Hunting in some NSW National Parks

[MrWalker]

i do like the thought of wearing bright colours when i'm in an area i know hunters are operating.... but even people wearing hi vis gear do get shot.... low light is a classic time for people to get shot... you'd think people would be more wary, but a lot of animals are out at dawn and dusk and so are hunters... you can't see clearly, maybe your brain just tries to join the dots of the vague shape thats moving and you're sure its a feral animal... or is it?

I know someone who shot a horse, mistaking it for a fox. Well, it was a small horse and it was vaguely the right colour, so it's quite understandable. But it doesn't give me confidence about every hunter shooting only feral animals.

[wearthefoxhat]

For those concerned with the safety aspect of hunting in National Parks. This report (not the one I intended to supply) shows that hunting is a very safe sport.
unintentional fatalities through shooting is 0.5% this includes unintentional shooting in the home etc... hunting unintentional shooting is a percentage of this figure.
This is from a country with a very liberal gun culture and where hunting culture is strong.

http://www.nssf.org/newsroom/releases/s ... &path=2011

Some other interesting facts..

To put hunting's safety standing into perspective, compared to hunting a person is . . .
•11 times more likely to be injured playing volleyball
•19 times more likely to be injured snowboarding
•25 times more likely to be injured cheerleading or bicycle riding
•34 times more likely to be injured playing soccer or skateboarding
•105 more times likely to be injured playing tackle football.

Perhaps these figures may settle some of the nerves out there about safety... perhaps some peoples time might be more productive in the pursuit of banning football.

[MrWalker]

Maybe I have spent too much time in the bush or maybe talk to farmers too much to get a realistic view on this matter. Unlike all these uni grads who sit behind a computer with their PHDs who seem to know it all and spend half their time trying to figure out how too weasle another research paper pay check out of some government agency.
I can't wait to present the "doomed surplus" theory to my farmer mates..it will be good for a laugh or they will think I have dropped my marbles one of the two ...lol..

Hunting on farms does make sense because those that you miss get scared off onto the neighbours' property. So regular hunting in one spot will keep numbers down, But as Wayno said, you need to blanket vast areas at the same time to reduce feral animals by hunting and keep doing it on a regular basis. I wouldn't want to be in a National Park that had that many hunters active all the time.

[MrWalker]

For those concerned with the safety aspect of hunting in National Parks. This report (not the one I intended to supply) shows that hunting is a very safe sport.

I don't think we need figures on how many hunters shoot each other. We need figures on how many non-hunters are going to be killed.
Also the incidence of "injuries" hides the fact that injuries involving guns tend to be more severe than injuries in other sports.

[maddog]

To put hunting's safety standing into perspective, compared to hunting a person is . . .
11 times more likely to be injured playing volleyball

According to your source, in 2002, 99 of the hunting incidents were fatal. How many of the volleyball incidents were?

Cheers

[wayno]

you cant compare injuries in any other sport with hunting at all.
the only thing you can compare hunting with for injuries is armed combat....
seems to me in nz a high proportion of people shot by high powered rifles die. i dont know what the percentage is, but i'd say most news articles i read about hunters shooting someone are about fatalities and not casualties..
high powered hunting ammunition causes a lot more damage than a military round. hunting ammunition is illegal to use in the military and police....
if you're lucky you get shot in a limb and not the body or the head and you can stem blood loss you'd me a lot more likely to live than if you are shot in the body or head... the damage caused by one small bullet can be horrendous and damages and area many times the size of the bullet as it expands and the shock wave spreads... so the total numbers being shot in nz are pretty low but the likelihood of dying would be higher i'd say than those shot by a single shot from a high powered rifle in the military,
mind you in the military you'd probably get better first aid quicker and get extracted to a hospital faster
how many hunters are trained to deal with the injuries caused by a gunshot? how many have medication to reduce the effect of shock and have a suitable first aid kit with them? combat soldiers all have first aid kits and training to deal with gunshot wounds. shock can be a killer when combined with a serious injury
so for an injury caused by a single shot from a high powered rifle i think your odds of survival could be a lot better in the military compared to recreataional hunting...

