6 June 2013

The Mayor v. Skippy. It's personal now

| johnboy
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kangaroos

With not a month gone since Mayor Rattenbury was assaulted by a Kangaroo to world notoriety it’s intriguing his department has now announced an expanded cull:

The ACT Government wishes to advise that a conservation cull to reduce overpopulation of Eastern Grey Kangaroos and protect biodiversity in some Canberra nature reserves will be undertaken this Winter.

“The conservation cull of up to 1,455 eastern grey kangaroos is needed to maintain populations at appropriate levels to minimise impact on other flora and fauna,” said Daniel Iglesias, Director of Parks and Conservation.

“The impact of overgrazing on our grasslands and grassy woodlands and the species that rely on them, such as the Grassland Earless Dragon, the Striped Legless Lizard and the Button Wrinklewort, can be easily seen in the deterioration of our nature reserves.

“The numbers to be culled have been based on scientific kangaroo counts in each location. This is then compared to what ACT Government ecologists establish as the sustainable carrying capacity for each area, taking into account the habitat requirements of grassland dependent animals and plants.

“Ensuring the grasslands and woodlands are not overgrazed will protect threatened species and ecosystems, provide habitat for creatures such as lizards and ground-feeding birds, prevent excessive soil loss and maintain sustainable numbers of kangaroos.

“The conservation cull will be conducted according to a strict Code of Practice that has the endorsement of all relevant authorities including the RSPCA. Rangers and security staff will patrol areas to ensure the safety of the public with warning signs also being installed at all entry points to the reserves.

“This year we will be using up to 20% of the kangaroo meat to make baits to use in our wild dog and fox control programs. This is in response to community concern that kangaroo meat was going to waste.

They’ve also produced a lengthy Q and A to convince you and sent us the above photo taken at The Pinnacle to demonstrate both roo numbers and what the grass could look like if the hoppers are kept off.

At the risk of invoking Godwin let’s hope they’re not working towards the Fuhrer.

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EvanJames said :

Frankly, it’s lazy and cheap politics as well as being cruel.

Rattenbury should take a good hard look at himself in the mirror to ascertain wheyher he’s actually a member of the ALP or Greens these days.

I’d suggest the former.

Totally agree. It’s very, very disappointing.

People seem to think of “the cull” like a video game, quick and clinical. But the footage we saw of the last one was bloody horrible, the roos were herded into a fenced area and you saw them desperately trying to get out as they saw their herd-mates being shot. Jesus!

Nope. Most of us know how it’s done. We just don’t care because we aren’t a bunch of whiny knobs who think our feelings are as important as actual data on the welfare of the greater kangaroo population.

EvanJames said :

It’s not starting to sound like Japan’s scientific whaling, it’s been dodgy from the start.

The Science: Jeez, there’s a lot of roos in that paddock. One almost hit my car! I heard a guy at work hit one last week. There’s too many of them! Let’s have a Scientific Cull.

This just screams of ignorance. 3-4 years ago I did my college work experience with ACT Parks and Recreation, and my supervisors for the week were the scientists who direct the kangaroo culls. I was highly impressed with the research and careful monitoring of the populations and environment that determines when it’s appropriate to implement another cull; they are also genuinely concerned with the welfare of the animals themselves. They are basing it on carefully gathered empirical data; you, on the other hand, are saying it’s wrong because “you have a feeling it is”.

Do some field research yourself (or find someone who has) and then present a better case.

HiddenDragon2:46 pm 07 Jun 13

When I saw the “working towards the Fuhrer” link, I thought it would be something to do with the “this is how the Nazis got started” line of argument (we’re not seeing nearly enough of that rhetorical gem on the RiotAct, by the way….), but was fascinated to find it’s something quite different. This is, indeed, an interesting coincidence – had Henry II been a cyclist, he may well have said “will no one rid me of this turbulent marsupial???”

