollars of hunters money restoring them to their former selves. Likewise ADA has numerous rehabilitation projects running mainly focussed on tree planting in run-down State Wildlife Reserves and fox and feral cat reduction activities on public and private land. The ADA annual tree planting weekend at Clydebank State Wildlife Reserve on the Gippsland Lakes has over the past 10 years planted in excess of 50,000 trees throughout much of the Reserve and is part-funded by grants from Greening Australia and supported by Parks Vic. This Reserve is now a viable environment for a wide range of native animals and birds thanks to the efforts of the participating hunters and their families and there are numerous similar projects being conducted by members of hunting organisations like this state-wide each year & none of these initiatives have the primary intention of producing game but are focussed on the broader good of improving the habitat for all the creatures that are found there. Cheers

s358

[sambar358]

Neil....I agree with your view that several portions of the Age article were fairly cringe-worthy and the "geriatric deer analogy" was one that ground on me a bit too. Remember though that the bulk of the text for that article was written by the Age reporter who likely has very little real knowledge on the subject apart from a few short-term meetings and some chatting to the few hunters who participated in the article. But over-all I thought that it represented the Dandenong Ranges NP deer cull pretty accurately and should have filled a few gaps for those wondering what was going on with it.

In all my years of hunting Iv'e never seen a sambar deer in poor condition close to death, they'll live to be 10-12 if they are very lucky then they succum to the elements or wild dog predation just like all the other wildife in the mountains. One way or the other every animal that dies in the bush becomes food for another....the odd sambar dies from a hunters bullet but the majority would die of natural causes & then be a short-term food resource for wild dogs, foxes, feral cats and various bird species. On plenty of occasions I've come across the scattered bones of deer, 'roos, wombats, brumbies etc while hunting....just the cycle of life....nothing lives forever and certainly there's no palliative care for our wild creatures....it can be a pretty harsh world out there.

Essentially though this dandenong ranges NP cull is just testing the water.....PV granting a permit to cull 200 or so deer from 3 or 4 small close-in Parks north-east of Melb may well achieve a short term reduction in the deer numbers but it won't eliminate them....nothing will and that's the simple fact. The sambar are very adaptive, will eat most anything and can handle climate extremes ranging from our highest peaks to the coastal scrubland. If the cull achieves their 200 animals this year then I'd expect that those areas would be spelled for a year or two from further culls but of course this will then give the deer the time they need to re-populate or move-in from other areas nearby. I'm not saying that these areas should ever be open to hunting like the ANP but the facts are that there are pretty strong sambar populations throughout that area most if not all which are "no hunting zones" due to close population settlement and that's fair enough of course. What this does produce though are essentially sanctuaries for the deer to build their numbers relatively unmolested and that's why these DRNP areas now contain signficicant and building numbers of deer.

So it will be a bit of a balancing act by Parks Vic I think on this....try and get the quota of 200 deer out of these Parks while minimising usage disruption to the public who have the right to be able to access these areas as well. If the cull is successful then should they do the same next year and keep the pressure on the deer....or back-off and let the public access those areas without having to dance around another cull ? But this of course gives the deer a chance to build-up and re-establish themselves back in those culled areas. Remember too that "the 200" is not what's there in the way of deer....it could well be 10 times that or more.....who knows.....200 is just a figure to aspire to, a target.....and if they achieve the 200 then I'd think the program would be regarded as a success....but it won't stop the sambar...as frankly nothing will ! Cheers

s358

[Nuts]

Nice pics sambar. And great effort at giving some insight into your world.

[north-north-west]

For me "firing a shot" often spoils a good walk in the bush and I'm sure those sentiments are shared by many other hunters who enjoy their bush experience just as much as anyone else in the forest....so in essence Earwig I think that many hunters would share your view that "I don't feel I have to kill something to participate in nature"......as often we are doing just that.

So why not take photos of animals instead? You have all the necessary skills to stalk them and get some incredible shots, I'm sure.

'cause fewer deer has to be a bonus, plus there's the tasty meat.
I have a healthy respect for people who are prepared to collect their own food rather than just sub-contracting the process out to farmers, abattoirs and shops. As long as they don't endanger any human lives (other than their own) and don't glorify gun culture . . .

[MickyB]

There is some serious BS in that Age article.

Totally agree Neil.

