HUNTERS are the latest target of animal activists, who are calling for the use of dogs to be banned when hunting feral pigs.
Animal rights group PETA is urging supporters to write to the Queensland and NSW governments to ban the use of dogs on wild pig hunts, saying it was cruel to both the pigs and canines.
"Pig dogging is a shamefully cruel and barbaric practice in which dogs are forced to hunt wild pigs," PETA claims.
"While hunters boast grotesquely of the adrenaline rush they experience, their treatment of the victims of this "sport" - both pigs and dogs - is deplorable.
"The dogs are encouraged to chase and tire out the pigs and then hold them by the ears until a human arrives to kill them. Pigs who are chased, trapped, and killed in this way experience intense fear and distress."
But Kennedy MP Bob Katter, who last year came under fire for posing with a pile of dead pigs at a hunting competition in Innisfail slammed the activists for being ignorant and hypocritical in their campaign.
Mr Katter said preserving the lives of the destructive pests would result in the further demise of native wildlife in the Far North, including the endangered cassowary.
"Where are all the crying, howling vegans now because without management of the exploding number of pigs, and numbers will reach 30 million in the next seven years, the cassowaries are doomed, the turtle is doomed and the dunnart is doomed," Mr Katter said.
"There is some naive assumption that nature stands still. Well I've got news for you - it doesn't and if we sit on our hands, then you'll watch our beautiful, natural wonderland vanish and it is vanishing as we speak."
Mr Katter said the role farmers play in pig management was vital and that government should throw their full support behind them.
Hill MP Shane Knuth, whose electorate takes in Tully, where the banana industry is under threat by Panama disease which is thought may be spread by feral pigs, lashed out.
Mr Knuth said there were estimated to be about 25 million feral pigs in Australia, with 10 million of them in Queensland.
"PETA would be better off spending their time thinking of ways to control the fast growing feral pig problem to protect our native wildlife - a serious issue that is often ignored in favour of crying help for the hunting dogs or pigs," Mr Knuth said.
"While PETA is busy pointing the finger at pig dogs - who love the sport and are some of the best kept dogs in the country - the feral pigs are killing cassowaries, digging up turtle eggs, ripping up the whole countryside, destroying the environment and devastating the agricultural industry.
"The hunters are doing more to protect our native wildlife from feral pigs than PETA, and they do it in their own time, at their own expense and contribute so much to the local economy.
"We are now encroaching 25 million pigs across Australia and 10 million in Queensland. This number will continue to increase, before we know it we'll have more pigs than the Australian population."
