Sandy's Say: Gone With The Wind
"Methanic men and wafting women of Australia be afraid, be very afraid,'' warns Sandy James in this breezy column.
The federal government has announced that it is starting with the culling of flatulent, feral camels in an initiative to cut emissions of greenhouse gases but once they're on a roll, who knows where they'll draw the line?
Camels are one of the country's big methane emitters, launching the equivalent of one tonne of aromatic carbon dioxide into the atmosphere per beast, per year. They live anywhere from 30 to 50 years in the wild, there are 1.2 million of them in the Australian Outback and that figure is doubling every nine years. You do the maths.
What will the government move on to next? Windy wombats? Popping possums? Where will this culling end? Gassy goannas? Backfiring bandicoots? Ripping Red Kangaroos? If you are an Aussie with a tendency to let a toot out the shute then, before you next make the sheets flutter, I suggest that you seriously consider buying yourself a family dog to blame for your indiscretions - an essential scapegoat in these persecutory times.
Camels are not the only introduced species which Australians are battling to cull. Communities on Queensland's Sunshine Coast recently declared 18th March 2011 to be "Whacking Day." The idea was for every citizen to go out on this day and kill as many cane toads as possible. Cane toads were introduced to Australia in 1935 in an attempt to get rid of the sugar cane beetle. They have since become an advancing, environmental pest. Not only are they prolific breeders, but they also have poisonous glands under their skin and the toxin kills any native or domestic animals which try and mouth them. These noxious, butt-ugly pests can grow to the size of a dinner plate.
To their credit, Australians have tried to find uses for these detested creatures over the years. Many a pub holds regular cane toad races where patrons can bet on a winner or even a trifecta. The toads have coloured ribbons tied around them to ease identification. Desperate junkies, too broke to buy drugs, have been known to cut the poison glands off the toads, dry them in the sun and then roll them in a joint and smoke it. One very enterprising company squished the toads into a liquid fertiliser called "Toadjus" but it did have an unnerving tendency to explode during storage.
Suggestions for methods to be used in this mass execution of cane toads varied from the humane to the barbaric. The consensus seems to be that the best way to kill them is to put them in the freezer until they stiffen or spray them with Dettol. Whacking them with a blunt instrument or playing cane toad golf is a quick way of dispensing with them. There is a great deal of satisfaction, I am told, in the resounding pop which they make when you drive over them and this has become somewhat of a national sport in certain areas. Throwing them upwards out of the door of your helicopter and putting them through a high powered garden mulcher were some of the less popular ideas.
Not surprisingly, forty-eight percent of Aussies surveyed supported the idea of posting them en masse to New Zealand, especially just before the Rugby World Cup - purely as a diversionary tactic, you understand.
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