By KATH GANNAWAY
A MILLGROVE couple is calling for an end to hunting in and around Warburton, and want more police to deal with illegal hunters.
“It’s complicated” doesn’t wash with Tom Osburg and partner Jackie Murphy when it comes to hunters shooting with high-powered rifles near their Millgrove home and river reserve and bushland where people walk, ride and fish.
The couple live on the boundary of the Millgrove housing estate with a lease over crown land that runs from the Yarra River up to the O’Shannassy Aquaduct walking trail.
They believed hunting for deer was prohibited in the area after Warburton Police made a case for public safety that resulted in a Prohibited Deer Hunting (PDH) zone being brought in in 2012.
An order brought in last September however allows private property owners, or authorised agents, to shoot on their own land where deer are a problem, but not on public land.
A confrontation with shooters they say were operating without permission on public land adjoining their property on Sunday, 8 June, was the last straw.
Warburton Police are investigating those allegations, and an alleged assault on Mr Osberg the same day.
“We have two heavily armed hunters, dressed in full camouflage in one of our paddocks, just a few hundred metres from where I sit,” Ms Murphy wrote to Police Minister Kim Wells in February.
She said she had called triple-zero several times, but by the time police arrived the shooters were nowhere to be seen.
“If this was happening in metropolitan Melbourne they’d have the police helicopter, dog squad and police scouring the area to find the shooters,” Ms Murphy said.
She said they can’t understand why the PDH was not being recognised.
The Mail has spoken with Warburton Police and with the Department of Environment and Primary Industry (DEPI) who say … “it’s complicated”.
“What the PDH does is prevent hunting for deer in public land in areas around Warburton. If you’re a private land owner in that exclusion zone, you can hunt deer on your own property and you can allow others to hunt. The order has nothing to do with those zones,” Simon Toop, Director Game, Game Victoria, DEPI, explained.
Under the order shooters must get permission in writing authorising them to destroy deer on their land.
Mr Toop said shooters must however comply with the Firearms Act which he said included not using a firearm in a dangerous manner, not shooting on someone’s property without consent and not hunting in populous places or towns.
The definition of a populous place seems to be at the heart of why the PDH was brought in and according to Mr Toop, nothing is changed by the order.
“The bottom line is DEPI and police will keep working with each other to resolve the matters and see what tools are available to deal with this,” Mr Toop said.
In a letter to the Mail this week, Ms Murphy is calling for others who are concerned to speak up and address the issue as a community.
