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The Forum > Article Comments > Kangaroo cull: necessary evil and the greater good > Comments

Kangaroo cull: necessary evil and the greater good : Comments

By Adam Henry, published 27/5/2008

Canberra's kangaroos - a genuinely open and ethical public debate could have expanded the options beyond 'to cull or not to cull?'

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Yes I too am disturbed at the indiscriminate taking of the female kangaroo RICHIROO.

Whilst haydn leonovich has posted a clinical and accurate account of the current culling, he has failed to allude to the mismanagement of the cull.

That these animals were allowed to breed, in an unnatural habitat, until they reached "plague" proportions to starving point, on lands where there was no escape, reveals the indifferent and callous approach of authorities to our wildlife.

Immunocontraception has been available at least since the '90s. A sterilisation programme before the numbers increased would have seen far fewer objections than the current protests over the recent slaughter.

Deliberately incarcerating and allowing these animals to breed, coupled with the knowledge that they would in the end, be slaughtered and buried, further exposes Australia as a callous nation.

Forward planning, it seems, applies only to those animals which have high commercial value. These are the animals (together with the crops which feed them) that have desecrated the lands of this arid nation and stripped the countryside of natural vegetation which was once available to our native species.

If there is a plague of kangaroos, as the rural community insists, why are cull quotas rarely filled?

No wonder this country is currently on the nose.
Posted by dickie, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 2:31:40 PM
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Alzo suggests killing kangaroos "for just plain fun" ...I'd cross the road if I saw him coming.
Candide thinks kangaroos CAN be domesticated "we don't happen to have domesticated the kangaroo". They CANNOT be. A species needs to have certain tendencies before humans can domesticate it. Kangaroos cannot be handled, they stress and die easily if handled. Cannot be herded, are dangerous if cornered, have hardly any flesh on them, are full of worms both in stomach and muscles, carry toxoplasmosis. Are shot and gutted in dusty, fly infested bush at night. Transported hanging in open trucks over vast distances to chillers. Eat undercooked kangaroos at your own risk and if you overcook their flesh - it's like leather! After 200 years of european activity in australia, hardly anyone who knows the facts will eat kangaroos. Kangaroos cannot be farmed. Only uninformed people swallow the 'good lean meat' spin. Apart from that, the abandonment of orphaned joeys to die a slow death is inhumane and cruel. Kangaroos have a far greater potential as tourism drawcards and in the outback we'd make far more profit and produce jobs out there around wildlife photo safaris. The tourism industry is worth $6 billion to this country (against a paltry $280 million from the Kangaroo killing industry) and has the potential to be worth much more if we stop the senseless killing and create wildlife corridors for kangaroos and other species. Climate change and increased temperatures reduce male kangaroo fertility. Tim Flannery in his book 'Country' quoting Alan Newsome's research re that, stated "It also filled me with fear for the future of the large kangaroos in the face of global warming"

Kangaroos are comparatively numerous,but they can be decimated by a greedy commercial industry together with climate change and new diseases being introduced because of that. The Tasmanian Devil was 3 years ago common and considered by farmers a pest now it is on the endangered list because of a facial cancer - unknown origin. For facts on the kangaroo read "Kangaroos - Myths and Realities" a book by Australian Wildlife Protection Council...www.awpc.org.au
Posted by jango, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 2:36:58 PM
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The fuzzy cuddly Australian Icon or numerous destructive pest! Nature had its own way of dealing with its over-population explosions in the animal kingdom, its we humans that have forgotten the laws, and with the casualties of our ever changing unstable world, the tens of thousands that been killed lately(humans) this should be a wake up call for all of us.
(9 billion people/ fifty years until the game for us is up) Your ignorance ( humans in general ) is just unbelievably stunning. "Of course the kangaroo has to be shot" and its all our fault because of our own over-breeding, how simple do you need the maths!

Humans are the new lords of nature and now you don't want to get your hands dirty when we make a mess of it all.

Like I said in the last thread!

HUMANS OR ROO'S.

You all want your cake and eat it!

Don't make me laugh!

EVO
Posted by evolution, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 3:40:27 PM
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Let's see. If I put 200 head of cattle in a locked paddock without food and water and left them there to fend for themselves I would be rightly charged with cruelty. But apparently its OK to do that with roos.
Posted by rivergum, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 3:48:16 PM
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What are we teaching our children? My kids have grown up around roos for all their small lives and I dare you to sit there and have a debate on why we should be culling them to my 9yo. How long are they going to last with the amount of killings going on? Do you never want to see one in the wild again - do you like the idea of going to a zoo or wildlife park and having to donate monies to help with the breeding programme??

Ok - I dont agree with the so called 'reasons' the Canberra cull accured - BUT if it did and it was done 'humanley', why were they jumping twice their height to escape? Why were they jumping into fences and breaking their necks and bones trying to get away? Why were the mothers kicking their young out thinking that they were helping them and yet under the human control of who was 'the power that be' in the killing pens - left for 36 hours with no food, water or parents - according to the witness who were THERE; you could HEAR these young calling for their mothers. If that is called 'humane' I would love to see what 'inhumane' brings us..

It is a pity one of the reasons for the cull was the precious grasslands - security people were clearly seen driving over this grassland - so what now is going to happen to the moths that they were trying to protect with no grasslands to feed on?? Why were their numbers large - maybe it had to do with the fence. And I think we are all forgetting that roos do not breed UNLESS their is pleanty of food and water to provide to their young.

Lets face the fact - this is all because the govt came up with a figure of 3.5 million to move the roos, the actul figure ws nowhere near that. Be honest - the reason why they wanted the roos gone? A housing development!

Just remember, soon there will be none left.
Posted by raykel, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 8:00:35 PM
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The main problem I have with this argument is that the basis of the ACT Government decision to authorise the cull of kangaroos in Belconnen was a 2006 export report. The experts included a professor of veterinarian science from the University of Melbourne, a rangeland expert from the CSIRO, a representative from the RSPCA and the ACT Environment Commissioner. These experts recommended that the most humane option to address overpopulation of kangaroos on the site, which threatened endangered grasslands and species.

I also have problems with the idea that the debate could expand beyond ‘to cull or not to cull’ because the cull is addressing overpopulation of some kangaroo species. Overpopulation of the larger species of kangaroos resulted from European land-management practices, such as farmers providing pastures and water sources for grazing domestic livestock, which favoured kangaroos. This effectively means that the larger kangaroo species have been able to flourish to greater numbers than would be possible before European settlement, without natural predators and traditional Aboriginal hunting for meat and skins. Australian Governments, both Federal and State, utilise culls and commercial shooting to address the problem of overpopulation because other methods are impractical or ineffective. Between 2000 and 2005, on available data, the numbers of kangaroos shot on mainland Australia was between 2.7 and 3.9 million each year, depending on the size of kangaroo populations.

If there was really alternatives to culling, wouldn't it be in the interests of the Department of Defence to pursue that alternative rather than persisting with a controversial cull? That would have avoided the embarassment of bowing to public pressure by pursuing relocation and then later back-flipping when Defence realised that relocation was expensive and it was unclear whether the kangaroos would survive.
Posted by Nic-Syd, Wednesday, 28 May 2008 8:59:27 PM
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