Transcript

Editor's note (January 10): The introduction to this story has been changed as it initially reported incorrectly that recent law changes will allow amateurs to shoot feral deer. Both professionals and amateurs have been permitted to shoot feral deer.

BEN KNIGHT: A professional deer culling program is taking aim at thousands of feral deer running wild south of Sydney.

The deers have to go because they wreck bushland, farms and gardens.

But the shooting program is in the firing line - because of new laws which favour amateur hunters.

Critics say the aim is to protect deer numbers to provide sport for weekend warriors.

Adam Harvey reports.

ADAM HARVEY: On the fringe of one of New South Wales' biggest cities a growing problem has reared its head. Thousands of feral deer. They're voracious feeders and a pest for locals.

DR JERRY DAY, ILLAWARRA RESIDENT: Well you can see it looks like the trees have been pruned halfway up. You can see a couple of places where the bark has been stripped back. All the ground-based plants have been eaten down to the roots.

ADAM HARVEY: They're more than a nuisance for farmers. They threaten their livelihood.

MICK PORTER, GRAZIER: What they don't eat out they wreck the fences. You just can't keep a fence on them unless you put one of those up here that costs you $60 a metre.

ADAM HARVEY: Grazier Mick Porter replaced his wooden fence for a deer-proof version. It cost him $75,000. But in the end, the deer won. Mick Porter sold his last dairy cow six months ago. The fence now guards his horse's feed from the deer herd.

MICK PORTER: Oh, they weren't so bad until about 10 year ago. Then we got those fires in the national park and there just seemed to be more and more of them. They just took over. I've had a few good shooters shooting them but they just can't keep up.

ADAM HARVEY: For the past 18 months local authorities have tried a new approach.

MICHAEL KNEZ, FERAL AND GAME MANAGEMENT: Okay guys. Tonight we're operating on a number of the properties.

ADAM HARVEY: Instead of leading it up to landowners they've hired a team of professional shooters. They operate at night with low-light equipment.

MICHAEL KNEZ: Stop there. Stop there. Which way? (Gunshot). Missed it. Can you believe it?

ADAM HARVEY: So far, Michael Knez and his team have killed more than 500 deer. But he's worried new laws that came into effect today will destroy his livelihood.

MICHAEL KNEZ: It is very frustrating. Particularly when the land holder has every right to shoot a deer but if he hasn't got the ability to do at the can't engage a contractor to do the work for him.

OK Louis, we're ready to go when you are mate.

ADAM HARVEY: The laws were introduced by the New South Wales Government to appease the hunting lobby. It means professional shooters will now be governed by a pro-hunting group called the Game Council of NSW. And there will be new restrictions on what the Shooters can do.

MICHAEL KNEZ: We can't use our night vision, we can't use spotlights. We can't shoot off the back of a ute, off a moving vehicle. The only thing I could think of there's a lobby out there that wants to preserve deer as a hunting game animal.

ADAM HARVEY: The program's partly funded by local and state government. Its spokesman is Daniel Shaw.

DANIEL SHAW, CUMBERLAND LIVESTOCK HEALTH & PEST: We found early in the piece and tried to raise some concerns.

MICHAEL KNEZ: Right there.

DANIEL SHAW: At the stage that we got a response it was too late. It had already passed both houses of Parliament.

ADAM HARVEY: The professional deer shooting program has an unlikely backer. Greens MP David Shoebridge.

GUIDE: See the damage down through here? All the broken small stuff.

DAVID SHOEBRIDGE, NSW GREENS: This is all borders onto the national park.

GUIDE: This is all national park.

ADAM HARVEY: He's on board because of the damage feral deer are doing to native bushland. And he's highly sceptical about the new rules.

DAVID SHOEBRIDGE: Look at this where they've dug up the ...

There's an existing professionally-run program with high ethical and high humane standards and it's been derailed solely so that the amateur weekend hunters can have more deer to kill. I mean, this isn't at all about reducing feral deer. This is about managing the herd for the weekend hunters to go and have fun.

ADAM HARVEY: In a statement the Game Council says it supports the deer culling program and says amateur hunters play an important role in controlling deer. Residents who live near the bush sometimes have to deal with the aftermath of the sporting hunters.

JERRY DAY: The first thing that happened is we found a dead deer with an arrow in its body on our property in the middle of winter and couldn't find anybody locally to claim it. So again I was told by council I had to take care of it myself. So I did.

ADAM HARVEY: Michael Knez's team don't leave behind wounded animals and they clean up after themselves.

MICHAEL KNEZ: We just aim for head shots only. We don't do any chest shooting and so on. It is a head shot only. If we can't get the shot off, it is unsafe, we won't.

DAVID SHOEBRIDGE: The fact that they're not hunting for fun, they're engaged in a professional clinical action with high protections for the animals that they're hunting, they're the kind of people you want engaged in reducing feral pests, not the weekend warriors with none of those controls.

ADAM HARVEY: The deer carcasses don't end up at hazardous waste. They're given to zoos as feed for Lyons and Tigers.

MICHAEL KNEZ: After three. One, two, three.

ADAM HARVEY: Jerry Day doesn't want the program to end. Michael Knez has shot nine deer from his property.

JERRY DAY: It's been very effective especially over the past few months. There's definitely been a substantial impact on the amount of deer seen on the road at night.

MICK PORTER: We think we're making headway until one day you look out the back and there's 50 running past. They breed quicker than rabbits.

BEN KNIGHT: Adam Harvey there.