The kangaroo industry in Australia

Abstract

As an introduction to current ecological studies of marsupials in Queensland, information on the kangaroo industry is presented and reviewed.
Personnel engaged in the industry; numbers and species taken, and districts of origin; times and areas of operation; methods of killing, skinning and treating; offal disposal; marketing and prices; ammunition costs; factors influencing annual harvests; and pest status are discussed.
For more than 40 years this native fauna has successfully supported an annual crop of some 350,000 skins, as well as the killing of indefinite numbers of animals as pests and for sport.
During the period 1950-1960 the annual harvest has been approximately 450,000 (81.5 per cent.-95.8 per cent. kangaroo) skins, conservatively assessed as worth £150,000 at the level of prices to shooters.
From observations some species have been affected in and adjacent to well-developed farming communities. There is, however, no quantitative evidence that past and current practices have had a detrimental effect on State-wide populations of larger macropod marsupials.