‘Not enough’: Hunters call for $15 fox bounty

Fox hunters have responded to Animal Justice MP Andy Meddick’s call to scrap the fox bounty with a request for higher rewards.

Plague numbers: Ken Smith shot these 25 foxes on one Vite Vite farm in Victoria’s southwest last Thursday night.

Sporting shooters are calling on the government to ignore the Animal Justice Party’s calls to end Victoria’s $10 fox bounty and instead lift it to at least $15.

The bounty has remained at $10 a scalp since it was first introduced by former Labor Government Treasurer John Brumby in 2003, yet the Reserve Bank of Australia’s calculator shows it would need to be $15.13 today to offset the effects of inflation.

Sporting Shooters’ Association of Australia’s Victorian division has urged the Andrews Government to lift the bounty to at least a level that covered recreational shooters’ costs, which it argues have increased substantially – ranging from fuel to ammunition.

“Our members are going out to control foxes to benefit a lot of landholders and wildlife,” SSAA hunting development manager David Laird said.

“They’re not out to make a profit, but they should get enough to cover their out-of-pocket expenses.”

Animal Justice Party MP Andy Meddick has launched a campaign and petition calling for an end to the fox bounty, stating it encouraged “mass cruelty” against foxes, which “are intelligent, playful animals with amazing similarities to our companion dogs and cats”.

Simpson-based recreational shooter Ken Smith said foxes were nothing like pets, but were cruel predators that he had seen chew half the face off a calf and tear a living cow’s udder to shreds.

“One night I shot 17 foxes around a calving pad,” Mr Smith said. “I’ve even shot them up trees, where they’ll take possums.

“Another time I came across a vixen and her pups who were following weaner lambs and picking off stragglers.”

Mr Smith said if the bounty were to end, fox numbers would reach plague proportions.

“The bounty needs to go up because $10 is not really enough,” he said.

The Cobden dairy factory worker said increasing the bounty to $15 would encourage more young hunters to help control the pest.

While Mr Smith said there were good and bad nights, Covid-restrictions on shooting and a bumper season had pushed up fox numbers.

Last Thursday night he shot 25 foxes on just one Vite Vite farmer’s property.

As for cruelty, the 63-year-old said he had been spotlighting foxes since he was 18 years old and ensured each kill was quick and clean.

As it stands the government is once again preparing to accept applications for the bounty in March, under which more than 874,000 fox scalps and 3900 wild dog body parts have been collected in Victoria since the scheme was revived in 2011, after a hiatus.