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Australia’s national fox strategy gets first overhaul in 18 years

The Invasive Species Council has welcomed the release of a draft new national strategy to tackle feral foxes, saying it is a long-overdue opportunity to strengthen Australia’s response to one of its most destructive introduced predators.

The federal government has released the draft Threat Abatement Plan for predation by European red foxes for public consultation, which would replace the existing plan dating back to 2008.

Invasive Species Council Rewilding Manager Rob Brewster said the draft strategy was an important opportunity to ensure Australia’s approach to fox control reflected nearly two decades of advances in conservation science and invasive species management.

‘Australia’s current national fox strategy was written 18 years ago. Since then, our understanding of the devastating impact foxes are having on Australian wildlife has grown enormously.

‘Foxes have helped drive native animals to extinction and continue to prey on threatened mammals, birds and reptiles across huge areas of the country.

‘For animals like bandicoots, bettongs and many ground-dwelling birds, controlling foxes can be the difference between populations recovering or disappearing altogether.

‘It is good to finally see a new national strategy on the table, but the final plan needs to be ambitious and backed by the funding needed to deliver real action on the ground.

‘A strategy sitting on a shelf won’t protect wildlife. Governments need to invest in coordinated, sustained fox control across the landscapes where our most vulnerable native animals still survive.

‘Australia has some of the best knowledge and tools in the world for controlling introduced predators. We need to use them at the scale required to protect wildlife and restore native animals to places where foxes have pushed them out.

‘Across Australia, conservation programs have shown that when foxes and other introduced predators are removed or effectively controlled, threatened native animals can recover.

‘Investment in novel, emerging control mechanisms like gene drive also requires a dedicated funding stream.

‘The final strategy should set a clear ambition not simply to manage the damage caused by foxes, but to dramatically reduce their impact and give native wildlife the opportunity to recover.’

The draft Threat Abatement Plan for predation by European red foxes is currently open for public consultation.

Media inquiries: (02) 8006 5004 

Photo credit: John Cull

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    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.

    Kind regards,
    [Your name]
    [Your email address]
    [Your postcode]


    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.

    Kind regards,
    [Your name]
    [Your email address]
    [Your postcode]