i think PLB's, first aid training in treating gnshot wounds and first aid kids should be mandatory for hunters, minutes count for gunshot injuries, if someone wants to wander around in an area where there could be other people with a weapon they are ready to discharge then they should be adeuately prepared for the scenario that they could shoot someone...
imagine the scenario of being shot and dying because the person who shot you didnt know how to treat you. and or didnt have a first aid kit or locator beacon... that speaks of "it's never going to happen" mentality... and that will cost lives.
i think the likelihood of being shot will be very low but the consequences of being shot have a high likelihood to be fatal.

its a black and white scenario, hunters see shooting an animal as a good experience, even a euphoric adrenalin packed experience...
shooting a human is the exact opposite.... all incidents where people are shot by hunters are preventable.. but they happen every year in nz....

[colinm]

To put hunting's safety standing into perspective, compared to hunting a person is . . .
•11 times more likely to be injured playing volleyball

So for every 11 games of volleyball a hunter plays where he's injured he's likely to shoot himself only once?

None of those sports are able to reach out and kill someone who's not even standing on the sidelines watching, whereas hunting obviously is, and obviously does.

[wayno]

the other issue is people not used to hunting game who dont know how to kill humanely
i shot a rabbit once, there wasnt much that was humane about it, no one had told me where to aim for a humane kill....
took three shots and that was at close range, first shot blew its foot off, it started crawling away in agony, next shot was in the back, it quivered until my dad took the rifle off me and shot it in the head putting it out of its misery...
was a major lesson for me in humane killing...
are you going to end up with a lot of novices running around leaving injured animals slowly dying, running off taking days or weeks to die in agony....
theres a fair bit of training that needs to be done for people hunting animals.... if you're not assured of being able to kill the animal quickly, or don't know how to, don't shoot....

[wearthefoxhat]

I do believe the Game Council should be able to at least match or better the cost per feral removed by National parks service which from memory was close to $50 per animal (I may stand corrected on this figure). The Game council is aware of the gap and is endeavouring to close it.... This may happen with more hunters and more areas to hunt as quantity of scale kicks in.
...

The cost of conventional control techniques provides a useful benchmark with which to compare the cost to the taxpayer of the recreational hunting scheme. In Queensland, a 2003 study:

examined the control and cost effectiveness of three feral pig management techniques (trapping, aerial shooting and aerial baiting) in the dry tropical savannah of north Queensland. In total, 203 pigs were controlled over a two month period; 81 by trapping, 65 by aerial shooting and 57 by aerial baiting. Estimated population reductions of 74%, 64% and 59% were achieved for trapping, aerial shooting and aerial baiting respectively. Aerial shooting was the most cost effective at a cost of $25.90 / pig controlled. Aerial baiting was ranked next ( $34.19/ pig) and trapping was the least cost effective ($62.90 / pig).

http://www.feral.org.au/wp-content/uplo ... 3/9243.pdf



Thanks mad dog that is interesting. I wonder if the administration costs are included in these figures or these are just contractor costs. There are many preliminary costs involved before an actual cull not to mention compliance costs etc etc
One would expect some variation in the relative costs and kill rate according to factors such as the target species, location, landscape, etc. However, it is worth noting of the three techniques considered in the study, only aerial shooting met the 70% kill rate required to achieve population reduction of pigs:

http://www.invasives.org.au/documents/f ... vfacts.pdf

Cheers

[wearthefoxhat]

To put hunting's safety standing into perspective, compared to hunting a person is . . .
•11 times more likely to be injured playing volleyball

So for every 11 games of volleyball a hunter plays where he's injured he's likely to shoot himself only once?

None of those sports are able to reach out and kill someone who's not even standing on the sidelines watching, whereas hunting obviously is, and obviously does.

