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"Sharp Shooters" - A positive story on feral hunting of introduced species on the ABC TV Landline programme.

Controlling feral species for positive results reducing pests.

Also the fact shooting is a positive activity and that there are more shooters now than at the "Gun Back" of 1996.

see this link for the video:
http://www.abc.net.au/landline/content/2014/s4082654.htm

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PIP COURTNEY, PRESENTER: First up, a story about helping farmers tackle pests, which are one thing Australia has an abundance of - from feral cats, rabbits, goats and pigs, to wild dogs and plagues of kangaroos.

Managing these pests is time-consuming as farmers grapple with increased work demands and complex firearm laws.

But as Peter McCutcheon reports, there are many people out there happy to lend a hand. And a warning - there are some scenes in this report that viewers may find distressing.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: It's a hard day's slog at the Andersons' cropping feedlot and cattle breeding property in central Queensland.

PETER ANDERSON, "GLENLEA DOWNS" CLERMONT: Oh, well, there's 820 in the feedlot at the moment and then there's 500 breeders, plus the weaners we're weaning now. They're all that's left in the paddock.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Today there's a couple more mouths to feed - two armed men on patrol.

What they're doing and how they came to be here is a story about untapping the unrealised potential of Australia's shooting community.

TIM LAWRENCE, RECREATIONAL HUNTER: Peter and Julia are trying to raise cattle here. They've had a fairly large crop of calves and they lost 50 by the time they got in touch with me. Fifty calves out of anyone's herd is a big loss.

PETER MURRAY, UQ SCHOOL OF AGRICULTURAL SCIENCE: Shooting doesn't always have the best rap. But certainly my experience - and I'm not a recreational hunter, I've never owned a firearm, so I'm not one of them, if you want to put it in that context - they certainly have done a lot of hidden public good.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: If you thought guns went out of fashion after the 1996 Port Arthur massacre and buyback program, you'd be badly mistaken.

(Sounds of gun shots)

Shooting in 2014 has never been more popular. Membership of organisations like Sporting Shooters of Australia skyrocketing.

GEOFF JONES, SPORTING SHOOTERS ASSOCIATION: There's been a steady increase, Peter, of about 10 per cent per annum over seven or eight years now, which has been really, really pleasing from our perspective.

In Queensland, we are about nine times larger in membership than we were in pre-1996.

(Shooting range)

MAN: Fire one shot at each exposure. Detail action!

PETER MCCUTCHEON: And many of these shooters - up to 300,000, according to a recent university survey - are recreational hunters.

PETER MURRAY: That was one of the interesting responses we got, is that they're doing that sort of recreational hunting, taking out pest animals now, but they actually want to do more.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: And there's a lot more that needs to be done on properties like the Andersons' farm.

The Andersons are still recovering from a wild dog attack on their herd earlier this year. It was deeply disturbing.

PETER ANDERSON: Some of the calves, you know, I reckon they'd only been born a few hours when they were killed. They just didn't have a chance. Not with six dogs in a pack. Yes, that's when they do the damage.

JULIA ANDERSON, "GLENLEA DOWNS" CLERMONT: And it was just horrific. I could just see cows not mothered up to their calves and it was just such a distressing time. Peter eventually came up and picked me up in the ute and we went round and checked them all and made sure they were all mothered up on dark. But yes, it was just night after night. It was very distressing.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: In just weeks, they lost up to 40 calves.

JULIA ANDERSON: We felt terribly guilty, like we could've done more or something. But Peter's often very busy that time of day - because it's a mixed farming enterprise, we don't stop. He'd have to be on the spray rig or doing something else or mixing feed or something and I would be left, you know, with the children and, yes, hearing this noise pretty close to home.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Now, Peter Anderson knows how to handle a firearm. But spending hours tracking down elusive and dangerous animals was just too much.

PETER ANDERSON: I could've staked them out and spent, you know, days and weeks doing it myself. But, you know, it was dry and we were drought-feeding and I had the feedlot in full operation and I had more than enough to do.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Baiting didn't work, so the Andersons called for help. Through Sporting Shooters, they were introduced to Tim Lawrence.

