THINK.CHANGE.DO

Compassionate Conservation

Is recreational hunting defensible? PART 2

Emeritus Professor Marc Bekoff & Dr Daniel Ramp

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• What is compassionate conservation and why do we need it (PART 1)

• Talk One

• Daniel Ramp

• “Why and how do we conserve nature”

• Talk Two

• Marc Bekoff

• “The case for compassionate conservation”

• A cost-benefit analysis of recreational hunting (PART 2)

• Talk Three

• Daniel Ramp

• “Shooting our mouths off about conservation”

• Talk Four

• Marc Bekoff

• “Would you do this to your dog?”

Outline of evenings presentations

Shooting our mouths off about conservation

THINK.CHANGE.DO

Dr Daniel Ramp

Senior Lecturer

School of the Environment

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• Established in 2009 to create discourse on kangaroo ecology and management in Australia

• Provide a focal point for academics and the community in which to share knowledge and ideas

• Publish reports and peer-reviewed articles

• Four key research reports:

• Four peer-reviewed articles with five more currently in progress

• Three Articles in The Conversation: • It’s raining kangaroos: the ups and downs of kangaroo management

• Food fight – Aboriginal elders take on the kangaroo industry

• Australia's commercial kangaroo industry: hopping to nowhere?

THINKK – the think tank for kangaroos

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• Focus on compassionate conservation practice at UTS

• Working across the faculties of Science, Law, Business, and the Institute for Sustainable Futures

• Working with government and non-government organisations

• Research, teaching, community outreach

THINK Wildlife

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• Symposium on Compassionate Conservation at the 26th International Congress for Conservation Biology in July 2013

Society for Conservation Biology

A framework for compassionate conservation

• Is there a clear conservation objective?

• Is it necessary to intervene?

• What intervention options are there?

• What is the minimum number of animals that will be affected to achieve the desired outcome?

• What impacts will the intervention cause?

• Is there anything that can be done to minimise harm or enhance welfare?

• Will minimising harm or enhancing welfare be likely to improve conservation outcomes and can these be measured?

• Will the intervention have wider negative or positive implications?

• Will the outcomes be lasting or will the intervention need to be repeated?

• Is the intervention sustainable?

• What are the implications of success?

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• Introduced species management has adopted three vital control principles

• Necessity

• Effectiveness

• Humaneness

• Governments take managing of introduced species very seriously and activities are usually scientifically-based, strategic, and employed in a manner to achieve measurable targets

• Eradication (and hence killing) is a major part of management practices

• “Conservation hunting” argument is that the public can assist with meeting targets

Let’s look at introduced species

Sharp T, Saunders G. 2007. Model code of practice for the humane control of wild dogs. NSW Department of Primary Industries.

Where is recreational hunting allowed in NSW?

• In 400 State forests and Crown land areas (2 million Ha of public land)

• Hunters must be a member of the Game Council NSW Approved Hunting Organisation (AHO), hold an R- Licence and Firearms license

• No licence is required to hunt on private land

• R-licence categories allows hunting with:

• Firearms

• Bows

• Dogs

• Blackpowder

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How much land do we protect in NSW?

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Current hunting areas in NSW

Not including private land

Trial hunting areas in National Parks

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79 National Parks and reserves, covering close to 3 million hectares or 40% of all NSW parks and reserves

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Potential hunting areas in National Parks

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No hunting areas in National Parks

Only 48 have been expressly excluded from hunting

Can hunting reduce impacts on biodiversity?

• 28 dedicated Conservation Hunting Groups in NSW (facilitated by the Game Council NSW)

“who contribute to the management of game and feral animal populations on private land and some public

lands in NSW”

• The Sporting Shooters Association claims in the Australian Shooters Journal (vol. 11 issue 1):*

1. There is “an abundance” of scientific evidence that recreational hunting is effective for feral animal control and highly beneficial for conservation

2. Recreational hunters offer a “free” or “low cost” service that governments should use to control feral animals on public lands

3. The motivations of hunters are aligned to conservation, and provide the most effective basis for conservation

15 * Invasive Species Council 2009 “Is hunting conservation?”