It includes all injuries a hunter may encounter while hunting...tripping over...falling out of a tree stand...you get my drift...

[wearthefoxhat]

"if you're not assured of being able to kill the animal quickly, or don't know how to, don't shoot...."

Exactly.. We promote this extensively

[wayno]

actually i'd revise that to say, don't go hunting....

[Nuts]

Oh, this is going in circles (but i think someone already said that?) Tastrax, is great to see that the program implemented on Macquarie Is was a success (eventually.. and at great cost) but isn't referring that as the best that parks can do an indication of how little hope they have of even controlling feral numbers in large mainland parks. Some of the reserves are little but a local feral refuge. The surrounding landholders currently need to hunt up to the boundaries of some places that a majority of bushwalkers will never visit... In theory landholders will continue to wait patiently for help.. in many cases this would be an attitude passed on for generations. I know local landholders are merely a side-'annoyance' to the 'hobby' hunting debate but there is some transference of reality v the science.

If folks are really serious about eradication then they need to get serious about what is required. Macquarie Island eradication (of rats, mice and Rabbits) is a good example of what can occur with good planning, $$ and commitment of professionals doing the job.

http://www.parks.tas.gov.au/index.aspx?base=13013

Now expand that to parks with neighbors, bigger pests and thousands more visitors and the problems go up exponentially - not to mention the $$ required.

Folks are kidding themselves if they think a few amateur hunters will do anything but have a good time, get a few trophy's and some rump for the barbie.

[wearthefoxhat]

I think the report clearly shows that hunting is a very low risk sport to the hunters themselves and to the public...

By the chart i presented car accidents are the cause of 32% of fatalities. Compared to 0.5% fatalities for unintentional discharge of a fire arm.

It would be fair to say you have a 64 times more chance of being killed in a car accident!

As far as I can tell there has been no accidental shootings in State forests in the 7 years of hunting these forests under the Game council and in 40 years there has been no shootings in Alpine NP which is heavily hunted with 40,000 deer taken in one year alone and they operate with a much more relaxed system...

Its about getting it into perspective. The anti hunting lobby will pull on all the emotive strings to win a debate but as I think I have shown it is mostly baseless propaganda that pulls on the heart strings of city dwellers who have absoluteley no idea about the reality of life outside the city... IMO
.

[wearthefoxhat]

actually i'd revise that to say, don't go hunting....

I would suggest , don't go driving... it's too dangerous..

[Nuts]

As a hunter you would know how disconcerting it can be to (even) hear a gunshot in the bush when you don't know the source.

It stands to reason (with an 'open slather' approach) that non-hunters will be even more fearful. Even ignoring the beat-up about safety surely any long-term strategy should address this fear, at least keep hunters away from popular walking areas. It's obvious that bushwakers are going to defend their right to enjoy the bush without added fear.

[maddog]

actually i'd revise that to say, don't go hunting....

I would suggest , don't go driving... it's too dangerous..

This is an invalid comparison. Driving is necessary, recreational hunting is not.

Cheers

[Hallu]

The risks during hunting shouldn't be only "really low" they should be null... and they're not. Many parks in the US were creating to forbid hunting in those areas, the Everglades is the most famous example. How in your mind can it seem logical to hunt inside a National Park ? It's not a NP anymore if you can hunt in it...

To show you how it should work : when in the US hunters claim their right at shooting stuff in an area, they ask the park boundaries to be modified. Why ? Because they know it is strictly forbidden to hunt inside it. Now, in Australia, what do hunters do ? They just ask if they can hunt inside the park itself... Why ? Because Australian NP rules are so damn forgiving... people know it is quite easy to do what you want there, you just need to threaten the current coward government ("you won't get our votes next time !")... It's even more effective if you're a mining company and you're already greasing the palms of influential politicians... which is easy for one simple reason : Australian NPs aren't national, they're state parks, and states only make decision base on economical interest. This is why the US, more than 100 years ago, created national parks instead... because only a strong federal government could say to the states "no guys you won't log or hunt or mine in those areas". In terms of conservation, Australia is behaving like a corrupt third-world country...

