Duck hunters face a two-day season: appeals for an extension

South Australian hunters can harvest ducks until June 27, but in Victoria the minister responsible has refused to extend the season despite the Covid-19 lockdown.

Duck hunters want the season extended to offset the Covid-19 lockdown. Picture: Yuri Kouzmin

The 2021 duck season has turned into a disaster for most Victorian hunters, who face their already limited 20-day season being curtailed to just two days.

Agriculture Minister Mary-Anne Thomas had already cut the season back to run from Wednesday, May 26 to Monday, June 14.

But Covid-19 restrictions mean that just two days after the season opened all hunters were locked out of regional wetlands.

Regional hunters were allowed back into hunting reserves last Friday, but doubts remain as to whether restrictions on Melbourne hunters will be eased in time for the upcoming Queen’s Birthday weekend.

Field and Game Australia’s appeal to the Andrews Government to extend the season has fallen on deaf ears, with Agriculture Minister Thomas’ office stating the Game Management Authority: “has already made it clear that this year’s duck season should not be extended beyond June 14 and this advice to the Government has not changed.”

The GMA has stated extending the season beyond would disrupt duck breeding.

Yet the South Australian Government has allowed it’s duck season to run until Sunday June 27.

FGA executive officer Dean O’Hara said South Australian hunters will be able to continue shooting, while the Victorian season ends.

He said the GMA seemed to pick and choose which science it would use to justify its decisions.

GMA commissioned research by the Arthur Rylah Institute, which was not released until April, found the current 20-day season could have been extended to 75 days, based on a daily bag limit of five birds.

But rather than extending the season the GMA amended its calendar to state duck breeding now began in June, rather than August, as it had declared in the past.

Victorian Opposition Agriculture spokesman Peter Walsh said the Labor Government was using every tool at its disposal to regulate duck hunting out of existence, with a grossly modified 2021 season that deliberately ignored current data showing waterbirds populations are at sustainable levels this year.

“The fate of this year’s season was sealed long before Labor’s fourth snap lockdown,” Mr Walsh said “A 21-day season is the season to call when you’re secretly working to stop duck hunting for good.”