(Julia greeting Tim Lawrence)

JULIA ANDERSON: How are you?

TIM LAWRENCE: Yes, good.

JULIA ANDERSON: Nice to see you.

TIM LAWRENCE: Yes.

PETER ANDERSON: We selected Tim, mainly because he was a bit more local than some of the other applicants. He's over at Glenden. It's only two hours away and he does shift work in the mines, so he's got four or five days off at a time. So he could come over here and give it a pretty fair effort.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Tim took out four of the six dogs earlier this year and today he's back to track down the remaining two.

TIM LAWRENCE: Where exactly were they?

JULIA ANDERSON: I found two sets of tracks coming out of the depot paddock - we call that the depot paddock - were in the black soil. I presume they crossed the road towards the cultivation, which is next to the depot, where you see the big silos, and cross that cultivation and go towards the dam at Colac.

PETER ANDERSON: Those other two are still getting around - we see their tracks - and Tim's determined to get them and he enjoys what he's doing, so it's like a hobby or an outlet for him and it's a big advantage to us.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Tim doesn't charge for this service. Sporting Shooters takes care of his insurance. Hunting for him is a welcome break, away from his day job as a mine engineer.

TIM LAWRENCE: It's a camping trip. It's an opportunity to come out, get out in the open, have a wander round, keep fit. I'm stuck behind a desk for a lot of my job. This keeps me out, keeps me active.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: He's part of a national program Sporting Shooters call Farmer Assist, which is being rolled out first in Queensland with the support of the rural lobby group AgForce.

(Talking to Michael Allpass) So what sort of farmers are taking up the offer?

MICHAEL ALLPASS, AGFORCE: We've had a lot of graziers so far, so sheep and cattle operations. I've had a number of graziers from Cunnamulla, Jundah, Longreach areas asking me about it and call the AgForce office to find out more about it. There's been a bit of spread from word of mouth there as well.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: The main reasons why farmers want a shooter on their property is to get rid of pigs and wild dogs.

Wild dogs in particular cost producers hundreds of millions of dollars a year and were recently declared a pest of national significance.

There's also an increasing problem with kangaroos and culling macropods requires special permits.

MICHAEL ALLPASS: At the moment we're seeing some significant drought, with about 80 per cent of the State drought-declared. And we're seeing kangaroos competing with the livestock cattle and sheep.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: But letting strangers with guns onto farms needs careful managing. Ultimately, it all comes down to trust.

(Talking to Michael Allpass)

We're talking about keen amateurs with guns going onto private property. There's a lot that could go wrong, isn't there?

MICHAEL ALLPASS: There's always a risk, I would assume, Peter, but the system and the program that Sporting Shooters have set up in Farmer Assist, there's a lot of checks and balances that they put in place. They put a lot of thought into it, into how they're going to operate it and manage it and also maintain the credibility and the reputation of the program itself.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Those checks include signing up to a code of conduct and passing an accuracy test. Shooters have to be able to hit an 8 centimetre target five times from 100 metres away.

As a British Army veteran and competitive target shooter, Tim Lawrence works within one-tenth of this range, about the size of a small coin.

TIM LAWRENCE: If you can't shoot you're not going to make it. You have to be a reasonable shot. It's important, because it might seem a bit washy, but if you're going to come out and start shooting animals, the least you can do is be humane about it. You don't want to start winging animals then sending them back into the bush to die slowly. It's not what we're about.

(Tracking a wild animal with Matt Godson)

These are the ones from this morning, down that way. I reckon he's going to be coming back this evening.

MATT GODSON, SPORTING SHOOTERS ASSOCIATION: It is all volunteer. And, you know, it's the great Australian way of helping out a mate, helping out a farmer and developing a relationship that both sides can benefit.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Joining Tim on this expedition is Matt Godson, a project officer with Sporting Shooters.

