2022-04-14
Firstly, thank you for visiting this page and seeking out more information. Whether you’re learning about it for the first time, or you’ve known about it for years, we understand this action in the name of conservation can be shocking or confusing.
The Greens have a plan to make Canberra a biodiversity refuge where species can thrive, even where their habitats interface with our city and suburbs. The Greens’ initiatives are focused on supporting our community to care for country and protecting and enhancing our ecosystems, through a network of wildlife corridors, employing more conservation workers, funding more First Nations-led conservation initiatives, and more.
The ACT is home to many endangered species that are impacted by urban development, climate change, bushfires and other causes of habitat loss. We can build a better normal for the animals, plants and people who live on this country. As we do, we are committed to ensuring any management of animals is led by evidence, moral consideration, and an ecological approach to our relationship with nature.
Reducing animal populations to protect biodiversity seems contradictory because it’s like having drastic surgery to save a life. It’s nobody’s go-to option. It’s the difficult decision we are forced to consider when too many big things have already gone wrong. In this case, Australia’s cities have grown up in the middle of habitats, our society has discarded traditional land management, and we’ve led our species into an extinction crisis.
To be clear - kangaroos are not the enemy. They suffer like all grassland species when their population grows, there’s no unoccupied or habitable space for them to move to, and no way for them to get there.
WHAT NON-LETHAL METHODS DOES THE GOVERNMENT USE TO MANAGE THE KANGAROO POPULATION?
We want to ensure our kangaroo management practices are the most humane in the country. This year, we are glad that the ACT will integrate fertility control treatments into its kangaroo management program, which will enable non-lethal management of kangaroos to commence in some of Canberra’s nature reserves.
With a $1.2 million commitment through to June 2025, this delivers on our 2020 Election commitment.
Through 20 years of ACT Government supported fertility control research with the CSIRO, GonaCon has proven to be an effective and long-lasting fertility control treatment for female kangaroos. Recent trials of GonaCon are showing that approximately 80% of female kangaroos remain infertile five years after treatment.
We have done small trials of GonaCon in the past, but this year, we will roll it out to broader management use. This is the first time GonaCon will be used at this scale in any macropod species in Australia.
We expect that the use of the GonaCon vaccine will reduce population growth rates and decrease the amount of conservation culling required in future. Fertility control methods are best suited to relatively small, discrete populations with minimal immigration, so culling will continue to be required as part of our ongoing kangaroo management.
HOW WILL GONACON BE ADMINISTERED?
This year, kangaroos will be darted with anaesthetics and injected with GonaCon by hand. At the same time, they will be fitted with ear tags for monitoring purposes. In future, GonaCon will also be administered remotely using a dart that simultaneously injects GonaCon and sprays a marking paint on the fur of the animal.
DO THE GREENS SUPPORT SHOOTING AS A ‘CONSERVATION METHOD OF LAST RESORT’?
We have looked carefully at this issue and have asked many questions about the policy, the science, and alternative approaches. Since 2004 we have reluctantly but consistently accepted the necessity of managing populations of Eastern Grey Kangaroos to protect threatened temperate grassland ecosystems.
However, acceptance doesn’t mean that we ‘set and forget’. The Greens continue to lead the ACT Government to investigate and implement non-lethal alternatives to reduce the population of kangaroos and protect the biodiversity of Canberra’s nature reserves.
COULDN’T SOME KANGAROOS JUST BE MOVED TO A DIFFERENT AREA?
Unfortunately, investigations into translocation have not shown a way to successfully move large populations of kangaroos, due to low survival rates following relocation, and the lack of appropriate areas for these kangaroos to move to.
Mobs are territorial. They don’t live in peace with other mobs and all of Canberra’s suitable habitat for these kangaroos is already occupied. Culls to reduce kangaroo populations happen all over Australia because habitats and biodiversity are threatened everywhere. Only by addressing the causes of the extinction crisis and shrinking habitats will we ultimately reduce the need to intervene to rebalance ecosystems.
WHAT ABOUT TRADITIONAL LAND MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUES?
Traditionally, kangaroos have been hunted by predators – people and dingoes – who utilised kangaroos in the food chain. Without these predators, kangaroo populations grow unchecked, impacting on their environment like never before.
The ACT Greens are committed to listening deeply to First Nations people, to integrate cultural practices into environmental management and restoration. Over the coming year we are committed to engaging the ACT Government in further discussions with Traditional Custodians, building on the consultations that have already occurred with the Dhawura Ngunnawal Committee.
WHO AUTHORISES THE SHOOTING OF KANGAROOS?
Independent statutory decisions are taken by the Conservator of Flora and Fauna each year, based on the expert advice of ACT Government researchers, ecologists and Parks and Conservation Service officers, as well as extensive monitoring of vegetation and kangaroo numbers.
In the ACT, the Conservator is established under the Nature Conservation Act 2014, to develop and oversee policies, programs and plans for the effective management of nature conservation in the ACT and to monitor the state of nature conservation in the ACT. This includes the management of kangaroos and their habitat.
Ministers in the ACT Government are provided information about kangaroo management and other nature conservation in the ACT but are not active decision-makers in this process.
WHY SHOOTING?
Shooting is recognised by the Commonwealth, state and territory governments and RSPCA Australia as the most humane method of kangaroo population management. This method of reducing animal populations is undertaken all over Australia, and in the ACT it is in strict accordance with the National Code of Practice for the Humane Shooting of Kangaroos and Wallabies for Non-Commercial Purposes.
In many instances, the ACT sets a higher standard than the Code, employing additional measures so that best-practice animal welfare standards are met and exceeded. These include proficiency testing for shooters to ensure a high level of accuracy, the use of silencers to reduce stress on nearby animals, and audits of the kangaroo management program. The timing of this intervention is also set to avoid the time of year when most females are caring for large but dependent young kangaroos.
Audits against the National Code of Practice are undertaken by trained veterinarians, with welfare and compliance audits undertaken in the ACT in 2013, 2015, and 2017. Full reports are publicly available online by searching ‘kangaroo audit’ on the ACT Environment website. The 2015 assessment, which was published in a peer reviewed journal, describes that of the 136 kangaroos which were shot during veterinary observations, two animals were missed entirely. The wounding rate was zero, with a 98% instantaneous death rate.
WHAT OTHER GRASSLAND SPECIES ARE AT RISK?
Aside from the challenges kangaroos face then their movement is limited and they have access to limited resources, the temperate grassland ecosystems themselves are at risk, as well as the reptiles, ground feeding birds, insects and small mammals that depend on these grasslands for survival. Of particular concern are some designated threatened species, including the Hooded Robin, Brown Treecreeper Grassland Earless Dragon, Striped Legless Lizard, Pink-tailed Worm Lizard, and Perunga Grasshopper, which rely on an intact grassy layer for survival.
As Greens in government we believe we have a moral and legal responsibility to balance the health and survival of all species, even where decisions are difficult and distressing.
For more information and answers to frequently asked questions, please visit: https://www.environment.act.gov.au/parks-conservation/plants-and-animals/urban-wildlife/kangaroos/2021-conservation-cull