Dear Saeed & Co.

Please forgive me for posting this here in the African section but it would be good for it get as much exposure on AR as we can.... since this section is by far the busiest. If it is inappropriate then please move it...

Please take a look at this thread in the South Pacific section about an online petition that has been raised - against the proposal to legitimise heli-hunting in New Zealand public lands.

Many of us will agree that using a helo for access to difficult places to hunt is acceptable but draw the line at actually allowing shooting from the helicopter (as do all hunting orgs and clubs that I am aware) but the NZ govt, along with some helo operators, seem to think this is the right thing to do.

It is unethical, unsafe and unfair on the animals, other hunters and threatens to destroy the trophy hunting industry. There are so many different options for successful tahr hunting these days - that there is just no reason for this to happen.

This could also be an under-handed way for the NZ govt to succeed in reducing tahr numbers - with the apparent 'support' of hunters...

Please... if you have an interest in fair chase hunting and conservation of rare species like the tahr please take some time to sign the petition and leave a few comments - that your are a hunter and the reasons you oppose it.

Many thanks
Matt

South Pacific Thread

Direct link to - Helo-hunting Petition

Matt:
Thanks for the update. However......
I realize your an Aussie not a KiWi but you did bring up the subject.
I'm not looking for a fight. I would just like to have some answers on why I should support banning helihunting.
Has it been decided that helihunting is in fact illegal in NZ?
1. The animals hunted using helicopters are considered pests. Mostly no limits and no season.
2. The DOC uses 1080 poison to kill them in areas they decide that the animal is doing damage to the local browse.
3. Helicopters are used for WARO kills. The animals are recovered and sold.
4. No meat is required to be salvaged from the animals. Typically only the hind quarters and the back straps are all that is salvaged for consumption by the locals.
5. "Cull" hunts are encouraged in areas where DOC determines there is a need. Most of the animals are left where shot.

I know one solution to the problem. NZ could reclassify the "Pests" into "Game Animals". They would then get more support for banning helihunting of Game Animals.
Thanks Matt, preciate any response.

Yes Chris or others would be far better qualified than me to talk.... however..

I think the issue goes to the crux of the matter that the animals are regarded as pests at the moment and should rather be managed as a game animal. I think the helo-operators are just exploiting this situation so that they can change the legislation to legitimise their actions. They would love to run helo-hunts as hard and as fast as they can. On DOC land they dont have to pay trophy fees like on the private land and hunters will be duped into paying less to step into a Hughes 500 for a half-day hunt - for one of the great mountain game animals of the world.

Is Helo hunting illegal now... pretty grey area there but if you mean clients shooting from a helo over public land.... YES. I understand that there is some provision to have the shooter named but in the end ... who cares.... it is not an ehtical hunt or anything else... just a joke...

So the petition is not for banning something - it for stopping it becoming fully LEGALISED and legitimsed in NZ (for rec safari hunting).

Yes the tahr need to be managed and no doubt they will need to be culled in certain areas (by helo too) but this is not about that. It is about allowing safari hunters to participate (in the air) - at the expense of the tahr. Hunters are fully capable of being engaged to participate in this activity (on the ground) and more of the meat may be used that way too....

We have the exact same issues in Australia with our game animals.... and the lack of respect shown to them by the authorities.

Matt, a fine answer and I can't improve on it. We have the unusual situation over here where management means restricting the herd, rather than limiting the kill. The santioned culls don't target males, only females and juveniles.Its unsavory, but we recognised its need to save the herd. If we head down the road of allowing helihunting, the whole herd will be destroyed as a hunting resource. We are one of the few countrys that don't have laws that support hunting ethics, so instead we tend to place value on good and ethical hunters and practises as a culture.
Its important to state that the authourities want these animals gone, and this is a means of devalueing them, and achieving this.

@TJ,

here's just my two cents to your points:

ad 1.) The animals are considered 'pest' only by the Department of Conservation and the Forest and Bird Society. A good proportion (hard to put a number on it, but definitely >>20%) of the NZ population sees them as a very valuable resource.

ad 2.) DoC does not use 1080 to kill chamois and thar. 1080 is used in the fight against the possum, which causes large scale damage by browsing native trees, shrubs and eating the occasional native bird chick. Deer are a convenient bykill for DoC from their 1080 operations. However tahr and chamois mainly live above the bushline, hence they do not live in territory affected by 1080 drops. Therefore they are not strongly affected by poison drops but only by whatever nature throws at them (weather, avalanches) plus hunters.

ad 3.) WARO is intended for the recovery of animals, both dead and alive. The intention of WARO is to reduce the herd in order to protect native flora, and allows for the bodies to be recovered - hence the operation is profitable (in most cases) and DoC does not have to pay for costly herd management. WARO licences say nothing about putting an inexperienced shooter in a low flying helicopter for a high speed chase with bullets flying everywhere.