[wearthefoxhat]

For those concerned with the safety aspect of hunting in National Parks. This report (not the one I intended to supply) shows that hunting is a very safe sport.

I don't think we need figures on how many hunters shoot each other. We need figures on how many non-hunters are going to be killed.
Also the incidence of "injuries" hides the fact that injuries involving guns tend to be more severe than injuries in other sports.

The report I supplied shows exactly what you ask..

[wearthefoxhat]

actually i'd revise that to say, don't go hunting....

I would suggest , don't go driving... it's too dangerous..

This is an invalid comparison. Driving is necessary, recreational hunting is not.

Cheers

In your opinion!

cheers

[wearthefoxhat]

Actually NP's in SA and Vic say it is necessary...coming from guys on the coal face I know who's opinion I would give the most credibility!

[Nuts]

The risks during hunting shouldn't be only "really low" they should be null... and they're not. Many parks in the US were creating to forbid hunting in those areas, the Everglades is the most famous example. How in your mind can it seem logical to hunt inside a National Park ? It's not a NP anymore if you can hunt in it...

To show you how it should work : when in the US hunters claim their right at shooting stuff in an area, they ask the park boundaries to be modified. Why ? Because they know it is strictly forbidden to hunt inside it. Now, in Australia, what do hunters do ? They just ask if they can hunt inside the park itself... Why ? Because Australian NP rules are so damn forgiving... people know it is quite easy to do what you want there, you just need to threaten the current coward government ("you won't get our votes next time !")... It's even more effective if you're a mining company and you're already greasing the palms of influential politicians... which is easy for one simple reason : Australian NPs aren't national, they're state parks, and states only make decision base on economical interest. This is why the US, more than 100 years ago, created national parks instead... because only a strong federal government could say to the states "no guys you won't log or hunt or mine in those areas". In terms of conservation, Australia is behaving like a corrupt third-world country...

That is one way to see things. An alternative, here in Oz.. would be that many parks and reserves were allocated without capacity for effective management. Is your suggestion to change existing tenure, try as best we can or add more reserves and deal with the problems that instantly arise..

Third world corrupt country!! Coward!! really?? You think the answer is just in the title? Not wanting to cause personal offence but with your comparisons it seems to me that your knowledge of the history of our reserved lands barely scratches the surface.

[Hallu]

The thing is, because hardly anything is banned in NPs, Australia has more than 500 NPs, less than 10% would qualify for it in the US. The key is to diminish the number of NPs, and allocate resources to the ones that deserve this title.

The lack of resources was also the problem in the early 1900s in the US. It was solved partly by bringing people to the parks, which was allowed by rich private contributors building better roads and trails, and by the government creating the NP service. It actually created jobs and boosted the economy, right after the recession, thanks to an ingenuous decision by FDR. The key is that in the US you had many passionate people caring for their pristine land, luckily some of them were rich. With the creation of conservation associations, they soon began to out-power the industrialists pushing for mines, dams, and logging. This is still not the case in Australia unfortunately, where there is a fragile balance between the two, resulting in the problems we're talking about.

[MrWalker]

For those concerned with the safety aspect of hunting in National Parks. This report (not the one I intended to supply) shows that hunting is a very safe sport.

I don't think we need figures on how many hunters shoot each other. We need figures on how many non-hunters are going to be killed.
Also the incidence of "injuries" hides the fact that injuries involving guns tend to be more severe than injuries in other sports.

The report I supplied shows exactly what you ask..

Thanks, I looked up the report (provided by the National Shooting Sports Foundation) and it showed that the risk of injury from Camping (vacation/overnight) is 0.01% , while the risk from hunting is 0.05%. That is more relevant here than the risk from playing volleyball.
So if we go camping where hunting is allowed we have multiplied our risk of injury 5-fold.
We need another multiplier to allow for the type of injury (sprained ankle while camping vs shot in head by hunter).

