An activist has put forward a petition to stop Wagga MP Joe McGirr from repealing the Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act. Photo: Gail Eastaway.
CONTENT WARNING: the following story contains pictures of deceased animals that some people may find distressing.
A resident from The Rock has started an online petition to NSW Parliament against a bill by Wagga MP Joe McGirr that enables the culling of more wild horses in the Snowy Mountains. She has argued that environmental damage is being done by other animals.
Photographer Georgina Gorman’s ‘Stop the repeal of the Kosciuszko Wild Horse Heritage Act 2018‘ e-petition, launched on Thursday (10 July), will be presented by Animal Justice Party MP Emma Hurst. If it gains 20,000 signatures, the parliament will be obliged to debate it. The petition gained just over 500 signatures in its first 24 hours.
Dr McGirr’s bill seeks to overturn a bill by former deputy premier John Barilaro, which recognised the heritage value of the brumbies and sought to preserve their presence in the Snowy Mountains by retaining 3000 horses across designated areas within the Kosciuszko National Park.
“Horses cause major damage to the alpine landscape, trampling wetlands and destroying habitat so it makes no sense to continue with a law that effectively requires that damage to continue,” Dr McGirr said.
The view is challenged by Ms Gorman.
“So the animals that Dr Joe keeps saying that the horses do damage to, the corroborree frog, resides in [an] area of Kosciusko, which is higher than where the brumbies are,” she said.
“The Southern corroboree frog is only found in Mount Kosciuszko National Park in the Snowy Mountains at heights of 1300 metres to 1760 metres above sea level.
“Taronga Zoo has been doing a successful breeding program and releasing the frogs in the wild for many years.”
The Kosciuszko National Park is home to a number of endangered wildlife species and fauna, including the critically endangered corroborree frog, which has a high risk of extinction due to its very small population size, further made worse by climate change, diseases and damage to breeding sites by feral pigs and horses.
While the population of this frog species is declining mainly due to the amphibian disease chytridiomycosis, research from environmental group Reclaim Kosci found the trampling by feral horses significantly impacted the quality of breeding sites for these frogs in 2018.
Wild horses that are not native to the environment are considered pests because of the damage they cause to the environment, according to the NSW Government’s Environment and Heritage department.
“The brumbies don’t go anywhere near the farmland. The farmland is fenced off,” Ms Gorman said.
“There’s wild deer, wild pigs and rabbits that do access the farmland and they do damage.
“The pigs have destroyed the creeks and the water banks; they forage for their food, so they dig up the ground, which destroys the ground and the environment.”
Ms Gorman supplied Region with photos she said were taken in the aftermath of the aerial shooting authorised by the NSW Government in October 2023.
“These were taken when the gates to Long Plain were opened,” she said.
“Carcasses were left in waterways to pollute the water. These waterways flow into the Murumbidgee River.”
University of New England Wildlife Ecology and Conservation Biology Professor Karl Vernes told TuneFM he had seen the environmental impact brumbies could cause.
“[Brumbies] chew the bark of trees and ringbark trees. In certain places in the Guy Fawkes, you find entire stands of trees that have been killed from ringbarking,” he said.
“They create erosion, and can spread weeds throughout the park.
“There are definite impacts that horses have, and the bigger the population, the bigger the impact.
“Wildlife managers aren’t cold, heartless humans. They typically love the animals that they’re studying.
“I’ve flown these transects in the park and I look down at these horses and think they are beautiful animals.
“It’s just a pity they don’t belong here.”
Ms Gorman said she wanted to save the brumbies.
“The reason why I went ahead with it was because of all the media sharing what Dr Joe’s done on Facebook and all the comments were against Dr Joe and his petition,” she said.
Anyone residing within NSW can sign the petition here, which will close on 2 October.