James-T-Kirk2:21 pm 07 Jun 13

Does this mean that there will be heaps of cheap roo meat at woolies?

crappicker said :

Extract from:

2013 Kangaroo Conservation Control Program – Questions and Answers
Why does the ACT Government undertake conservation culls?

“Work is currently being undertaken with the CSIRO through the Invasive Animals Cooperative Research Centre. A successful injected vaccine has blocked fertility of all treated kangaroos for three breeding seasons to date. This work is still in the scientific research stage and due to the drug’s administration via injection it is only suitable for small captive populations.”

It would take a little retraining of the mercenary shooters to use dart guns for tranquilizing the kangaroos and I guess some more re-education of the follow-up henchmen, the ones doing the joey bashing, to administer the fertility-blocking vaccine.

Thus the ACT government has the capability to manage kangaroo populations through fertility control rather than through cruel slaughter but is lacking the political will.

Gutless and outrageous!!

#35 beat you to it and makes a lot more sense.

Not killing is not always the most humane thing to do. Those ‘humane mouse traps’ for example. The RSPCA advises against them because in most cases the mice end up dying from stress either in the trap or when they are released in a completely foreign environment. Therefor the snap trap is better for everyone involved. Or a quick blow to the back of the neck.

And I wonder if the bleeding hearts who go about rescuing joeys from the cull (or from road kill for that matter) actually give those a contraceptive implant before they release them?

I will never forget the protests against the cull a few years back and a photo of an activist in front of the Legislative Assembly holding a tiny joey that he ‘rescued’ from the cull close to his chest. That image still haunts me today. We clearly don’t always agree on what is humane…

Extract from:

2013 Kangaroo Conservation Control Program – Questions and Answers
Why does the ACT Government undertake conservation culls?

“Work is currently being undertaken with the CSIRO through the Invasive Animals Cooperative Research Centre. A successful injected vaccine has blocked fertility of all treated kangaroos for three breeding seasons to date. This work is still in the scientific research stage and due to the drug’s administration via injection it is only suitable for small captive populations.”

It would take a little retraining of the mercenary shooters to use dart guns for tranquilizing the kangaroos and I guess some more re-education of the follow-up henchmen, the ones doing the joey bashing, to administer the fertility-blocking vaccine.

Thus the ACT government has the capability to manage kangaroo populations through fertility control rather than through cruel slaughter but is lacking the political will.

Gutless and outrageous!!

poetix said :

The cull is a revolting thing; surely there must be another solution? How are they going with contraceptives for Skippy (or Mr Skippy)? The legless, earless and wrinkled lived side by side with kangaroos (and people who didn’t wreck the land) for many years.

There is something very sad about our national symbol being killed en masse and chopped up to poison feral animals.

Cotraceptives exist, and they are quite effective. The prohibitive downside is that you have to chemically restrain the kangaroo, surgically implant them with the contraceptive, then revive them. To be able to achieve a reduction in numbers, you would need to do a lot of darting and surgery. This is not without significant risk, as kangaroos are known to die quite readily from capture myopathy (where the heart muscle can’t cope with the stress hormones and dies). From an ethics and legal point of view, the sure, quick death by bullet is preferable to risk of stress-induced death by capture.

Perhaps what is required is large-scale trial, but knowingly exposing animals to suffering is hard to get an ethics committee to sign off on, and could expose the department to an animal cruelty prosecution. Perhaps some of the animal groups would like to do it, and wear the cost and the risk?

The other downside is that you wont achieve a significant control environmental impacts immediately through fertility control. Any reduction will be in future seasons, and will be unpredictable. Fertility control is certainly part of the solution, but it is not the magic wand that a lot of people want it to be. In the end, ACT government has an obligation to mitigate impacts on reserves, so they are going to do it with “best-practice” or “least-worst” methods. It’s not ideal, but it’s what it is.

In the end, this is such a logistical and political headfeck that I can’t believe anyone would do it if they didn’t believe it needed doing.

EvanJames said :

Frankly, it’s lazy and cheap politics as well as being cruel.

