ATTITUDES AND CHARACTERISTICS OF AUSTRALIAN RECREATIONAL HUNTERS

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1 ATTITUDES AND CHARACTERISTICS OF AUSTRALIAN RECREATIONAL HUNTERS Greg Baxter 1, Neal Finch 2, Peter Murray 2, Julia Hoy 2 1. School of Geography, Planning & Environmental Management, The University of Queensland, St Lucia gbaxter@uqg.uq.edu.au 2. Wildlife Science Unit, The University of Queensland, Gatton Campus 4343 ABSTRACT Globally recreational hunters are a large and active group whose behaviour has important implications for wildlife management in general and pest management in particular. The implications of the behaviour of hunters for wild populations of vertebrates are obvious. However, it also has important, though less obvious implications for policy makers, legislators and merchants. In other parts of the world the attitudes and habits of recreational hunters are well known and they have a powerful voice in setting policy. In Australia, despite there being perhaps 300,000 recreational hunters, there has never been a national survey to determine basic information such as where, what, how, and how often do hunters hunt, and how much time and money they spend doing it. In September 2011 we launched an on-line survey which asked hunters 53 questions about themselves and their hunting practices. At 13 th April 2012 there had been just over 6700 completed responses, of these 97.8% were from males and 2.2% from females. Almost 80% of respondents were 31 years or older, with 4% being younger than 20, and two thirds had been hunting for 20 years or more. Slightly more than half of the hunters travelled interstate to hunt, at least occasionally. The most commonly hunted animals were rabbits, foxes, pigs, wild cats, goats, and hares. The most commonly hunted native animals were ducks and other waterbirds. On average 66% of hunters spent between $500 and $5000 per year directly and an average of 71% spent an additional $700 to $7000 indirectly on hunting. Almost 90% of hunters got information from magazines and less than 6% obtained information from sources such as government publications. Thus there are a large number of hunters who pursue pest animals, are willing to spend large sums of money on hunting, and who do not turn to official sources for information. The implications of these findings for pest managers are discussed. Key words: human dimensions of wildlife, surveys

2 INTRODUCTION In North America, parts of Europe, South America and Africa, recreational hunters are represented by large and relatively cohesive groups who have a significant practical and political influence on wildlife management practice and policy. This is partly due to the overt and well-understood nature of these groups. Determining how many recreation hunters there are in Australia is difficult. Bauer & Giles (2000) report that approximately 900,000 Australians (5% of the population) participate in some type of hunting but this is likely to be an overestimate. Recreational hunting rates in Australia vary from state to state with license sales increasing in those states where they are sold. In 2012 Victoria sold > (Victorian Hunting Guide 2012), NSW > (NSW Wales Game Council 2012), and in 2011 in Tasmania > (DPIPWE 2011). However, most recreational hunting in Australia isn't licensed or regulated. Active recreational hunters in Australia are therefore likely to be greater than and less than with a median of around likely to be close to the real number. The degree of influence with, or attention from, policy makers and wildlife management practitioners varies considerably across the country. While there are no doubt cultural and political reasons for this, we also suspect that this is partly because the characteristics, motivations and needs of the hunting community in Australia are not widely known or understood. We addressed this deficiency by conducting an on-line survey that asked 53 questions about recreational hunters, what they hunted, where and when they hunted and their attitudes to important aspects of their sport such as licence fees. That survey is still on line but here we report the major findings to 13 th April METHODS We selected the survey questions after consultations with the Sporting Shooters Association of Australia, Australia Deer Association, Field and Game Australia and NSW Game Council. We limited the survey to 53 questions in order to limit the time it would take to complete the survey. Once the final questions were selected we trialled the survey in paper-based format on 100 subjects to ensure that the questions were unambiguous and easily understood. Some modifications were made to the wording of questions as a result of the pilot study. The final survey was made available on the world-wide-web using Survey Monkey as the delivery platform. At the same time the survey was launched we wrote editorial pieces for the major shooting magazines which described the survey and solicited

3 participation. The major shooters organisations also linked the survey to their own web sites. RESULTS At 13 th April 2012, 6727 people had attempted the survey, though not all respondents attempted all questions. Almost all of the respondents were male (97.8%) and 85.6% of all respondents were aged between 18 and 60. The biggest single age cohort was the year olds (23.6%) followed by the year old cohort (22.2%). Almost fourteen precent (13.9%) were aged over 60. About two thirds of respondents (65.5%) have been hunting for 20 years or more. The respondents to this survey were active hunters with 92.2% saying that they had hunted in the past 12 months. They were also likely to belong to a hunting club or organisation with only 17.1% saying that they didn t belong to any hunting club. A rifle was the most common hunting weapon (91.9% of all respondents; Figure 1), followed by shotguns, bows and dogs alone. Figure 1. Types of hunting. Rifle, 91.9% Shotgun, 57.0% Bow, 16.2% Black Powder, 3.4% Dogs only, 8.9% Other, 3.4% Almost a third of hunters (30.1%) said that they hunt with a dog, where 44.8% used them when hunting waterbirds (Figure 2).

