Top scientists demand NSW commit to brumby cull in Kosciuszko national park

Berejiklian government urged to acknowledge ‘the extensive, serious and potentially irreparable damage’ the horses are causing

Lisa Cox

Thu 8 Nov 2018 04.09 GMTLast modified on Thu 8 Nov 2018 04.18 GMT

Dozens of Australia’s top scientists are demanding the New South Wales government repeal legislation that abandoned the culling of feral horses in the Kosciuszko national park.

In Canberra on Thursday 145 scientists met to hear evidence of the damage feral horses are causing to the park, the worst of which includes the destruction of nesting habitat of critically endangered corroboree frogs.

An accord to be presented to the Berejiklian government calls on NSW to acknowledge “the extensive, serious, and potentially irreparable damage” the horses are causing and to cooperate with governments in Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory to remove them using aerial culling.

It says the government must “repeal in its entirety the NSW Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act 2018, and restore the protected status of Kosciuszko national park, its 2006 plan of management and implement the 2008 horse management plan”.

Jamie Pittock, an associate professor at the Australian National University Fenner school of environment and society, said the government had walked way from decades of cooperation between the science community and governments to protect the national park.

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Josh Frydenberg urged to step in to save national park from NSW brumby plan

Conservationists say federal environment minister has obligation to protect areas of national significance

Lisa Cox

Fri 8 Jun 2018 23.00 BSTLast modified on Sat 9 Jun 2018 01.04 BST

Conservationists have called on the federal environment minister, Josh Frydenberg, to intervene to protect the Kosciuszko national park from brumbies after a New South Wales bill was passed giving heritage protection to the feral horses.

The Australian Conservation Foundation says the federal government has an obligation under national environment law to protect areas of national significance, including the national heritage-listed Australian Alps national parks and reserves.

The Berejiklian Liberal government, with support from the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers party and the Christian Democrats, passed the Kosciuszko wild horse heritage bill through the state’s upper house this week.

The move has attracted widespread criticism from the conservation and science community, which is now pushing for the issue to be addressed under the federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act.

ACF policy analyst James Trezise said several nationally listed threatened species and ecological communities occurred within the national park.

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Victoria pledges to remove 1,200 brumbies to protect alps and calls on NSW to act

Environment minister says up to 2,500 wild horses are causing ‘significant damage’ to plant and animal species

Lisa Cox

Fri 1 Jun 2018 21.00 BSTLast modified on Sat 2 Jun 2018 01.01 BST

The Victorian government has signed off on a plan to remove more than 1,200 feral horses from the Alpine national park, saying the impact of the animals on sensitive ecosystems has reached critical levels.

Two weeks ago the New South Wales government announced a proposal to protect Kosciuszko national park brumbies, which conservation advocates have labelled a “disaster” for Australia’s environmental heritage.

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The Victorian environment minister, Lily D’Ambrosio, has endorsed a plan to remove up to 400 feral horses a year for three years from Victoria’s eastern alps, where as many as 2,500 of the animals are causing “significant damage” to threatened plant and animal species.

A smaller population of 80 to 100 horses in the Bogong high plains will be removed entirely.

The government’s preference is to trap and rehome the animals but where that is not possible, it says they will be humanely euthanised.

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Culling 5,000 brumbies: 41 scientists back controversial Kosciuszko proposal

Academics say plan to slash number of wild horses is needed to protect delicate Snowy Mountains environment

Australian Associated Press

Friday 19 August 201604.38 BST

A plan to cull more than 5,000 brumbies in the Snowy Mountains has received the support of leading scientists from around Australia.

Forty-one scientists from 16 universities have written to the New South Wales premier, Mike Baird, to support the proposed cull of 90% of the brumby population in Kosciuszko national park.

They are backing a controversial NSW government plan to reduce the number of brumbies from 6,000 to 600 over 20 years, arguing it is needed to protect the delicate Alpine environment.

One of the signatories, Prof Don Driscoll from Deakin University, said the academics behind the letter represented the greatest pool of knowledge about Alpine ecosystems in the country. Horses were not compatible with nature conservation in a national park, Driscoll said.

 “Horses are stock animals recently introduced and are not characteristic of this area, but threaten ecosystem processes, ecosystems and species that are characteristic,” he said on Friday.

He said the brumbies in Kosciuszko had degraded 48% of the national park and the current management strategy was not working. The population had increased from 4,200 in 2009 to 6,000 despite 450 being removed each year, he said.

Driscoll said the group believed the current rehoming system was not a humane solution because there was not enough demand for the brumbies. “Only 18% of 3,183 horses removed since 2002 were rehomed,” he said. “The remaining 82% of horses went to abattoirs after a long journey.

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Australia wants to kill 90 percent of these wild horses. Why?

MAY 2, 2016

by John Hopton

The lives of thousands of wild horses are to be ended within the next ten years by government in Australia, the Daily Mail reports.

Horses in Kosciuszko National Park, New South Wales (NSW), have been involved in 26 car crashes since 2003. However, more major concerns regarding the feral horses, known as brumbies, relate to their impact on habitat.

The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) detailed how the horses are a threat to other wildlife and even to humans as they damage riverbeds, streams, natural bogs, wetlands and soil structure when trampling the ground as they feed or look for water.

Species threatened include the broad-toothed rat, the alpine water skink and the alpine tree frog, while the fouling of waterways by brumbies poses a risk to domestic and industrial water supplies.

In addition, the horses can spread cryptosporidium - an infection of the bowel carried by a parasite - and diseases such as equine influenza, African horse sickness and tick fever, which can have a severe impact on farmers in the area.

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