"People ... say, 'Let animals live naturally', but how do you think they are going to die? There is no palliative care for wild animals. It would be a horrible way to die, alone in the bush. This notion of Bambi and that sort of stuff is all wrong. Shooting them, in a way, is humane."


Using this logic we should shoot every wild animal on earth just so they don't get old and die alone in the bush.

Great photos Sambar. I can see why you have won a few awards.

[sambar358]

Yep....I agree that's a pretty rediculous statement and didn't do the general thrust of the article much good....like Steves "flower sniffing" comment. Death in the bush is a daily occurrence and creatures large and small eat and get eaten......that's just how nature works. In its native range of India and Sri Lanka the sambar deer is predated upon by the tiger and packs of wild dogs so to a degree back-home they had large and successful alpha predators to keep their numbers in-check. Not quite so in Australia although wild dogs do take young calves and would kill old and injured animals quite often....but a mature sambar stag or hind is quite capable of defending itself against a pack of wild dogs and I have witnessed this on a number of occasions while out hunting. So to a degree man has taken-over the mantle of the tiger for the Australian sambar.....but we'll never do it as well as "stripes" so the sambar adapt and continue to flourish.

Some years ago a mate and I were asked to give a presentation to a large group of National Parks staffers from Qld, NSW, Vic & SA on sambar deer hunting in the Vic ANP. This group was travelling in a convoy of 4WD's doing a whistle-stop tour of icon NP's around SE AU and we met them in the Wonnangatta Valley in the heart of the ANP and sambar country. After a sumptious camp-oven meal prepared by a group of chef's travelling with the party they all assembled around a roaring fire and we gave our presentation on the history of sambar hunting in Victoria and how it is conducted in the ANP which at the time was in its relative infancy. Most of the Parkies (especially those from NSW) were quite aghast that hunters were permitted to hunt with a firearm in a NP but with a bit of support from the Vic Park staffers present we slowly started to win a few over and the questions from the group showed that most were interested to hear more about the deer and the hunting.

There was one partucularly persistant young NSW Parks lass who kept on about the deer being a pest and that we must control them but hunting just wasn't the way to do it as guns and hunters were totally incompatible with her view of a National Park. But despite us pointing out that there was an established tradition of deer hunting for over 50 years in what was now the newly declared Alpine National Park and that the LLC had approved seasonal stalking for the Park as a legitimate recreational activity she kept on and on. Eventually the mate....who was a very patient man and old enough to be her father took a deep breath looked her in the eye and said " Well April, I guess if you don't want hunters to manage the deer population here then I suppose Parks could always introduce the sambars natural predator from India into the bush to keep them in check" A few people started to nod in agreeance at this and then she said "Oh that sounds good and far better than hunters.....what would they be ?"

The mate had a great sense of theatre and impeccable timing and as everyone (50+ people) sat transfixed by the flickering flames awaiting his answer...he paused for a few seconds then (with tongue planted firmly in-cheek) simply said.... "Oh the Tiger of course !" There were a few seconds of silence, some gasps of anguish then a bit of nervous laughter.....April said something like "No no.....but they might eat the...." and then I gave a few deep tiger-like roars and we all had a good chuckle.....and quite a few red wines around the fire after that if I recall correctly. I think that we can well do without the Tiger in the bush to keep the sambar in check....but laying back in the bag in a flimsy tent on a black night and listening to one give a few rasping roars just off in the darkness would get ones senses really pumping I'd think....LOL !!! Cheers

s358

[GBW]

Im speechless.

[Earwig]

In its native range of India and Sri Lanka the sambar deer is predated upon by the tiger and packs of wild dogs

We have panthers!

[Moondog55]

Not sure about the panthers but we do have a few wild dogs about.
All in all; I think I prefer not having tigers roaming wild in our bush.
I've always liked that particular tiger story BTW

[sambar358]

I don't mind camping-out when there are a few wild dogs howling in the darkness nearby but something that would see me as a menu item would be a quite different matter. We are indeed fortunate here to have a very benign bush free of large predators that might just see us as another option for dinner !

