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Council backs moves to overturn NSW feral horse protection law

The Invasive Species Council is backing this week’s push in the NSW Parliament to overturn the Berejiklian Government’s decision entrenching destructive feral horses in Kosciuszko National Park.

The council is calling on people who live in NSW to contact their local MP and ask them to ‘Reclaim Kosci’ by overturning the Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act 2018 and to put in place effective and humane feral horse control methods.

“Overturning the Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act – which should be called the Kosciuszko Destruction Act – is essential for protecting our fragile alpine region,” said the council’s feral horse campaigner Richard Swain.

Yesterday, the NSW Greens gave notice that they will introduce a Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Repeal Bill to the NSW Parliament. It follows the release earlier this month of shocking images showing feral horses littering the Snowy River in Kosciuszko National Park. The horses were clearly malnourished and starving as a result of the drought before they died.

“Leaving feral horses to run wild in the park with no effective population control is environmental vandalism,” Mr Swain said.

“Unless the horse act is overturned, Kosciuszko will become increasingly battered, and will start to look more like a horse paddock than a national park. That’s bad for Kosciuszko, bad for tourism and bad for local businesses that rely on the park.

“Uncontrolled feral horses will push threatened species like the critically endangered corroboree frog, the endangered alpine she-oak skink and the vulnerable broad-toothed rat closer to extinction.”

The Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act 2018 overrides the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Act and does not allow any effective population control of feral horses in Kosciuszko National Park.

“The NSW Government is prioritising a feral animal over the globally significant values of Kosciuszko National Park and its many threatened and unique species and ecosystems,” Mr Swain said.

“We urge all parties to support the repeal bill – it is vital if we are to give Kosciuszko’s fragile ecosystems and waterways a chance to recover from the impacts of feral horses.”

The Labor Opposition has committed to repealing the Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act if elected in 2019. The party has launched a six-point plan to protect the park.

The Invasive Species Council is calling on the NSW Government to repeal the Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act 2018 and to put in place humane and effective feral horse control methods.

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Feral Deer Control: A Strategy for Tasmania

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Your support to protect critically endangered and vulnerable species from extinction is vital. Together, we can ensure governments prioritise action on invasive species and protect our wildlife and iconic places.

The Invasive Species Council was formed in 2002 to seek stronger laws, policies and programs to protect nature from harmful pests, weeds and diseases.

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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]