Victoria Police divisional firearms officer Leading Senior Constable Chris Cummins says he's witnessed a dramatic increase in fox numbers.
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00:00Currently, this is my tally for Kerry Oliver's lambing season for these fox populations.
00:10It's a sign for the farmers to show that somebody's actually out having a crack at the foxes,
00:15trying to reduce the impact they have on the young lambs and the older ewes during the
00:19lambing season, and it just creates conversation in the local community.
00:22I think there's 67 or 68 foxes on the fence at the minute, hanging on this fence alone.
00:28Yesterday, I took 138 scalps in at Broadford.
00:31It's $10 a scalp, so all up this season I think it's 240-odd scalps that I've handed in.
00:37I've shot for probably the last 10 to 12 years.
00:40Early years, I averaged 50 a year.
00:43This year, I'm well over the 200, so the numbers are dramatically increasing, and where you
00:47used to shoot two to three foxes a night, if I don't come home with 10 foxes at night,
00:52there's something seriously wrong.
00:53The number of shooters have probably diminished due to the cost of the shooting itself, but
00:58also the $10, it's enough to cover, but when they used to sell the pelts for $50, $60,
01:03$70, fox shooting was a lot popular back in those days.
01:07A lot of kids from my daughter's school, they ask me how many foxes, and they're pretty excited
01:11to come to school the next day and see if there's any new foxes added to the fence,
01:15so it's just that younger hunter education.
01:18It's bringing them up and sort of showing them what we need to do and what needs to
01:21carry on.
01:23For more information, visit www.FEMA.gov