Decline and fall: Ducks in New South Wales
Life in the air
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“The NSW Native Game Bird Management Program allows licensed, responsible volunteer hunters to help landholders manage the impacts of native game birds over their agricultural lands”.
The general public believes that duck hunting in New South Wales was banned many years ago. They would of course be wrong. Dressed up nicely with all the usual spin and nonsense, these are the ten duck species being hunted in New South Wales on private land:
- Mountain Duck Tadorna tadornoides
- Australian Wood Duck Chenonetta jubata
- Pacific Black Duck Anas superciliosa
- Blue-winged Shoveler Anas rhynchotis
- Chestnut Teal Anas castanea
- Plumed Whistling Duck Dendrocygna eytoni
- Grey Teal Anas gracilis
- Hardhead Duck Aythya australis
- Pink-eared Duck Malacorhynchus membranaceus
- Water Whistling Duck Dendrocygna arcuata
The most recent survey of ducks in New South Wales shows that duck numbers have crashed. Only the Chestnut Teal and the Mountain Duck showed a modest increase from an already very modest population number. In total, for the 8 duck species included in the survey, the population fell to 43 per cent of the previous year’s population estimate. Pacific Black Duck populations plummeted as did the population of the Pink-eared Duck. Not one Blue-winged Shoveler was recorded.
“These requirements set a benchmark for individuals hunting native species in NSW and ensure that landholders are still able to access the free assistance of hunters to protect their crops”. New South Wales Government.
In the period 2023-2024 (12 months) the New South Wales Government reports that 29,266 ducks were shot on private land as reported by shooters, doubling when compared to the number of ducks shot in 2022-2023 and more than tripling from the year before that.
The number of licensed shooters (NGBM program) has also increased from 60 in 2022-2023 to 106 in 2023-2024.
The increase in the number of ducks killed by ‘recreational hunters’ dressed up as ‘volunteers’ in New South Wales gets even more concerning when one considers the catastrophic treatment of waterbirds in the neighbouring state of Victoria where around 300,000 to 400,000 birds are killed each year. Added to this is that duck hunting continues in South Australia and Tasmania.
The 2024 Eastern Australian Aerial Waterbird Survey, which encompasses a very significant area of Eastern Australia (slightly under 3 million square kilometers), found that:
“The abundance of breeding birds fell to well below the long-term average and was one of the lowest on record… the survey spotted 287,231 birds this year – half the 579,641 birds recorded in 2023”. The Guardian
All up, if we include the Northern Territory, about 800,000 ducks are shot in Australia in a typical year. We do not believe this can continue given the significant changes in the Australian climate and we can be certain that waterbird populations cannot sustain the slaughter.
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