RSPCA South Australia is deeply aggrieved that the South Australian government has ignored public opinion to allow yet another season of duck shooting – where native waterbirds will be sprayed with shotgun pellets, chased by dogs, wounded and left to die slowly.

The recreational activity – which is banned due to welfare concerns in NSW, Queensland and Western Australia – will begin in South Australia on Saturday 16 March and finish on Sunday 30 June. During those three and a half months, hunters will be permitted to shoot seven species and take a maximum of ten ducks per day.

RSPCA South Australia’s Animal Welfare Advocate Dr Rebekah Eyers said the community expects all animals killed for food to be killed promptly and humanely, with no wounding and no animals escaping wounded to die slowly. This is possible in an abattoir and with rifles used by skilled shooters, because rifles fire a single bullet, but is impossible when shooting flying birds with shotguns.

“What we have ahead now is yet another hunting season where ducks will fall from the sky after being hit by shotgun pellets, fearful and gasping for air, with those that are retrieved having their necks twirled in circles by shooters in their clumsy efforts to kill them, before dumping their wounded, twisted bodies on piles without checking for signs of death,” Dr Eyers said.

“This is what we saw happening repeatedly in footage taken on the opening day of the duck shooting season in South Australia last year, and we can expect to see it all again.

“And again wounded birds that aren’t retrieved will be left to die slowly by starvation, infection, predation or dehydration.”

In its final report released in December, the Select Committee that conducted the inquiry into duck hunting found that:

• Compliance with hunting and animal welfare laws was difficult to police due to the vast areas where native bird hunting takes place (in recommending a ban, the Victorian report into duck hunting released in August 2023 found that compliance monitoring was “a near impossible task”.)
• Hunting caused unacceptable risks to public safety due to hunters being unaware of the presence of tourists and protesters.
• Shotgun litter left in wetland habitats by hunters is unacceptably high.

“It’s perplexing that the report recognised shotguns inevitably wound birds, hunting is difficult to police, poses safety risks to non-hunters and litters wetlands – but still, the majority of committee members stood on the side of hunters in recommending the activity be allowed to continue,” Dr Eyers said.

RSPCA SA has no faith that the Select Committee’s recommendations will address the welfare issues with duck hunting and is calling on the State Government to reverse its decision, in order to meet community expectations for an end to this inhumane recreational activity. Recent polls conducted by credible polling organisations consistently show most South Australians want duck hunting banned, and feedback to the government’s review of the state’s Animal Welfare Act found community demand to ban duck hunting was amongst its strongest feedback.

“The wounding cannot be eliminated, no matter how many taxpayer dollars are used to improve compliance, because the simple fact is that shotguns do not kill cleanly,” Dr Eyers said.

---

 Background Information

The 2024 duck hunt season in SA is scheduled to run from Saturday 16 March to Sunday 30 June. It will allow the shooting of seven duck species:  grey teal, chestnut teal, Pacific black duck, Australian shelduck (mountain duck), maned (wood) duck, pink-eared duck and hardhead. (The pink-eared duck and hardhead duck were not permitted species in the 2023 season.)

Individual shooters are permitted to (kill) and ‘bag’ ten ducks each per day, which is two more than last year. These ‘bag’ quotas do not include the significant number of birds that shooters are likely to injure whilst attempting to kill and bag ten ducks.

Australian research estimates at least 1 in 4 birds hit will be injured, not killed outright. Many of these will escape and drown or die slowly from starvation, infection, predation or dehydration.  This figure is likely to be an underestimate of wounding because it does not include the ducks that fly on with embedded shotgun pellets, to die later.

This figure also does not include the number of shot, wounded ducks retrieved by hunters who suffer a prolonged, painful death, due to shooters’ failure to promptly retrieve and kill them by an approved humane method or to check for signs of death before abandoning the ducks they have shot.

For more information on this issue: https://www.rspcasa.org.au/the-issues/duck-hunting/

---