[wearthefoxhat]

If you drive your car to the National park you have a 64 times greater risk of killing yourself or god forbid killing a hunter who is legaly going about his business... You have just become a 64 times greater risk than that of the hunter. We could play this game all day...

[Turfa]

Its about getting it into perspective. The anti hunting lobby will pull on all the emotive strings to win a debate but as I think I have shown it is mostly baseless propaganda that pulls on the heart strings of city dwellers who have absoluteley no idea about the reality of life outside the city... IMO
.

Hmm..interesting to see you try to take the high moral ground. The pro-hunting lobby is hardly above being dishonest about the issue... pushing the line that it is all about conservation & doing their bit for the National Parks ...however, it's really just about being allowed to go out & have some fun shooting animals.........go ahead.......tell me that you & all the other "conservation" hunters would be willing to devote the same amount of time volunteering in NP's to go out & place baits for a feral control program ????

or is that not as much fun ???

[wearthefoxhat]

Hallu...you said... "The risks during hunting shouldn't be only "really low" they should be null... and they're not. Many parks in the US were creating to forbid hunting in those areas, the Everglades is the most famous example. How in your mind can it seem logical to hunt inside a National Park ? It's not a NP anymore if you can hunt in it..."

Firstly it would be nice if life was without risk but it isn't. Everything we do is a risk. One of the riskiest activities we do is driving but I would bet that everyone sees that as low risk yet we do it everyday. interesting thing is that the extreme greens and others will portray hunting activities as many times more dangerous which is illogical and a plain lie

The difference between NP's in the US and NP's in Australia we will hunt introduced species only and in the US they hunt Native species. A whole different management scenario. It appears they mange their system very well now especially now they have reinstated some species back into areas that were hunted to extinction eg wolves.
I will never hunt an australian native that is my choice but it is also illegal.

[maddog]

Former Shooters Party executive opposes hunting in parks

http://www.abc.net.au/local/audio/2013/ ... utheastnsw

[wearthefoxhat]

Its about getting it into perspective. The anti hunting lobby will pull on all the emotive strings to win a debate but as I think I have shown it is mostly baseless propaganda that pulls on the heart strings of city dwellers who have absoluteley no idea about the reality of life outside the city... IMO
.

Hmm..interesting to see you try to take the high moral ground. The pro-hunting lobby is hardly above being dishonest about the issue... pushing the line that it is all about conservation & doing their bit for the National Parks ...however, it's really just about being allowed to go out & have some fun shooting animals.........go ahead.......tell me that you & all the other "conservation" hunters would be willing to devote the same amount of time volunteering in NP's to go out & place baits for a feral control program ????

or is that not as much fun ???

No I won't lay bates. My brothers dog died a digusting death from taking a bait many years ago and I would never impose that on any animal not even a feral.

I am about conservation. I spend many hours clearing lantana locally with the ambition of regenerating local flora and and hopefully this will encourage our native friends back.
I have recently assisted in the relocation of endangered flaura from a highway development to a secure site. I do ongoing maintanance here. I also participate although not as regularly as I would like with native forest replanting.
Keeping the lantana at bay is a tough job but after 5 years we are seeing positive results with native grases and ground covers getting well established and rustic plums among others making a comeback...this is voluntary work.. Oh and I also hunt feral animals.

What do you do?

[juxtaposer]

Regardless of what harm hunting will or will not do, it is the thin end of the wedge. Bushland destroyers already have a short list of parks on the NSW north coast they want to log, and a list of parks they want revoked altogether. That a lot of parks arn't well funded, well a lot don't have to be, they pay their way for their catchment, wildlife and scenic protection values. These are not necessarily high cost items. The parks that get the most funding are the ones that generate the most $, the ones that are best suited to commercial opportunities, mainly in the way of tourism. I say leave feral animal control to the park managers, 96% of whom don't want recreational shooting in their parks.