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Summary Report

Summary of ‘Report on deaths and injuries to Grey-headed Flying-foxes, Pteropus poliocephalus shot in an orchard near Sydney, NSW’ 
by Anya Divljan, Keryn Parry-Jones, Peggy Eby (2009). 
Download full report here 

In spring of 2007, a licensee who believed themselves to be acting within the bounds of normal, acceptable industry practice granted permission for flying-foxes to be collected from their orchard during a short period of shooting for crop protection. A large number of animals were killed in a two week period as a result of shooting, a high proportion of animals shot in the orchard sustained significant injuries but were not killed and a high proportion of the adults shot were lactating females whose dependent young would have died of starvation or predation in the camp. 

Two weeks of shooting resulted in a total of 164 dead or injured flying-foxes in an orchard. Not all could be collected, and several more were likely to have died outside the orchard.  Of 146 flying-foxes collected:
  • 30% were alive: the majority had to be euthanased.
  • 67% were females
  • 40% were lactating and thus had dependent young; 9% were carrying a newborn pup (5 pups died with their mother, 8 were passed to a wildlife rehabilitation organisation); the other juveniles would have died in the bat camp due to the death of their mother.
  • 5% were pregnant
In total, more than 205 flying-foxes, including young in the bat camp, died during 2 weeks of shooting in one orchard during a season in which orchard damage by flying-foxes in the area was considered low. The number does not include animals that were able to fly out of the orchard with injuries that would result in their death. 
58 autopsies were conducted on dead or euthanased flying-foxes:
  •  The majority of animals found dead died of internal haemorrhaging (associated with injury of non-vital organs such as ribs). Few had serious head injuries (more likely to have resulted in rapid death).
  • All flying- collected alive and then euthanased had major or multiple injuries to their wings and considerable contusions. If not euthanased they may have suffered many days before dying.
  • The likely time to death was estimated based on the extent and type of injuries:
·        > Minutes to a few hours: 21%
·        > Several hours: 48%
·        > Many hours to days: 28%