ad 4.) Quite true - it is pretty hard to carry out the whole meat of a deer (have you done it? I have!) for hours over steep terrain. Still, where is your point here? A foot hunter can shoot a low number of animals on a given day - but a heli-hunter can wipe out whole herds within the same amount of time. And he is not required to take home the meat either.

ad 5.) Cull hunts are not "encouraged" by DoC (well, technically they always encourage them) but they are paid by them. However we have finally managed to persuade them to work with local hunters for these culls, so now they start targeting females and leave trophy animals for the foot hunters. Therefore you can not compare organized culls with heli hunting.

quote:

Originally posted by timot:
I certainly do not agree with hunting the Thar from a helicopter but it is the same deal with the canned lion. If the sport hunter does not have a problem with shooting a lion in the Eastern Cape of South Africa where the last wild lion was seen 100 years ago then that is up to him.
The Thar are going to be culled from a helicopter and no money is made from the animals, so why not put a paying sport hunter in the chopper and make some $$ out of the animals that are going to be culled anyway.

I think this issue is rather different to the lion... as the lions are specifically raised for sport 'hunting' .... whether you like it or not that is the way that many hunters will take them... just as many hunter to NZ will take a tahr behind the high fence... so be it, it should not effect other hunters.

The govt has no business culling this valuable resource from the air.... the management (herd control, etc) should be placed in the capable hands of hunters (paying hunters and/or local rec hunters, it does not matter). While ever the tahr is disrespected by the govt this will not happen on private land.

Just my thoughts
MG

Timot, the key too this situation is the Bulls. They are in high demand, and have a value. In any given year there is less than 2000 true trophie's on public land. A few years back hunters had a win and got the authourity's to recognise that killing them from the air was a waste, so now only Tahr that look female are targeted in official culls.The culls are solely to keep animal numbers below intervention levels (10,000 on public land) and within their accepted region.We have no issue with the sanctioned culls, and in a better world, we would be charging a license for bulls, and culling the nanny's ourselves with this income.
Because of the nature of the terrain they occupy, just getting to Tahr country is an adventure, part of the reason we hunt them. Take that away, Take away any chance of ordinary hunters getting a trophy and we loose this herd. No ones going to fight for it if its the exclusive domain of a few pilots.
Up till recently helihunting has been considered illegal, and yet there has been still enough of it going on, that good bulls are becoming hard to find, even for these chopper shooters, this is why you see 10 and 11 inch bulls being called trophy's.What I don't understand from your post is you start by bemoaning the fact that hunter ethics has slipped worldwide, yet when we fight to stop an unethical practise, you say so be it.

Thing is Timot, it is more than just hunters who use our mountains. There are climbers,hikers ,fisherman,etc who are entitled to enjoy the ambience of our alpine areas without having their time there disturbed by helicopter gunships manned by sedentary tourists shooting at our Deer,Tahr and Chamois.
Our DoC [Dept of Conservation] do conduct arial culls to maintain the Tahr herd at around ten thousand animals.That is acceptable.The shooter in that case is a trained professional.We are I guess fortunate to have game animals on our public lands which are free to all to hunt.
I am opposed to granting concessions to a wealthy minority to collect a trophy by shooting from the air. Tahr hunting can be challenging and strenuous. If you can't cut the mustard then accept that,and don't try and cut corners via a chequebook. They are public animals on public lands.

quote:

Originally posted by TJ:
Matt:
Thanks for the update. However......
I realize your an Aussie not a KiWi but you did bring up the subject.
I'm not looking for a fight. I would just like to have some answers on why I should support banning helihunting.
Has it been decided that helihunting is in fact illegal in NZ?

Helihunting is not legal (until DoC prosecute someone it is not illegal either) there are no concessions for it a few operators are seeking a concession. None of the 3 conservation boards in the tahr management zones have approved or advanced their applications despite repeated attempts to get approval. Bluntly put the boards represent the opinions of NZers and make recomendations to DoC. NZers don't want heli-hunts thats their recomendation. One DoC conservancy is driving this against their own boards recomendations. Read my thoughts on this at the end

quote:

Originally posted by TJ:

1. The animals hunted using helicopters are considered pests. Mostly no limits and no season.

Is it wrong to fight for a change that will progress tahr and chamois status closer to game animal ? that is where we are trying to go, continuing to ignore their value and hunt tahr as pests is not helpful.
It is the helihunters who undervalue tahr these are the people we wish to stop

quote:

Originally posted by TJ:

2. The DOC uses 1080 poison to kill them in areas they decide that the animal is doing damage to the local browse.

No ! tahr are not targeted or poisoned in 1080 operations. tahr are protected under the tahr control plan which has as its sole objective healthy plant growth with a population of 10000 tahr in an area of 1.7 million hectares. It is a control plan not a management plan What this means is hunters can have 10000 tahr in NZ as long as they don't damage the plants too much.

quote:

Originally posted by TJ:

3. Helicopters are used for WARO kills. The animals are recovered and sold.

Only 300 tahr were taken last year for dogfood.
No chamois were taken under WARO
5000-10000 red deer were taken,

What is your point ?
On one hand you are point out we shoot to waste and on another you are point out we take animals for meat recovery by WARO ?

quote:

Originally posted by TJ:

4. No meat is required to be salvaged from the animals. Typically only the hind quarters and the back straps are all that is salvaged for consumption by the locals.