Rattenbury should take a good hard look at himself in the mirror to ascertain wheyher he’s actually a member of the ALP or Greens these days.

I’d suggest the former.

People seem to think of “the cull” like a video game, quick and clinical. But the footage we saw of the last one was bloody horrible, the roos were herded into a fenced area and you saw them desperately trying to get out as they saw their herd-mates being shot. Jesus!

I think the footage you are referring to is from the cull at belconnen about 6 or 7 years ago when they were herding all the kangaroos during the day into killing pens ……this was done by defence not ACT

Frankly, it’s lazy and cheap politics as well as being cruel.

Rattenbury should take a good hard look at himself in the mirror to ascertain wheyher he’s actually a member of the ALP or Greens these days.

I’d suggest the former.

Again, why would being a Green or an environmentalist clash with being pro roo cull?

And to those lamenting on the good old days before the bad white men started killing roos en mass, apparently when the first Europeans arrived in Australia the sighting of a kangaroo was a fairly rare event because… they were hunted consistently and efficiently by the original inhabitants of the land. I read that in a Tim Flannery book, “The Future Eaters” possibly?

Frankly, it’s lazy and cheap politics as well as being cruel.

Rattenbury should take a good hard look at himself in the mirror to ascertain wheyher he’s actually a member of the ALP or Greens these days.

I’d suggest the former.

Totally agree. It’s very, very disappointing.

People seem to think of “the cull” like a video game, quick and clinical. But the footage we saw of the last one was bloody horrible, the roos were herded into a fenced area and you saw them desperately trying to get out as they saw their herd-mates being shot. Jesus!

The bleeding hearts are now taking it to court the clog the system up even more why do they advertise what there doing? And not just wop in to the roos and deal with the fall out from the water melons later?

But have you heard of the Unbuttoned Wrinklewort?

Also known as the Michael Douglas.

***

The cull is a revolting thing; surely there must be another solution? How are they going with contraceptives for Skippy (or Mr Skippy)? The legless, earless and wrinkled lived side by side with kangaroos (and people who didn’t wreck the land) for many years.

There is something very sad about our national symbol being killed en masse and chopped up to poison feral animals.

Bubbalo_Bill11:53 pm 06 Jun 13

Endrey said :

Hmm…up to 20%. Why not say up to 100%?

That way you still include the possibility of zero and get to sound far less wasteful.

I was suspicious about that too, Chris – but the longer Q&A linked to in the original post says it’ll be from 15 to 20%.

Anna Key said :

I’m just glad Shane is out to protect Button Wrinklewort. (no idea what it is but has a great name!)

I’ve got quite a bit of that on my place, and craploads of roos. Hmmm.
http://www.environment.gov.au/cgi-bin/sprat/public/publicspecies.pl?taxon_id=7384

I heard a radio personality only today say there are claims if the cull goes ahead, there is a risk their population will be under threat. I get outside in Canberra from time to time and I see the population of kangaroos is without question over-represented (for a word) and, in spite of the expansion of the suburbs of Canberra, I see more bush than not only within our fine city and indeed territory limits, but for acres upon acres afield from our borders.

All this aside however, is it possible? Could Canberra really look like that picture of grass?? I’m afraid I must remain skeptical.

I wonder if the nature park land they are protecting from ‘overgrazing’ (to ensure there is food for other critters?) will be the same places they back burn later in the year before fire season?? hahaha!
Thank god for us humans. You have to wonder how any ecosystems survived before we came along to twiddle the knobs and levers…! How did any creature survive in Aus before we got here to fix things for them? 🙂

I’m just glad Shane is out to protect Button Wrinklewort. (no idea what it is but has a great name!)

Masquara said :

Shane Rattenbury’s motivation is nothing more, nothing less, than allowing more unpleasant, eco-vandalistic suburban development. While supposedly espousing that high-rise is desirable on ecological grounds, his behaviour is the polar opposite. If he actually behaved like a Green, he’d be keeping the ecosystem from being encroached by housing. He is hopelessly, utterly compromised.

