Feral animals

Every animal that humans have introduced to Australia, with the exception of the sheep, has become feral. This includes horses, cattle, goats, pigs, donkeys, camels, water buffaloes, dogs, cats, rabbits, foxes and mice.

These animals are accused of causing damage, including:

damage to wetlands and waterholes due to wallowing, trampling and rooting by buffaloes and pigs;
soil erosion caused by eating off the vegetation and trampling the soil with hard hooves.;
competing with sheep and cattle for feed;
competing with native animals for feed and habitat;
damage to fences, particularly by horses;
eating tree seedlings and preventing regeneration;
killing livestock and native animals.

Large populations of animals in an area can cause problems. For example, in times of drought the bodies of very thin wild horses can be seen around dried up waterholes. Rabbits can eat out all the available feed and die of starvation. These animals suffer terribly before they die, and this alone is good reason for keeping their population under control.

Some people can become quite hysterical on the subject of feral animals. They blame them for just about every environmental problem in Australia and want them eradicated by any available method. It is very important to bear in mind a few facts to counter this hysteria:

some government scientists have admitted that there are very few good studies of the actual impact of feral animals;
humans have cleared most of the native forest and introduced 126 million sheep and 27 million cattle, so it is hypocritical to blame feral animals for all the habitat destruction and degradation.

Nevertheless, millions of feral animals every year are killed by cruel methods. This approach is not effective because the surviving animals will continue to breed, and before long the population will be back to where it was. The killing then starts all over again.

The killing methods also cause enormous suffering, not only to the animals being targeted, but also to any other animal unfortunate enough to eat a poisoned bait or to step on a trap. Feral animals have feelings just like any other animal, including the pet cats and dogs people lavish so much attention on. It is completely wrong to disregard these feelings just because an animal has been labelled "pest" or "vermin". Feral animals should be protected from cruelty just like other animals.

For more detailed information see: Feral animals in Australia: introduction

Killing methods

Poisons

1080 is the most commonly used poison for rabbits, pigs, cats and foxes. It has different effects on different species, with symptoms including convulsions, vomiting, difficulty in breathing, trembling and agitation.

Gases such as chloropicrin (tear gas) and phosphine are used to kill rabbits in their warrens. Both cause suffering before the animals die.

Strychnine is used against mice, foxes and on dingo traps. It is a particularly cruel poison that causes convulsions and painful muscle spasms.

Zinc phosphide is used against mice, CSSP (phosphorus) and warfarin are used against pigs. All cause animals to become very ill before they die.

Poisons are not only cruel, they also kill many non-target animals who eat baits, or who eat other animals killed by poison.

For more detailed information see: Poisons

Traps

Cruel steel-jaw traps are set for dingoes/wild dogs, foxes and, to a lesser extent these days, rabbits. They don't kill, but cause excruciating pain as they break bones, tear ligaments, and cut into flesh. Animals also get mouth injuries as they bite at the trap in their desperate effort to get free. Some animals have been known to chew off their own foot.

The animals will be in pain for a long time, depending on how often the traps are checked. They can die of dehydration, infection or even starvation if the traps are not checked regularly. Some trappers put the poison strychnine on traps to avoid having to check them. Strychnine certainly kills animals, but it does so in a particularly cruel way (see previous section).

Traps are not selective - they snap shut on any animal unlucky enough to step on them. Trapped animals include birds, wombats, possums, wallabies, and even lizards. Many are so badly injured that they have to be destroyed.

For more detailed information see: Trapping

Diseases

It is hard to imagine a crueler disease than myxomatosis. This virus, spread by mosquitoes and fleas, was deliberately released in 1950 to kill rabbits. Their eyes become swollen, with pus around the eyes and nose, tumour-like lumps all over the body, and laboured breathing. With a very lethal strain of the virus, rabbits may die in 10 days. With a less lethal strain they may linger for 3 weeks. A rabbit with myxo is a very pitiful sight.

There is nothing that can now be done to remove the virus from the environment, but scientists are still encouraging its spread, for example, by introducing the Spanish flea so that the disease could be spread into the arid inland. It is completely unacceptable to spread such a terrible disease.

