Feral horse.
©Team 00128,
ThinkQuest 2003.
The feral horse is found in many different habitats. One area
that they are a great pest is in the alpine regions of
Australia, south-east New South Wales and north-eastern
Victoria. This area is called the ‘
Kosciusko National Park’ and
is part of the Australian Alps. The Alps contains the highest
point in Australia, Mt. Kosciusko. Numbers of the horses in the
national park are around 3000 to 4000, and the approximate
number in Australia is 337 000 to 600 000. The number in the
Alps may not seem very threatening but only 1% of the Australian
land is alpine. But alpine is not the only land that feral
horses inhabit.
It is believed that there are no feral horses in Tasmania.
The horse is a very adaptable animal. It is due to this great
ability to adapt that the animal is causing major problems in
the Australian environment. They run wild in the desert areas,
grasslands, tropical rainforests, and the famous
Australian
bush. Practically every type of terrain has feral horses in
habitation. Australia has the biggest population of feral horses
in the world. The Australian environment cannot support the
rising number of feral horses. In drought they die a slow,
painful death due to lack of water and food.
Aerial culling takes place every few years and is the most
humane way to control the numbers. The RSPCA and other animal
welfare groups claim that this isn’t a humane way, but it’s
better than seeing the animals suffer. Feral or not, they don’t
deserve to starve and dehydrate to death.
On
Fraser Island, the largest sand island in the world, just off
the east coast of Queensland, there is a herd of feral horses.
The island’s extremely delicate rainforest ecosystem cannot cope
with much more than 20 so the National Parks and Wildlife
Services hold an annual cull. Their previous numbers were as
large as 200. They were introduced by the logging industry that
used to be on the island. When logging ceased they let the
horses go, thus creating the situation that is now currently on
the island. These animals adapted to their environment, yet due
to their sandy ground from where they obtained their food they
ingested sand and it led to them having a very short life span
of only approximately 8 years.
Fraser Island is a World Heritage
listed site. Loosing this sanctuary of rare native animals and
plants to a few horses would be devastating.
It is believed that most of the feral horses in Australia are
concentrated in central Australia. A feral horse can have a home
range of approximately 70 square kilometres. The approximate
population of feral horses in central Australia is 200 000. If
conditions are favourable, and no control, horse populations can
grow by 150 000 per year.
