‘Idiotic’ hunting ad riles Gutwein

THE hunting of wildlife with a bow and arrow is illegal and will not be tolerated, Minister for Environment, Parks and Heritage Peter Gutwein has said.

Responding to reports of a social media post offering the bow hunting of deer on private property, Mr Gutwein said such a practice was “disgusting”.

“I want to make it perfectly clear: hunting with a bow and arrow in Tasmania for the taking of wildlife is illegal,” he said yesterday.

“We’re investigating that Facebook post. Once more information is to hand we’ll have more to say then.”

A Tasmanian hunting operator is advertising private hunting trips on Facebook.

“Come and hunt on our private 2000 acre block, Everything from Trophy Bucks to the Meat hunter, Also catering for Bow Hunters,” the page reads.

An accompanying photo gallery includes images of a deer apparently shot with a bow and arrow.

Mr Gutwein said if the business was found to be offering bow hunting of deer, the trips would be shut down. He said severe penalties were in place for animal cruelty.

“We recently increased the penalties to more than $50,000 for animal cruelty. The penalties are significant,” he said.

“I think this is very unfortunate and distressing — an example of where people behave in idiotic and quite frankly disgusting ways.

“I think that it has highlighted that those penalties were necessary.

“I don’t believe that it is acceptable to be shooting at anything with a bow and arrow and we will look at this advertisement … once we have more detail we will have more to say.”