BAN DUCK SHOOTING ONCE AND FOR ALL Friday 10 June 2011
This long weekend marks the end of yet another tragic duck shooting season in Victoria. For the last 25 years, Victorian animal activists have been consistently rescuing dying, injured ducks while the State Government refuses to listen to the public’s overwhelming call for a ban on the “sport”.
In a Morgan poll of 637 Victorians (in 2007), 75 per cent were in favour of a ban on duck shooting. Despite such opposition to the killing, Premier Ted Baillieu continues to play politics as the murdering continues.
Victoria is sadly one of the only remaining states that continues to sanction this violence - Western Australia banned duck shooting in 1990, followed by New South Wales in 1995 and Queensland in 2005.
Tell the Premier that Victoria must follow the other states example and BAN DUCK SHOOTING ONCE AND FOR ALL.
DUCK RESCUE 2011 Tuesday 22 March 2011
On March 19 Victoria’s annual duck shooting season yet again opened with horrific injuries and suffering for countless birds.
HELP NEEDED:
To join the duck rescue teams during the rest of the 2011 duck shooting season, please contact the Coalition Against Duck Shooting via their website,...
This is the 25th year that animal activists have been busy on the wetlands doing all they can to rescue the injured and distract the shooters from their deadly ‘recreation’. ALV and UPROAR organised rescue teams to help cover the Kerang area, a highly popular shooting spot while the Coalition Against Duck Shooting (CADS) organised the main rescue with 150 activists at Lake Buloke where they were pitted against 2,000 shooters. One of the brave rescue team members, Julie Symons was shot in the face by a 14 year old shooter who was illegally shooting birds on the water. She suffered facial injuries, lost teeth and pellets embedded in her skin.
10 ALV and Uproar rescuers gathered at Macdonalds Swamp and were pitted against several hundred shooters. The guns started blazing shortly after 7am and it was young birds who dropped out of the sky. The majority of dead and injured birds collected by the rescue team were young juveniles, some only a couple months old.
The heavy rains and flooding in the Kerang area made for a longer breeding season and these young birds were literally caught in the hail of pellets. It is unforgivable that the Liberal Government not only allowed a duck season this year but they extended the shooting time to three months. Not only did these young birds have no chance, but many who did survive are now orphans and unable to fend for themselves and will die a slow death from starvation and/or predation unprotected by their mothers.
The Police and DSE kept a close guard on the ALV/UPROAR basecamp and at the end of the morning confiscated all the dead birds we had collected. Three badly injured birds were brought in by our kayak teams and two of these died shortly after. One young bird was found dazed sitting on a log amidst all the mayhem and loud shooting. She was brought in and put in a warm dry hospital ‘pen’ and then taken to a vet. Sadly, though she appeared alert and sitting fully conscious an examination showed she suffered extensive injuries.
Dr. Jason Wright found that this wounded bird had a massive bloody hole under one wing and her leg on that same side had been shattered by pellets and some of the pellets remained embedded in her skin. He said there was no alternative but to euthanise her. She was only the size of a small pigeon and the vet put her age at 3 months.
HOW YOU CAN HELP
Please Email Premier Ted Baillieu and demand an end to duck hunting once and for all.
This long weekend marks the end of yet another tragic duck shooting season in Victoria. For the last 25 years, Victorian animal activists have been consistently rescuing dying, injured ducks while the State Government refuses to listen to the public’s overwhelming call for a ban on the “sport”. 