Back in '07 in the early winter in Montana I spent a few nights out in a tent in the wilderness near Yellowstone NP and that area had a good population of black and grizzly bears and the wolves of course. During the day while riding we'd often come across bear tracks in the snow and saw a pack of wolves once off in the distance and each night we had wolves howling close to camp. I must admit to feeling a tad vulnerable with just a thin wall of silnylon between me and the great unknown out in the darkness and getting-up one morning to find fresh wolf and black bear tracks 100m from camp was a bit unsettling. But my guide took it all in his stride and would asssure me that all was well......stating that he'd "hardly ever" had any problems with the bears and wolves while camping-out in that country. But it was certainly a different experience to spending a night in a tent in the Aussie bush and I slept very lightly that's for sure ! Cheers

s358

[Strider]

To some of us just being in the bush is enjoyable in itself. I think what Sambar is getting at is that having to carry a deer carcass out with you cuts the trip short.

[sambar358]

That's correct Strider....my comment of "firing a shot can often spoil a good day in the bush" means that my enjoyable wander thru the mountains is over and I've got some serious work to do to get the deer out of the bush. In almost all situations for me these means multiple trips lugging a 50+kg pack of vension and the recovery can take a couple of days to complete if you are 4-5ks from the vehicle which is often the case. For a lone hunter having a 300kg sambar stag on the ground is quite a daunting task but the recovery is part of the deal for most of us so it is undertaken with a sense of responsibility to the animal if you like...."you fire the shot....and you do the work". There's been plenty of occasions when I've been dead on my feet or flopped on the ground exhausted during a carry-out where I'ver regretted firing the shot....but once the last load is back at the vehicle or camp that's all soon forgotten. Cheers

s358

[Lophophaps]

Sambar358, I used to believe that guns had no place in a NP. However, with nasty levels of feral animals, and shooting the best way of attempting to control the situation, my views have changed.

In the thread about the ANP management plan you said that feral pigs and horses are protected. Odd. You also raised what I think is an important point, a distinction between "idiots with guns" and responsible hunters. This sort of comment can apply to most if not all areas of human endeavour. In NPs, it's important to know that some 4WD people, hunters, day trippers and even bushwalkers conduct matters contrary to accepted behaviour. Equally, it's important not to judge or accept this idiot minority (your words, which I very much like) as representative of the non-idiot majority.

I like tigers, but couldn't eat a whole one. I get fur balls.

[sambar358]

Yep....unfortunately as deer hunting gains in popularity as it is these days the idiot element within have their impact on occasion but by-and-large the vast majority of us are just normal keen outdoors type people who have a passion for the bush and have a great appreciation of it and the wildife that resides there. Who knows....you may be living next to a hunter, one may be teaching your kids or sitting across from you next time you go to the doctors.

What most non-hunters probably don't realise is that in the ANP we are only permitted to shoot a deer and at the moment that means just sambar....so no "ferals" such as foxes, rabbits, cats, wild dogs, pigs, goats are permitted to be taken. This has always been the case and will still be under the new Plan however it has been recommended that the deer species be broadened from sambar to include other species such as red and fallow which are present in the ANP in some locations. Hunters are currently permitted to hunt deer in the ANP because of the legislative "game" status of the deer.....if they were re-classified as "feral" as per the previously mentioned animals then according to the Regs. they too would be untouchable. So while there is a push to have deer declared feral pests and there-by loose their "game" status from some quarters, achieving that will have the opposite result to that intended (reducing the deer numbers) in the ANP as then they would essentially be "protected" as are the other pest species currently residing in the Alpine National Park and our other hunting Parks.

Pest management control in NP's is the responsibility of PV and the Vic govt and unfortunately the issue with pest animlas such as cats & foxes particularly impacting on the native fauna in Parks is significant and growing. But under the current hunting regs. in Parks it is illegal to shoot any pest animals encountered and that will remain the case well into the future. In the far-east Parks including the new area proposed for deer hunting around Willis on the Snowy the main issue there is not the deer but a build-up of feral pigs, goats and horses....so while deer hunting may be allowed in these areas that hunting will not encompass feral animal control to any degree as it is and will still be illegal under the NP Act. Cheers

s358

[Travis22]

The upper snowy river has goats in plague proportion!

While rafting it late last year from burnt hut crossing down to the Barry way, we could have destroyed no less then 400 goats, a couple hundred wild horses, 20 pigs and a dozen deer and a dozen wild cows without breaking a sweat.

The Victorian length of the snowy isn't anywhere near as bad as it is in NSW.

Travis.

[Moondog55]

Never heard a deer scream when shot. I suspect something else made the noise too.

Travis.

Perhaps the Noisy Myna AKA The Screaming Woman bird; perhaps the animal initially responsible for the Yowie legend, the Other possibility is that well known Australian mimic the Lyrebird

[Cauchs]

...