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• Game and Feral Animal Control Act 2002

• Animals that can be targeted

• Category 1

• Wild deer, California quail, pheasant, partridge, peafowl, turkey, some ducks

• Category 2

• Foxes, rabbits, feral goat, feral pig, cat and wild dog (other than a dingo)

Let’s look at pigs in NSW

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What do we know about where pigs are?

West, P. (2008). Assessing Invasive Animals in Australia 2008. National Land & Water Resources Audit and Invasive Animals CRC, Canberra.

Occurrence Abundance Distribution

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How good is our information?

West, P. (2008). Assessing Invasive Animals in Australia 2008. National Land & Water Resources Audit and Invasive Animals CRC, Canberra.

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Distribution and abundance in NSW

West, P. (2008). Assessing Invasive Animals in Australia 2008. National Land & Water Resources Audit and Invasive Animals CRC, Canberra.

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Why are pigs a problem?

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• Pigs can impact through*

• Predation of newborn lambs

• Reduction in crop yields

• Damage to fences and water sources

• Competition for feed

Impacts on agriculture

* PestSmart Toolkit for Feral Pigs

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• Pigs can impact through*

• Turnover of soil

• Fouling water sources

• Trampling vegetation

• Spreading weeds

• Predating upon fauna

• Has implications for 18 nationally listed threatened species

• However, impacts are incompletely researched and mostly anecdotal

Impacts on biodiversity

* Threat abatement plan for predation, habitat degradation, competition and disease transmission by feral pigs. DEH 2005.

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• Threat abatement plans (DEH 2005)

• Poisons

• Pigs are susceptible to toxins such as sodium monofluoroacetate (1080) and the human food preservative sodium nitrite

• Trapping and shooting

• Fencing and habitat manipulation

• Bio-control techniques

• Dogs and harvesting

What actions do governments take?

* Threat abatement plan for predation, habitat degradation, competition and disease transmission by feral pigs. DEH 2005.

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• Cowled et al. (2006) showed that an extensive, repeated aerial shooting program across a 4,000 km2 MU, produced no demographic or genetic changes

• Cowled et al. (2008) showed that MUs needed to be much larger to achieve natural resource and conservation protection

• Extending across entire sub-populations

• Establish buffers against immigration

How large an area do you have to target?

Conserv Genet (2008) 9:211–224

J Wildlife Manage (2006) 70:1690-1697

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• Five main objectives of the national TAP for pigs*

1. Prevent range expansion and reduction in areas important for biodiversity

2. Integrate management plans into NRM planning

3. Increase awareness

4. Quantify impacts on biodiversity

5. Improve effectiveness, efficiency and humaneness of control methods

• Clear that only systematic, collaborative and extensive programs of control have any effect on pig numbers

Current management strategies

* Threat abatement plan for predation, habitat degradation, competition and disease transmission by feral pigs. DEH 2005.

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• Problematically, reducing pig density is not a simple task

How do you reduce pig numbers?

* Invasive Species Council 2012 “Recreational hunting NSW claims v facts”

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• Detailed analysis by the Invasive Species Council*

Can hunting reduce pig numbers?

* Invasive Species Council 2012 “Recreational hunting NSW claims v facts”

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• Detailed analysis by the Invasive Species Council*

Is recreational hunting a free service?

* Invasive Species Council 2012 “Recreational hunting NSW claims v facts”

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• Likely that hunting has negative conservation outcomes

• One animal killed does not save prey individuals unless it coincides with a population reduction

• Natural mortality is very high but removal of large individuals results in competitive release, reducing local mortality rates

• Hunters can contribute to spread into new areas, through chasing or deliberate release

• No authority or regulatory body supports the premise that recreational hunting reduces introduced species numbers or benefits the environment

Do the few that are killed improve conservation efforts?

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Poor welfare outcomes

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• We currently do not meet world standards in protected area allocation

• Convention on Biological Diversity 2011-2020 – Target 11: at least 17%

• A way forwards with compassion:

• Adopt the precautionary principle to animal wellbeing

• Include ethics in decision making

• Move from exploitative-based sustainability to equity-based sustainability

• Encouraging wildlife research that addresses welfare

• Compassion is not an undesirable state

Bringing compassion to conservation practice

Would you do this to your dog?

THINK.CHANGE.DO

Marc Bekoff

Emeritus Professor

University of Colorado

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