In 1995 a new disease, Rabbit Calicivirus Disease (RCD), "escaped" from quarantine on Wardang Island. In 1996 it was officially released. Infected rabbits take about 2 days to die. They develop a fever, breathe rapidly and eventually die of heart and respiratory failure caused by a breakdown in small blood vessels.

When myxomatosis was first released it killed 99% of rabbits who came in contact with it. RCD is said to have killed 95% of rabbits in some areas. But all diseases become less effective over time - this effect is already being seen in RCD. In the process of evolution over time, more and more animals become immune to the disease, and the virus becomes weaker. So, while diseases cause great suffering in the short-term, in the long-term they lose their effectiveness.

For more detailed information see: Introduced diseases

Mustering for slaughter and export

Animals such as horses, goats and buffaloes have been rounded up and transported to slaughterhouses, or exported live overseas. This process is extremely stressful for wild animals who are not used to humans, noisy vehicles, and being crowded together with many unfamiliar animals.

Often they are chased into yards with helicopters and/or motor bikes and 4WD vehicles. Horses may be trucked several thousand kilometres because the only slaughterhouse licensed to export horse meat for human consumption is at Peterborough in South Australia. Horses are transported there from all mainland states, including from the northern Gulf country and across the Nullarbor. They are without food and water for long periods. Some die during transport, but all of them are extremely stressed.

Some wild goats are exported on ships to the Middle East and Asia, but so far this trade has been limited because so many of them die. Some die while in the feedlot waiting to be loaded, and more die once on board ship. The main causes of death are refusal to eat and Salmonella infections.

It is very cruel to subject wild animals to the stress of rounding up and transport. These journeys would be very stressful even for domesticated animals, but are even more so for wild animals.

For more detailed information see: Mustering for slaughter and export

Other methods

Some animals are shot from the ground, but this method doesn't have much impact on the population. Helicopter shooting kills more animals, but not all animals are killed by the first shot. Some are wounded because of the difficulty of aiming at a moving target from a moving vehicle. Animals shot from helicopters include horses, goats, buffaloes, donkeys and pigs.

Rabbit warrens are destroyed by pulling a ripper with long blades through them. Not only does this destroy the rabbits' shelter, it also kills the rabbits inside. They die of crushing, suffocation, starvation or injuries from the blades. It is not a humane way to kill animals.

Dogs have been set on rabbits and pigs. In South Australia, it is illegal to cause one animals to kill or injure another animal. In New South Wales, pig dogging was made illegal in 1997. Previously dogs would chase and grab a pig until the hunter arrived to cut its throat. Not only is this method cruel, it is also ineffective as population control because it kills very few pigs.

For more detailed information see: Other methods (shooting, warren ripping, dogging)

Alternatives to killing

Rather than killing animals creating a problem, there are ways of stopping them causing damage. For example:

there are non-toxic sprays for grass areas such as bowling or golfing greens that animals will find very unpleasant. They will leave and feed elsewhere.
there are sprays to protect tree seedlings from rabbits and wallabies.
there is a scare device for orchards and vineyards. As animals approach they are detected by radar, which triggers recordings of distress calls. The animals think they are in great danger and take off.
parts of the dingo fence in South Australia have been electrified, and this has been very effective in reducing damage to the fence and in keeping dingoes out of sheep areas.

In the long-term, a population will only be controlled if animals stop breeding. This is particularly true of fast breeding animals like rabbits, cats and mice.

The most effective way to control unowned cat colonies is to desex them and return them to their territory. This stops breeding and nuisance behaviour, and it reduces the population because the desexed cats keep undesexed intruders out of their territory.
Australian scientists are working on ways to genetically engineer viruses and bacteria so that infected animals will become infertile. The method, called immuno-contraception, is designed to affect only one species. Work is well under way to stop the breeding of rabbits, foxes and mice.

Fertility control is the best option for long-term control of populations, without using cruel killing methods year after year.

For more detailed information see: Alternatives to killing