The goal of any horse management plan for Kosciuszko National Park must be to eliminate and restore feral horse damage through significant reduction in numbers.
This report applies an economic lens to the impacts growing numbers of feral horses in Kosciuszko National Park are having on the NSW economy.
An analysis of the 2019-20 NSW bushfires on Kosciuszko National Park suggests that most areas home to high numbers of feral horses were unburnt.
Submitted: April 2020
Letter to NSW planning and environment ministers opposing the movement of water from Talbingo Reservoir to Tantangara Reservoir as part of the Snowy 2.0 proposal due to potential impacts from the spread of invasive species.
Submitted: August 2016
The goal of the draft wild horse management plan for Kosciuszko National Park to set a 20-year target to drastically reduce feral horse numbers is supported, but the prospect of the plan succeeding is limited because the plan prohibits the use of aerial shooting as a control method.
Observation of Pest Horse Impacts in the Australian Alps, by Graeme Worboys and Ian Pulsford, illustrates the extent of the damage to the alpine national parks of NSW and Victoria.
The goal of any horse management plan for Kosciuszko National Park must be to eliminate and restore feral horse damage through significant reduction in numbers.
This report applies an economic lens to the impacts growing numbers of feral horses in Kosciuszko National Park are having on the NSW economy.
An analysis of the 2019-20 NSW bushfires on Kosciuszko National Park suggests that most areas home to high numbers of feral horses were unburnt.
Submitted: April 2020
Letter to NSW planning and environment ministers opposing the movement of water from Talbingo Reservoir to Tantangara Reservoir as part of the Snowy 2.0 proposal due to potential impacts from the spread of invasive species.
Submitted: August 2016
The goal of the draft wild horse management plan for Kosciuszko National Park to set a 20-year target to drastically reduce feral horse numbers is supported, but the prospect of the plan succeeding is limited because the plan prohibits the use of aerial shooting as a control method.
Observation of Pest Horse Impacts in the Australian Alps, by Graeme Worboys and Ian Pulsford, illustrates the extent of the damage to the alpine national parks of NSW and Victoria.
The goal of any horse management plan for Kosciuszko National Park must be to eliminate and restore feral horse damage through significant reduction in numbers.
This report applies an economic lens to the impacts growing numbers of feral horses in Kosciuszko National Park are having on the NSW economy.
An analysis of the 2019-20 NSW bushfires on Kosciuszko National Park suggests that most areas home to high numbers of feral horses were unburnt.
Submitted: April 2020
Letter to NSW planning and environment ministers opposing the movement of water from Talbingo Reservoir to Tantangara Reservoir as part of the Snowy 2.0 proposal due to potential impacts from the spread of invasive species.
Submitted: August 2016
The goal of the draft wild horse management plan for Kosciuszko National Park to set a 20-year target to drastically reduce feral horse numbers is supported, but the prospect of the plan succeeding is limited because the plan prohibits the use of aerial shooting as a control method.
Observation of Pest Horse Impacts in the Australian Alps, by Graeme Worboys and Ian Pulsford, illustrates the extent of the damage to the alpine national parks of NSW and Victoria.
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The Invasive Species Council acknowledges the Traditional Custodians throughout Australia and their connections to land and sea. We pay our respect to their Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today. The Invasive Species Council supports voting ‘YES’ for a Voice to Parliament.
Dear Project Team,
[YOUR PERSONALISED MESSAGE WILL APPEAR HERE.]
I support the amendment to the Kosciuszko National Park Wild Horse Heritage Management Plan to allow our incredible National Parks staff to use aerial shooting as one method to rapidly reduce feral horse numbers. I want to see feral horse numbers urgently reduced in order to save the national park and our native wildlife that live there.
The current approach is not solving the problem. Feral horse numbers have rapidly increased in Kosciuszko National Park to around 18,000, a 30% jump in just the past 2 years. With the population so high, thousands of feral horses need to be removed annually to reduce numbers and stop our National Park becoming a horse paddock. Aerial shooting, undertaken humanely and safely by professionals using standard protocols, is the only way this can happen.
The government’s own management plan for feral horses states that ‘if undertaken in accordance with best practice, aerial shooting can have the lowest negative animal welfare impacts of all lethal control methods’.
This humane and effective practice is already used across Australia to manage hundreds of thousands of feral animals like horses, deer, pigs, and goats.
Trapping and rehoming of feral horses has been used in Kosciuszko National Park for well over a decade but has consistently failed to reduce the population, has delayed meaningful action and is expensive. There are too many feral horses in the Alps and not enough demand for rehoming for it to be relied upon for the reduction of the population.
Fertility control as a management tool is only effective for a small, geographically isolated, and accessible population of feral horses where the management outcome sought is to maintain the population at its current size. It is not a viable option to reduce the large and growing feral horse population in the vast and rugged terrain of Kosciuszko National Park.
Feral horses are trashing and trampling our sensitive alpine ecosystems and streams, causing the decline and extinction of native animals. The federal government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee has stated that feral horses ‘may be the crucial factor that causes final extinction’ for 12 alpine species.
I recognise the sad reality that urgent and humane measures are necessary to urgently remove the horses or they will destroy the Snowies and the native wildlife that call the mountains home. I support a healthy national park where native species like the Corroboree Frog and Mountain Pygmy Possum can thrive.
Dear Project Team,
[YOUR PERSONALISED MESSAGE WILL APPEAR HERE.]
I support the amendment to the Kosciuszko National Park Wild Horse Heritage Management Plan to allow our incredible National Parks staff to use aerial shooting as one method to rapidly reduce feral horse numbers. I want to see feral horse numbers urgently reduced in order to save the national park and our native wildlife that live there.
The current approach is not solving the problem. Feral horse numbers have rapidly increased in Kosciuszko National Park to around 18,000, a 30% jump in just the past 2 years. With the population so high, thousands of feral horses need to be removed annually to reduce numbers and stop our National Park becoming a horse paddock. Aerial shooting, undertaken humanely and safely by professionals using standard protocols, is the only way this can happen.
The government’s own management plan for feral horses states that ‘if undertaken in accordance with best practice, aerial shooting can have the lowest negative animal welfare impacts of all lethal control methods’.
This humane and effective practice is already used across Australia to manage hundreds of thousands of feral animals like horses, deer, pigs, and goats.
Trapping and rehoming of feral horses has been used in Kosciuszko National Park for well over a decade but has consistently failed to reduce the population, has delayed meaningful action and is expensive. There are too many feral horses in the Alps and not enough demand for rehoming for it to be relied upon for the reduction of the population.
Fertility control as a management tool is only effective for a small, geographically isolated, and accessible population of feral horses where the management outcome sought is to maintain the population at its current size. It is not a viable option to reduce the large and growing feral horse population in the vast and rugged terrain of Kosciuszko National Park.
Feral horses are trashing and trampling our sensitive alpine ecosystems and streams, causing the decline and extinction of native animals. The federal government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee has stated that feral horses ‘may be the crucial factor that causes final extinction’ for 12 alpine species.
I recognise the sad reality that urgent and humane measures are necessary to urgently remove the horses or they will destroy the Snowies and the native wildlife that call the mountains home. I support a healthy national park where native species like the Corroboree Frog and Mountain Pygmy Possum can thrive.
