In the wake of the ACT kangaroo cull getting permission to go ahead, there's been soome major vandalistic protests against it. I'm not sure if this is the right approach to protest, or even of I support of oppose the cull. What do others think of the cull and the vandalism?
First attack:
Depot vandalism:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-06-17/vandals-target-tams-depot-to-protest-annual-roo-cull/5529574
TAMS expecs more vandalism:
As for the cull, it is a waste of money and time. I have observed the results over the years and it does not take long for the numbers to come back to where they were.
As for the Vandals, they think of no one but themeselves and should be made to do community service to help people who are victims of crime. The people who work for Tams in an enviromental position would be devistated that money they could have used to improve the enviroment is now gone thanks to them.
It reminds me of when the CSIRO were growing GM crops. My neigbour at the time was a scientist working on this crop and he explained to me what he had to do. Before going into the enclosed crop (glassroom) they had to de-robe and put on protective clothing, then do the opposite on the way out so there was no risk of them taking seeds out of the room. Not only was he devistated of years of hard work gone to waste but the vandals that broke in and used whipper snippers to destroy the crop took no such precautions and put at risk the spread of the crop. Idiots.
Shorty......Canon gear
Canberra
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rawshorty/
Let's assume that there is sufficient evidence to link the vandalism to people opposed to the kangaroo cull. I fail to see how community support against the cull will be gained by committing such acts. To the contrary, it's likely that more people will now be in support of the cull. And Shorty makes a good point about the diversion of resources away from conservation to damage repair.
That said, it seems to me that there is increasing anger in the community about the treatment of wildlife generally & the authorities, especially our law makers, would do well to pay heed to this. But a controlled, strategic use of this anger is likely to be far more helpful to kangaroos & other wildlife than wanton vandalism.
In relation to Animal Liberation's appeal against the cull as reported in the Canberra Times, I have problems with what I understand to be the philosophy of Animal Liberation, especially in relation to wildlife. The organisation, in my opinion, focusses far too much on individual animals & far too little on species conservation through ecological restoration. Such an approach may be great for battered battery hens but does little for wildlife species.
From what little I've read in the media it seems to me that once more the authorities are falling into the trap of blaming the victims, in this case the kangaroos. I'm confident in saying that the reason kangaroo numbers are over-grazing grasslands is a combination of habitat alteration (e.g., land clearance to provide more grasslands &/or the provision of more watering points provided by farmers) & high rainfall causing a build up of food supplies sufficient to, in turn, cause an explosion of kangaroo numbers.
If we're going to have natural conditions artificially altered so much that there is a plague of kangaroos then one approach is to restore as far as possible the original natural conditions so that kangaroo numbers are of less concern & other species affected by artificial habitat change can prosper. This would have a lot of potential benefits including better water quality, greater biodiversity, more natural species populations & improved soil quality.
It's a huge pity that the media reports contained little about the scientific basis for the cull. I'm interested to know how much understanding the vandals, assuming they were angry about the cull, have of the rationale for the cull. Knee jerk reactions to vandals & vandalism rather than broad education approaches are likely to only perpetuate such distasteful events.