Wednesday, 3 May 2023

Duck hunting

Georgie PURCELL (Northern Victoria) (09:50): Last Wednesday I joined duck rescuers at Lake Connewarre for the opening day of the Labor government’s annual recreational duck-shooting season. Despite there being only a handful of shooters, rules were still broken: native waterbirds were shot and injured but not retrieved. After 10 am, when they were permitted to do so, volunteer rescuers entered the water to commence the almost impossible task of searching for wounded birds in the vast waters and thick reeds.

At wetlands across Victoria the reports of wounded birds came flooding in, with Wildlife Victoria reporting over 70 unretrieved birds across just five wetlands in the first five days, including eight threatened and protected species. Blue-winged shovelers and freckled ducks – threatened species – are legally shot and left to suffer at the hands of this dying so-called pastime. This season around 80,000 birds will be killed in Victoria, and with a wounding rate of 40 per cent, reported by the RSPCA, at least 32,000 birds will be shot and horrifically injured but not killed over the next five weeks. With shooters failing to retrieve birds, it is volunteer rescuers that save as many as possible from the prolonged suffering. May this year be the very last that birds suffer at the hands of this government.