Yeah right………………………………..I’m sure thats the reason
All sites that they’ve listed for culling this year and previous years are nature reserves

So where are they exactly culling kangaroos that is slated for ‘eco-vandalsitic’ suburban development, you going to make a claim like that you got to back it up.

enlighten us please

Shane Rattenbury’s motivation is nothing more, nothing less, than allowing more unpleasant, eco-vandalistic suburban development. While supposedly espousing that high-rise is desirable on ecological grounds, his behaviour is the polar opposite. If he actually behaved like a Green, he’d be keeping the ecosystem from being encroached by housing. He is hopelessly, utterly compromised.

crappicker said :

I do not believe the numbers quoted by ACT government ecologists in their proposal for this year’s slaughter in ACT nature reserves (CT 02/06/2013: huge roo cull call aims to kill 2000). I walk daily through the Wanniassa Hills Reserve (WHR) and adjacent government horse paddocks and last month carried out systematic counting of the kangaroo population over a five day period. I am not an ecologist,

Funny how you blokes will jump up and down about anyone who questions climate change science but cull science must be wrong.
Lets just hope the crazy people don’t go cutting fences again this year.

Matt_Watts said :

Went for a walk on Mt Painter the other month. HUGE number of roos up there. I became surrounded at one point.

Really, and you got away unscathed?

From this we can deduce Canberra’s roo population vote Liberal – and another possible reason for the cull suddenly becomes clear!

Went for a walk on Mt Painter the other month. HUGE number of roos up there. I became surrounded at one point.

It’s obvious! The overpopulation of kangaroos is caused by a miss match between prey and predator. This can be remedied by introduction of Leopards, Panthers or my favorite; cheetahs! They can run around eating roos until the re-birth of the Tasmanian Tiger from specimen jars.

The Wrath of Rattenbury

“He kicked me. He hopped and he kicked me and I shall have him! I’ll chase him ’round the maze of roads of the inner south and ’round the brown country side of the nature park and ’round Charnwood’s car wreck flames before I give him up!”

Shane’s effort made it to one of my favourite podcasts (‘smartest man in the world’, which is American). I was quite proud.

Hmm…up to 20%. Why not say up to 100%?

That way you still include the possibility of zero and get to sound far less wasteful.

So what evil motives are behind this despicable slaughter conspiracy then? No one gains from it financially as far as I can see.

And it sh!ts me to tears when people suggest that green or environmental means having to save anything and everything from death no matter what. It takes courage to kill the cuddly to save the ugly, I say. Don’t start me on so called nature lovers saving orphaned joeys from culls and hand raising them. It puts the mental in environmental…

And the reason why they cannot make it into a commercial activity is because to make that viable they would then have to meet a certain quota each year, I believe and they wouldn’t want to commit to that. There’s something about that in the CT article, but I’m in a hurry so can’t go find it now.

Mr Evil said :

I also find it’s interesting that they state that the ‘Greater-Eastern Legless Horny Beer-Drinking Toad’ is endangered by the Kangaroos consuming so much pasture, yet the same authorities seem to turn a blind eye to the fact that bulldozing half of the Molonglo/Murrumbidgee River corridor for ‘cheap’ housing is probably worse for whatever poor critters are out there.

Absolutely. Land release and biodiversity protection are competing priorities. That doesn’t change the fact that biodiversity values WITHIN the reserve system have to be protected, which falls on the Parks mob, who don’t have a great deal of say in the release of land.

crappicker said :

I do not believe the numbers quoted by ACT government ecologists in their proposal for this year’s slaughter in ACT nature reserves (

I hope you kept records and your methodology, and look forward to reading the research paper in the future. Without physically demonstrable data, it’s just competing ideologies shouting at each other. Science is not pantomime. (Oh Yes It Is!)

Mr Evil said :

I also find it’s interesting that they state that the ‘Greater-Eastern Legless Horny Beer-Drinking Toad’ is endangered…

I would add, lazy and cheap to the mix though.

There’s no need to be rude. What did the toads do to you?

