Victorian Prime Minister Daniel Andrews has defended the decision to slaughter wild horses that are causing ecological damage to Victoria’s fragile alpine ecosystems, while protesters campaigning against the planned shooting have rallied on the steps of the state parliament.
Parks Victoria plans to remove 500 horses from the eastern alpine region this year as part of a wild horse management plan that includes the eventual removal of all horses from Barmah National Park on the Murray River and the Bogong Highlands .
The protest comes a month after Parks Victoria issued a tender for the control of wildlife in alpine areas, for the grounding of “deer, wild pigs, goats, foxes and other species.” Jill Pickering, president of the Australian Brumby Alliance, says she believes the other species will include horses.
“They don’t announce the shooting until after it’s happened,” he said.
Parks Victoria declined to confirm any shooting plans and says it does not disclose details about the timing and location of the planned sacrifices to protect the safety of its staff and contractors.
“There are a large number of wild horses in the Alpine and Barmah national parks and the damage they cause is obvious,” a spokesman said. “Victoria Parks needs to respond to the current situation with the best available techniques.”
There are an estimated 5,000 wild horses in the Eastern Alps, 600 in Barmah National Park and 100 in the high plains of Bogong, according to surveys conducted by Victoria Parks.
Andrews said the state government’s plan to control wild horses, which was revised last year, was human and was based on the protection of national parks.
Protesters on the steps of the Victorian parliament. Photography: Joel Carrett / AAP
“If you’re concerned about biodiversity and if you’re concerned about the natural environment, this pristine environment is owned by all Victorians … it won’t be maintained if wild animals invade you,” he told reporters. “And we’re not going to spend millions and millions of dollars moving them.”
The Wild Horse Management Plan states that some horses will be disposed of through passive trapping and rehousing, especially in more accessible areas such as Barmah National Park.
But he says the difficulty of trapping horses in remote areas of the eastern Alps, combined with the scarcity of people with the knowledge and ability to train wild horses, made it “unlikely that capture and resettlement would contribute in any way. significant to the necessary reduction of wild horse populations in the Eastern Alps ”.
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When relocation cannot be done, he says, it will be considered shooting from the ground or from the air.
Pickering says that despite the resettlement policy, the government “by default is firing.” He also denied that science was focused on the damage that wild horses do to Australian ecosystems.
Wednesday’s protest also coincided with a state opposition announcement banning the slaughter of wild horses to focus on “rehousing and veterinary intervention,” a proposal that both animal welfare and environmentalists say that he would not be able to handle the volume of horses they need. be removed from national parks.
The position echoes a move by the New South Wales National Party to end the slaughter of wild horses in Kosciuszko National Park by declaring them a heritage breed. In November, the NSW government signed a plan to reduce the number of wild horses from more than 14,000 to 3,000, a figure that conservationists said was still too high.
Victorian opposition leader Matthew Guy said ending the killing was both human and sensible.
“This is not a new topic, this goes back to the Snowy River man and beyond,” he said. “We can go back to school, the greyhounds go home, we should be able to do it with brumbias.”
Pro-brumby groups, including the Brumby Alliance of Australia, have argued that horses should be trapped at a rate of about 200 a year, which would allow reeducators to keep up. they should carry out other population controls through the use of fertility control drugs.
Both Parks Victoria and the RSPCA say fertility control drugs are not a viable option for a large and diverse wild horse population, especially since they must be re-administered after a few years.
Matt Ruchel, of the Victoria National Parks Association, said there was a world of difference between rehousing a greyhound, a low-energy dog raised by humans, and the knowledge and facilities needed to return to train and re-house a wild horse.
“We don’t go home to wild dogs,” Ruchel said.
Ruchel said the Coalition’s policy was “disappointing” and that controlling the number of wild horses required a combination of approaches, which included both rehousing and removal.
“It simply came to our notice then [for rehomed brumbies] to control the numbers effectively, “he said.
Ruchel said calls for pro-brumby advocates for more research to determine the effects of wild horses in national parks were “just a delaying tactic.”
“There are decades of science that bring this problem to light,” he said.
RSPCA Victoria’s Mhairi Roberts said there were circumstances in which the shooting, by skilled shooters, was “more humane than other options.”
He said wild horses were very stressed by some methods of capture and the process of being transported to rehomers, and there were thousands of non-wild horses in Victoria that also needed homes.
“We are seeing a large number of reports of animal abuse related to horses, most related to neglect,” he said. “From these reports we believe that the market is already quite saturated. We don’t think there would be enough houses in the state for a lot of wild horses. “