4 Figure 2. Styles of dog hunting Water birds, 44.8% Quail or pheasant, 36.1% Pig, 36.9% Scent-trailing hounds, 26.8% Other, 28.9% Answer Options In an average year hunters spend large amounts of money on their hobby. On average 66% of hunters spent between $500 and $5000 per year directly (Table 1) and an average of 71% spent an additional $700 to $7000 indirectly on hunting (Table 2). Table 1. Direct expenditure on hunting in an average year $0-100 $ $501-1,000 $1,001-5,000 $5,001-10,000 More than $10,000 Response Count Firearms or bows Licences Guides Ammunition Other Table 2. Indirect expenditure on hunting in an average year. Answer Options $0-100 $ $501-1,000 $1,001-5,000 $5,001-10,000 More than $10,000 Response Count Fuel Accommodation Airfares

5 Non hunting pest control (eg; baiting, trapping etc) Weed control Tree planting Fire management Property management Wildlife watching Bird watching Fishing Number of responses Photography equipment Camping equipment Food and beverages Other The most commonly hunted animals were rabbits (5037 responses), foxes (4591), pigs (3565), feral cats (3220), and feral goats (2872). The most commonly hunted deer were fallow (2071 responses). Native animals were hunted much less frequently with kangaroos being the most commonly taken (1257 responses), followed by wallabies (438). Respondents participated in a variety of other natural resource management activities (Table 3). Almost 90% of participants included pest control as a motivation to hunt and 65% included conservation as a motivation. More than 99% were willing to assist landholders with pest control activities. How do you rank your participation in the following activities? Never Sometimes Frequently Activitie s Most of the time spent hunting was on private land (56.1% of all hunting days) and hunting trips were usually long. On private land 58.9% of hunters spent more than 12 days hunting in the last 12 months, while on public land only 33.7% of hunters spent more than 12 days. Slightly more than 41% of respondents had undertaken some kind of formal hunter training whilst 72.2% of those who hadn t indicated they would undertake training if it were available.

6 Hunters overwhelmingly got their information about hunting from magazines and friends (Figure 3). Official sources were consulted by less than 6% of respondents. Where do you get hunting information? Magazines, 88.6% Websites, 78.2% Friends, 84.1% Clubs, 59.1% Other, 5.6% DISCUSSION This survey shows that there are large numbers of active hunters who spend large amounts of their free time hunting and are they willing to spend large amounts of money in the practice of this past time. We estimate that there are probably 300,00 active hunters in Australia. But even if we conservatively halve that estimate and 66% of them spend $2250 (the median amount of the range that 66% said they spend, Table 1) directly on hunting, then the annual direct expenditure is $222,750,000. Additionally if we assume that 71% of those 150,000 spend an additional $3150 (median of the range, Table 2), then another $333,9000,000 is spent annually indirectly on hunting. That leads to a total annual expenditure of $556,650,000. Recreational hunters in Australia are actively interested in wildlife management with 85% already motivated by pest control and almost all respondents to this survey willing to assist landholders to control pest species. The outcome of this survey also demonstrates that hunters are actively involved in a range of other natural resource management activities. Although less than half of the survey respondents had undergone hunter training there was an obvious willingness by many hunters to undertake training. This point is doubly important in the light of the fact that hunters

7 currently turn to magazines and other hunters for information about hunting. An opportunity exists for agencies who manage declared pests to have more influence on this large and active group of stakeholders. There is no doubt recreational hunting has an effect on the economy, and may be especially important in remote rural areas where hunting takes place. It also demonstrates that recreational hunters are potentially a large and important constituent group to be taken into account when managing wildlife, including pests. There is good evidence (Finch and Baxter 2007) that many landholders like having declared pests, like deer, on their property. Hence the management of pests needs to take into account the attitudes and needs of the hunting community. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This survey was supported by a grant from the NSW Game Council. The research was part of the Wild Deer Research project and could not have occurred without the support of the following collaborating partners: Biosecurity Queensland; Toowoomba Regional Council; Sporting Shooters Association of Australia; Australian Deer Association and the Safari Club International. REFERENCES Finch, N., and Baxter, G.S Oh deer, what can the matter be? Landholder attitudes to deer management in Queensland. Wildlife Research. 34, New South Wales Game Council Web site accessed 3 May Tasmanian Department of Primary Industries, Parks, Water and Environment Annual Report for the financial year. DPEPWE, Hobart. Victorian Hunting Guide Government of Victoria.