NSW must allow aerial culling of brumbies: inquiry

Tracey Ferrier | October 13, 2023

Feral horses pose an immediate extinction risk to native species in the Australian Alps and NSW should allow them to be shot from the air, an inquiry has found.

Australia’s high country has long suffered the effects of feral horses and a federal parliamentary inquiry says there’s an urgent need to slash the 25,000 that run through the sensitive region.

It’s estimated NSW’s Kosciuszko National Park is home to 19,000 feral horses, but the state government doesn’t allow aerial culling, which does happen in Victoria as well as in the ACT, where they’ve been wiped out.

The inquiry said things must change in NSW, and the state government must add aerial shooting as a method of control.

It said NSW had provided protection for feral horses, resulting in an exponential population boom, while limiting the ability of the NSW Parks and Wildlife Service to manage the pest.

“It has been made clear that if feral horse populations are not urgently managed, there is a real risk of losing this unique landscape and the native species that call it home,” the committee found.

“Feral horses could be the final factor in the extinction of several Australian native plants and animals.”

The inquiry made 14 recommendations, including a greater leadership role for the federal government, and more federal funds for control efforts.

It also called for a national threat abatement plan, and an urgent assessment of all threatened species, such as the critically endangered Stocky Galaxias and Southern Corroboree Frog.

Federal environment laws should also list habitat degradation, competition and disease transmission by feral horses as key threatening processes.

The Invasive Species Council said the political mood had clearly shifted and was now in line with the science.

“Australians have become better-informed about the damage feral horses are doing to the high country,” advocacy manager Jack Gough said.

“No one likes to see animals killed.

“But the sad reality is that we have a choice to make between urgently reducing the numbers of feral horses or accepting the destruction of sensitive alpine ecosystems and habitats, and the decline and extinction of native animals.”

The federal government has set a target of no new extinctions.

During the course of the inquiry, the NSW government said it would begin public consultation on allowing aerial shooting to meet a commitment to cut the Kosciuszko population to 3000 by mid-2027.

Last year the park’s population was estimated at 19,000.

AAP is seeking comment from the NSW government.