Belconnen on the World Map

umm, why don’t they just open a gate at one end, head to the nearest school and get everybody to walk the site from the opposite end to the gate ?

No more roos, and kids have a fun day out not at school.

I agree Ingee, but according to Wildcare the costs involved with both options (culling and relocating) are comparative. If this is the case, I think that the relocation would (and should) be the preferred option.
I’m not so sure the costs would still be comparative if they were looking at getting professional shooters in, but that’s a whole other issue….
🙂

Fair call, but it can’t do them any good to be getting tied up with hair-brained ideas like this when there’s a humane, sensible, cost effective alternative – their position seems to be more driven by irrational idealism.

Ingee, I’ve just got to pass comment on your obvious opinion of Wildcare. I’ve had to deal with them on a number of times before regarding injured wildlife, and I’ve found them to be reasonable and easy to deal with. I’ve also had the dubious pleasure of dealing with WIRES before, who really are nothing but a bunch of tree-hugging hippies with nonsensical ideas on how the world should run. In my experience, Wildcare are nothing like that. They do the job they are supposed to do – help injured wildlife and explore sensible options for maintaining harmony between urban life and wildlife. Nothing more, nothing less. In my opinion, they don’t deserve to be grouped with inflammatory and harmful ‘animal welfare’ groups like PETA and WIRES.

Let’s look at some of the spin and hype that’s being pedalled here as so called fact:

Defence applied for and was granted a permit to kill the kangaroos in case this was necessary as the ACT has a culling season between the beginning of March and the end of July when the kangaroos can be killed. This became public knowledge and there was an outcry about the proposed killing.

There was no ‘outcry’ whatsoever. There was a small, loud and hysterical group of whingy troublemakers with no genuine interest in animal welfare who went the carry on – the Canberra Times, desperate for copy ran the story giving the confected outrage oxygen.

Wildcare prepared a report for Defence outlining a combination of translocation and reproductive interventions to reduce the kangaroo population to a sustainable level at the site.

A group with, by it’s own admission, no ability to deliver on it’s pie-in-the-sky proposals for sedation and relocation prepared a report that either deliberately ignored or failed to adequately consider the humane slaughter of the ‘roos as a sensible alternative.

The report was leaked to the media by someone in Defence and was subsequently lambasted by the ACT Government and the hastily formed Limestone Plains Group. Both of these, as well as the ACT RSPCA quickly attacked the credibility of the report and the decision by Defence to approach Wildcare to prepare the report.

It’s the primal fear of tin-foil-hat outfits like Wildcare – objective review of their cuckoo-land schemes. Considered examination becomes “lambasted” and timely consideration by independent experts becomes “hastily formed” while pointing out the patent sheer stupidity of the proposal becomes “attacked the credibility”. Enough said.

…the translocation had to be stopped as the ACT Government had refused to grant an export license to move these kangaroos out of the ACT and demanding they be killed instead.

So the sad reality is that the whole idea of sedation and translocation was never going to work in the first place, because of regardless of everything else Wildcare ran a political agenda rather than one based on what was the best thing that could be achieved within the established frameworks and management structures. If HLA had tried this … deliberately omiting the need to secure an export licence and instead hoping that holding their breath while stamping their feet was going to be enough to get the ACT Government to roll over … Defences lawyers would have been all over their professional indemnity insurers like a rash.

These are facts.

No they’re not, they’re spin with some observations about facts thrown in for colour.

I just thought it worth addressing some of the comments in this thread. I set up the http://www.canberraroos.com website, not VIVA. VIVA placed a link to the site on their website and some sensationalist news services did the rest, I even saw one story claiming a spat between Peter Garret and Paul McCartney over the issue, I doubt the two have spoken about it.

Some history, this is fact, not hype. In early 2006, Defence commissioned HLA Consulting to prepare a report into kangaroo numbers at the BNTS site and was told that kangaroo numbers were too high and some kangaroos needed to be killed to reduce the population. Defence applied for and was granted a permit to kill the kangaroos in case this was necessary as the ACT has a culling season between the beginning of March and the end of July when the kangaroos can be killed. This became public knowledge and there was an outcry about the proposed killing.