What is your point here over 3000 tahr were shot to waste by DoC because numbers exceded the population ceiling in the tahr control plan.
The plan also sets maximum population densities and culling intervention levels.
20% of the NZ herd are males the other 80% are females a huge imbalance. NZ hunters seek to correct this we can't if the current regime continues. 1300 bulls were taken off the canterbury conservancy last year by guides alone over 50% of these were heli-hunted and other 500 to 800 bulls were heli-hunted off the west coast. Another 300 bulls were captured live in the wild to go to game parks. I am not making these figures up I will send you the DoC info. We need to stop helihunts for the simple reason we have an 80% female population. Is it any surprise we have to shoot to waste to keep tahr numbers below the control plan ceiling of 10000

quote:

Originally posted by TJ:

5. "Cull" hunts are encouraged in areas where DOC determines there is a need. Most of the animals are left where shot.

Yes they are ... read the above

quote:

Originally posted by TJ:

I know one solution to the problem. NZ could reclassify the "Pests" into "Game Animals". They would then get more support for banning helihunting of Game Animals.

Wow .... brilliant ...... gee .... why didn't we all just think of that we will just wave our magic name wands and change the name !

We want change, stopping trophy hunters in helicopters cherry picking too many bulls and hunting them like a pest would be a start.

I have driven 780 kilometers today and spent 36 hours there and back just to speak to a conservation board addressing that issue, not one guide in sight its the heli-hunt guides that want tahr to stay as pests on public land thats how they want to hunt them.


It may just be that this conservator is getting all the dirty secrets of heli-hunts out into the open and seeking discussion and changes in the concession system that gives absolute clarity and a clear mandate to prosecute and arrest anyone heli-hunting after september this year.
Make no mistake if heli-hunts are successfully excluded under the proposed concession regime all the loop holes will be closed.

One or the other .... heli-hunts become legal or heli-hunts become totally illegal, no more bullshit .....

You gotta problem with that TJ ?

quote:

Originally posted by TJ:

Thanks Matt, preciate any response.

Yah got a Weathered one

The film that I watched on the culling of Tahr was sickening!!! They shot any Tahr that they could get, Big Males, Females and babies. I could see maybe culling Females but shooting those big males with shotguns from the choppers was disgusting and should be stopped!!!

Hawkeye47

I think this is the petition?

We the undersigned are totally opposed to guided heli-hunting being able to be conducted on a WARO (Wild Animal Recovery Operation) permit and are totally against this activity altogether.


1. Define heli-hunting. Is the definition in any Guvment regs?
2. You are opposed to GUIDED heli-hunting? How about Non Guided? If I come down and a friend with a helicopter wants to take me shooting, that would be non guided so legal?
3. Outside of a WARO, guided heli-hunting would be legal? It specifically states (on a WARO) permit.

Lets start with the wording and go from there.....
I'm not a lawyer or politician but here is how I would word it.

"We the under signed are opposed to the use of helicopters being used as a shooting platform for the killing of any animal."

That would of course include deer, elk, tahr, chamois, goats, possums, stoats or any other animal, because it says "any animal."

The words "any animal" could be changed to "what ever animal you decide."
I'm not looking for a fight guys, if I wanted one of those, I'd go wake the old woman up!
I'm just trying to explain why I won't sign the petition.
Here's the "Nut Cuttin".
All the animals being shot from a helicopter are considered "pests", by your guvment.
These "Pests" are culled and no meat is salvaged. There is no season or limits on shooting these "pests."
In Alaska, we shoot wolves from choppers when they become Pests. I don't have a problem with that.
Words mean something. The different meaning of "Pests" and "Game animal" is considerable.

If your petition was to change the classification of deer, elk, chamois and tahr from "Pest" to "Game Animal", I would sign it.

quote:

Originally posted by TJ:


If your petition was to change the classification of deer, elk, chamois and tahr from "Pest" to "Game Animal", I would sign it.

Just don't sign it then ... because you have no idea of what you are asking when you demand a change of definition from pest to game animal.

More chance of the Americans catching Osama than us getting that name change.

The petition has been modified to clearly define helihunts please check it.
We are asking for guided and unguided helihunts to be banned.