TIM LAWRENCE: You're trying to second-guess what the dog's actually going to do. What I've noticed with this one is you'll see his tracks going towards the farmhouse in the morning and then he'll come back either in the evening or in the morning. I haven't been able to figure that out yet. Then he just stays away for a day. Where we found those tracks on the path heading sort of in towards the farmhouse, hopefully either this evening or tomorrow morning, he's going to be heading back home, I guess. And yes, hopefully we'll nail him.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: The work is mainly done in the late evening and early morning. It's a job that requires patience and endurance.

TIM LAWRENCE: I don't mind looking for the dogs and not finding them. Doesn't bother me in the slightest. It's not a job for people that just want to wander round and put holes in things. You're not going to. Hunting is hunting. It's not shooting.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: From time to time, Tim looks through his scope for any hint of movement in the bushes. But the evening hours passed without incident.

(Sound of gunshot and dog yelp)

A wild dog appeared just after dawn, taken out with a single shot from 30 metres. It was a dingo/domestic hybrid. There are few, if any, pure-bred dingos in this part of the world.

(Talking to Tim) So how many hours work have you put into this one dog?

TIM LAWRENCE: This dog I've known about for a while. I've known about it since the first time I've visited. I've just never been able to catch sight of it. I would've spent three, four, five, six and this morning - seven hours, seven hours staking out that dog. So I'm very pleased this morning. It's not blood lust. It's an achievement. I don't know if you're going to show pictures, but those teeth, yes, they pull calves apart. It's not a pet dog.

(Customer walking into hunting shop)

CUSTOMER: G'day, mate, how are you?

SHOP ATTENDANT: Not too bad, mate. You?

PETER MCCUTCHEON: There are other ways recreational hunters could help with land management, according to a recent survey. Seventy-seven thousand shooters were asked if they'd be prepared to pay an environmental levy every time they bought hunting equipment. Remarkably, most of those surveyed said yes.

PETER MURRAY: And we got 60 per cent responding that they would be happy to pay a 5 per cent tax and another 30 per cent saying they'd be willing to pay a 10 per cent tax, for conservation.

GEOFF JONES, SPORTING SHOOTERS ASSOCIATION: There is scope for that, Peter. It's proven to be an incredibly successful program in the United States, where it's been operating now for almost 80 years. So I think there's some scope here in Australia. Mind you, there are some real obstacles in the minds of many of our members.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Yes, because it's very unusual for an organisation to be advocating its members pay a new tax.

GEOFF JONES: Well, as I say, we'd be very, very cautious in promoting that, primarily because I would believe that probably the average Australian is not necessarily convinced that their tax dollar is spent as wisely as it might be. It's not managed as wisely as it might be and they probably, without being too critical, don't necessarily trust governments of any colour not to keep their hands out of the till.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Nevertheless, the Sporting Shooters Association is attempting to promote its green credentials.

This property just west of Brisbane is owned by Sporting Shooters Australia and is a registered nature reserve, despite the fact that it includes a shooting range.

Sporting Shooters president Geoff Jones says the Queensland Government is now planning to plant over 100,000 trees here to increase the local koala population.

(Talking to Geoff) And you'd be the sort of landowner that that would be able to keep feral pests under control?

GEOFF JONES: Most definitely. That's part of the contract that we have with the government. We are obligated to keep the feral animals under control.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: Will this be seen as a type of rebranding, if you like, of Sporting Shooters? Be more attractive to parts of Australia that have been hostile towards firearms?

GEOFF JONES: I suppose it could be construed that way, but I think it's part of, if you like, an evolutionary process. The world is changing. And all sorts of sports and activities need to change along with it.

PETER MCCUTCHEON: It's a change the Andersons very much welcome. Linking up with a shooter they can trust is not only insurance for their farming business, it also brings peace of mind to a young family.

(Talking to Julia) Do you think Tim will keep coming back here?

JULIA ANDERSON: I'd like him to. It's up to him. And I really hope he does continue and, yeah, this is as much his home, too, as ours, I reckon.

TIM LAWRENCE: Coming back's not a problem. I got into this in order to help out the farmers. Peter and Julia are wonderful people. They're very keen and happy to see me when I turn up and that goes a long way towards it as well.

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John aka NitroX

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