(sorry, couldn’t resist).

Mr Evil said :

Is it just me, or does anyone else think the ACT’s scientific culling of Kangaroos is starting to sound as convincing and well researched as Japan’s ‘scientific’ whaling operations?

It’s not starting to sound like Japan’s scientific whaling, it’s been dodgy from the start.

The Science: Jeez, there’s a lot of roos in that paddock. One almost hit my car! I heard a guy at work hit one last week. There’s too many of them! Let’s have a Scientific Cull.

Mr Evil said :

I also find it’s interesting that they state that the ‘Greater-Eastern Legless Horny Beer-Drinking Toad’ is endangered by the Kangaroos consuming so much pasture, yet the same authorities seem to turn a blind eye to the fact that bulldozing half of the Molonglo/Murrumbidgee River corridor for ‘cheap’ housing is probably worse for whatever poor critters are out there.

Sssssh. You’re using logic again. We don’t like that. Fact is, if they build over 100 acres with housing, then it stands to reason they have to have more Scientific Culls as now there’s less grass for the kangaroos. and more residents whose cars must be protected from them.

Plenty of roos out my way, I think I surprised about 100 of them last night, not seeing any starving though. Feed is not plentiful (the rain will help with that, in about a week), it’s winter after a dry season, but they are quite good at ferreting out grass. And unlike our introduced grazing animals, and rabbits, they don’t graze down to the soil.

I do not believe the numbers quoted by ACT government ecologists in their proposal for this year’s slaughter in ACT nature reserves (CT 02/06/2013: huge roo cull call aims to kill 2000). I walk daily through the Wanniassa Hills Reserve (WHR) and adjacent government horse paddocks and last month carried out systematic counting of the kangaroo population over a five day period. I am not an ecologist, but as a well-trained field geologist/geophysicist I can count, can locate myself on the map, and can distinguish rocks from trees and kangaroos. In my opinion there are no more than a few hundred kangaroos resident in WHR, that is about one fifth of the 1133 quoted by the government ecologists and about half of the 400 proposed for culling. There are substantial kangaroo mobs in the adjacent government horse paddocks, but these mobs have shown reluctance to take up residence in the WHR after last year’s slaughter near the boundary fence. I see no reasonable ground to include these mobs in the WHR count, inadvertently doing so would not even come close to the 1133 number quoted by the government ecologists. WHR may have escaped yet another slaughter this year, but its inflated kangaroo count queries the justification for the wider culling program in ACT nature reserves. Kangaroo slaughter in the ACT was started in the Stanhope era. It is disappointing that Shane Rattenbury has not shown the spine to steer this cruel slaughter program around towards fertility control. As an incoming green minister with an impressive environmental action record I had expected otherwise.

Is it just me, or does anyone else think the ACT’s scientific culling of Kangaroos is starting to sound as convincing and well researched as Japan’s ‘scientific’ whaling operations?

I also find it’s interesting that they state that the ‘Greater-Eastern Legless Horny Beer-Drinking Toad’ is endangered by the Kangaroos consuming so much pasture, yet the same authorities seem to turn a blind eye to the fact that bulldozing half of the Molonglo/Murrumbidgee River corridor for ‘cheap’ housing is probably worse for whatever poor critters are out there.

I am surprised that they are still claiming that the cull is too small for financial gain i.e. justifying the lack of appropriate use/consumption of the culled animals. I’m no expert but 1,455 animals seems like allot to bury in the ground. I would suggest that this is not an economic restriction but a jurisdictional regulatory restriction that the legislative assemble is unable or unwilling to rectify.

gungsuperstar10:48 am 06 Jun 13

Revenge is a dish best served cold.

Except in this case – its best served roasted medium rare with a side of veges.

The fauna that the roos adversely impact is humans and their cars.

Need to shoot more then that to make a dent on the bastards

Retribution will be swift,off with their heads!

” hey ,, watta can I say .. youz don’t a fk-a with the mayor,,, kapeesh !

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