When NSW Environment Minister Penny Sharpe announced earlier this week that aerial shooting was back on the table as a possible brumby control option, passions rose to the surface, as they always do on this issue.
They were celebrated in the poetry of Banjo Paterson and inBecause of their celebration in literature, and because a wild horse thundering across the snow grass tussocks is a hell of a sight, many Australians see brumbies as the heart and soul of the mountains.
The presence of huge herds of 300kg horses with hard hooves is devastating to fragile alpine plants which evolved for thousands of years alongside only small, soft-footed animals like wallabies. They are grazing fields of snow grass to bare earth, exposing native ground-dwelling mammals that rely on grass for cover from predators.The first shows the state of a creek in brumby country in northern Kosciuszko National Park.Ecologists liken the damage to coral bleaching on the Great Barrier Reef.A stream untouched by brumbies in northern Kosciuszko National Park.Kosciuszko National Park head ranger Dave Darlington first became concerned at rising brumby numbers back in the late 1990s.
Sadly, rehoming brumbies on a mass scale is not feasible, as there are simply not tens of thousands of people out there who are capable of taking a horse. That's the plan put in place to protect the brumbies by former NSW deputy premier John Barilaro - the first piece of legislation in Australian history prioritising non-native animals in a national park.
The snow grass plains of northern Kosciuszko are less tricky terrain than the gorge country of Guy Fawkes, which is why Kosciuszko National Park rangers believe the likelihood of a similar mishap is extremely remote.
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