Around the same time, a group of RSPCA employees led by ACT CEO Michael Linke attended the site and decided that the kangaroos were starving and needed to be killed to save them from starvation. They outlined to Defence the possibility of animal welfare charges being brought against them if they did not kill the kangaroos. It was proved this year in the grassland report prepared by Maxine Cooper that the kangaroos are not and never were actually starving.

Defence contacted Wildcare, a NSW based volunteer native wildlife rescue and care group whose area of operation surrounds the ACT to provide a report on humane alternatives to killing the kangaroos.

Wildcare prepared a report for Defence outlining a combination of translocation and reproductive interventions to reduce the kangaroo population to a sustainable level at the site.

The report was leaked to the media by someone in Defence and was subsequently lambasted by the ACT Government and the hastily formed Limestone Plains Group. Both of these, as well as the ACT RSPCA quickly attacked the credibility of the report and the decision by Defence to approach Wildcare to prepare the report.

As a result of this, Defence assembled a panel of independent experts to study the report provided by Wildcare and the expert panel came to the conclusion that a mix of translocation and reproductive intervention was the preferred course of action in this case.

Defence announced that they had accepted the report as the most humane solution to the overpopulation problem and put the process out to tender.

Wildcare did not tender for the project as it was beyond our financial resources as a volunteer group but did offer our expertise in dealing with wild kangaroos as well as a number of release sites from these animals to be translocated to.

In January 2008, Cumberland Ecology was appointed by Defence to carry out the translocation, as well as to euthanase animals that were sick, injured or too old to be successfully translocated, with a brief to leave 100 kangaroos at the site. This 100 includes 60 female kangaroos that are being used in a sterilisation experiment being conducted at the site, as well as 40 male kangaroos.

Cumberland Ecology began to prepare for the translocation project in January 2008 and was in consultation with Wildcare to organise the release sites as well as some volunteers to assist with the translocation.

Inspections of the release sites were underway and I was actually preparing to take some staff from CE to inspect a site on Monday, March 3. On Friday, February 29 we received a call from CE telling us that the translocation had to be stopped as the ACT Government had refused to grant an export license to move these kangaroos out of the ACT and demanding they be killed instead.

This decision was made based on the findings of a panel that decided that translocation was inhumane and it was far more humane to kill the kangaroos. The findings of the panel were based on very dated information, including the 14-year-old ACT Kangaroo management plan which ruled out translocation as being inhumane. This decision was made despite a lot of current data on translocation indicating it is very successful. A recent translocation of 250 kangaroos in Queensland had an over 95% success rate.

These are facts. The only thing stopping this translocation going ahead is the ACT government refusal to grant an export license. The infrastructure currently in place at the site is actually what is required for the translocation. The only difference is that as it stands now, the kangaroos will be killed with an injection of lethabarb once they are sedated rather than moved to pre-prepared sites, treated with long term medication to reduce stress and allowed to continue living. The cost of either process is very similar. The only difference is that as it stands now the result will be a very large hole full of poisoned kangaroos rather than these animals living out their lives in other areas where the landholders are happy to have them.

The only harm to come from translocation in this case is maybe a chief minister with a bruised ego.

Cheers,

Greg Tarlinton
Vice President
Wildcare.

Maybe if they just knock down a section of the fence, then herd all the ‘roos out the gap, then put the fence back up. Might cause some chaos on the roads/surrounding suburbs, but would solve all Defences problems, surely?

One things for sure. Roo’s don’t take stress very well at all and I would say more then 50% would die from being tranquillised and relocated.

A side note to the story: Listening to Hack on triple J this afternoon, and they had an interview ith Maxine Mckew(?) who is understandably for the cull, and she has said that the land will “never ever” be sold for housing and if it is, she will the first person out there protesting.

Also they spoke to a wildlife activist, whose name I forget, and he said that if they start tranquilsing roo’s that the protesters will throw themsleves in front of the tranquilisers. We can only hope, then maybe I can eat my roo steak in peace,

This has been a total cluster F*** they should have just got on with the cull 2 years ago with little fanfare and be done with it. Instead they have dragged it out and now looks what’s happening.