Yarra Ranges Council votes to delay kangaroo commercial hunting ban decision

Commercial shooters are going rogue in Melbourne’s east, “trespassing” on private land to kill kangaroos and sparking outrage from locals.

Cowboy commercial shooters are entering private properties in Melbourne’s east to kill kangaroos, with residents demanding a local council ban the “unethical practice”.

It comes Yarra Ranges councillors drag their feet on a decision to ban commercial hunting in the municipality, voting at Wednesday’s meeting to wait on more reports before they make a decision in April.

Councillor Len Cox put forward the motion to remove the council area from the state government’s commercial killing zone.

Yarra Ranges Council will debate commercial kangaroo harvesting in April. Picture: Dean Martin

32 Victorian council areas including the Mornington Peninsula, all of metropolitan Melbourne and French Island have been excluded from the commercial harvesting zones.

Animal activist and Yarra Ranges resident Peter Pruess said shooters were “trespassing” on private properties, fearing the local kangaroo population could be decimated if action is not taken.

“The reality is (the councillors) have all the information they can possibility get,” he said.

“While they were debating kangaroos were being shot.

“Many landowners, who have not considered kangaroos to be a problem before, are now allowing the shooters onto their property.

“Shooters are even trespassing where they are unwelcome.

“So, our kangaroos will soon disappear from our landscape.”

Mr Pruess said the commercial hunters’ practices were “unethical”.

He said kangaroos were often wounded and left to suffer while joeys were being clubbed to death after their mothers were shot.

Mr Pruess labelled the practice of commercial hunters as “unethical”. Picture: Dean Martin

A Warburton landowner, who did not wish to be named, said hunters had been on his property after neighbours gave them the green light to shoot on theirs.

“When they came to my door I told them they could not shoot on my property but when your neighbours let them roam free I don't think (the hunters) care where they are shooting,” he said.

“You never hear the shots but you can tell they have been there.”

The Warburton local, who has lived in the area for twenty years, said he loved seeing the kangaroos around.

“You would often see them roaming about but now they are very scarce,” he said.

“You can tell they have been spooked.”

This bid for exclusion comes as Parks Victoria was accused of turning the state’s national parks into “killing fields” by slaughtering hundreds of thousands of kangaroos and joeys as part of its conservation management.

The allegations included hunters not to delivering “brain shots” to kangaroos, leaving them to die in pain and shooting pregnant and lactating females with pouch joeys or joeys at foot.