According to the RSPCA:
"The Victorian duck shooting season is a 12-week massacre of our native waterbirds, many facing a slow, painful death."
"What’s worse is that our government is encouraging children as young as 12 to fire guns at wildlife without testing and with fee-free licencing. These new regulations are designed facilitate easier access to duck shooting for juniors and this will mean that if they fire at any animal there will be no legislation making them accountable - no consequences and no authorities policing them. This is all part of our governments strategy (put in their own words) to “cut the red tape” and “promote the growth of hunting”.
According to SAFE (a New Zealand animal rights organistion):
"Duck shooting is indiscriminate slaughter, and causes severe suffering to those birds not killed outright.
As many as 275,000 ducks, geese and swans in New Zealand, including non-game and protected birds, could be left crippled to die a slow and lingering death during the annual shooting season on New Zealand waterways. It is expected one million waterfowl will be shot and killed, most of them in one day, on the opening day.
International evidence shows that between 20% and 40% of ducks and geese that are struck by shotgun pellets are never retrieved, and die lingering deaths.
Birds feel pain, stress and fear as much as humans and other animals. Many ducks and other birds are killed for no reason except a gruesome and outdated sense of what is ‘fun'."
Advocates for duck shooting say:
""It's like grown-up Christmas you know, everyone gets really excited about it," said Wellingtonian Andrew Sturt, 25.
"You get to go out and build a little tree hut with your mates without being accused of being a kid.
"It's more about the experience and excitement than the actual duck shooting itself."
"It's partially about getting food, and it's partially about being out in nature."
Fish & Game say between 15 and 20 per cent of ducks are shot each year - about the proportion that would otherwise starve during the winter."
www.rspcavic.org/issues-take-action/duck-shooting/ www.safe.org.nz/Campaigns/Duck-shooting/ www.nzherald.co.nz/northern-advocate/news/article.cfm?c_id=1503450&objectid=11027357 dailyreckoning.com/right-to-hunt-vs-animal-rights/ What do you think about duck shooting?