Trade union action reveals duck hunting bans will impact city and country people

I treasure those memories during the opening dawn of the duck hunting season spent with my late father, even though I pestered him constantly about being allowed to carry a gun.

It will be sad if others in the future don't have the same bonding opportunities.

I tried to make myself useful as a fill-in dog retriever when a duck was downed, or in setting up the camp.

The writing has been on the wall for the annual duck hunt ever since more cashed-up animal welfare groups like RSPCA muscled Laurie Levy aside to campaign for its demise.

For those who see game hunting as somehow cruel or out of touch with the modern world, I thought it relevant to offer my own take on the current debate.

For us it was never just about the ducks, or the quail, the fish or the yabbies, but the event.

It was a day on the calendar when you could, and did, meet all sorts of people.

It was one of the few times city and country came together.

Powerful trade unions are opposed to this latest push to ban duck hunting - demonstrating again this is not only an issue for the bush.

Regional towns like Kerang, Sale, Mildura, Colac, Boort and many others will doubtless feel the economic impact if duck hunting, particularly the opening of the season, was to be lost.

Who didn't chuckle when Donald's town sign used to read "Donald - duck country", back when Lake Buloke was full of water and a mecca for hunters?

Apparently not those on the parliamentary inquiry who have asked the government to ban the sport.

Some say the government has virtually outlawed duck hunting already, by stealth.

Even after successive La Nina wet years, bag limits fell to four birds per day and the season was reduced to 35 days this year.

Hardly a season at all.

Unions are spending millions of members dollars on an ongoing campaign to "defend our rights to the great outdoors".

We often used to come across city people - perhaps they were union members - back in my day, decades ago when I hunted the wetlands.

These "strangers" would come in late to our favourite lake on the Friday night after driving up from the city and set up their rugged camps by car headlights.

The last opening I attended as a participant was in a big party which included two coppers from Bendigo who had converted a bus for camping.

We sat up drinking beer while watching Les Hiddins (Bush Tucker Man) on their TV, under floodlights, with a barbecue supper, oh the luxury.

Up before dawn to find our already chosen shotting spots, we spied the city-slickers across a creek in the darkness. This day it didn't matter where you came from.

It was only when they followed a flight of ducks travelling low and suddenly we were in their sights, we reminded them where we were.

None of us had the camo gear of today.

We were armed with a motley collection of shotguns - side-by-sides, under and overs. Five-shot autos were king. Dad had a very old shotgun handed down the line for generations with a skinny, wooden butt. Kicked like a mule.

I had a single-shot later on with a broken shell ejector. We used a stick down the barrel to remove the cartridge. The stick fell in the water and swelled up, became stuck in the gun and ended my opening early.

Sadly my father's gun was pinched from his gun safe in later years and while the thieves admitted to police they'd thrown it in the Murray River, but couldn't remember where, and it was lost.

We soon became friends with these city folk at Lalbert Lake and learned much about each other.

They had a black labrador which was expert at retrieving downed birds, saved us kids a splash in the cold water when they loaned him to us.

Mid-morning when the shooting was done we returned to our camps, to find in the daylight they were camped very close to us.

They admired our feather plucker bolted to the spinning hub of a rear ute wheel, jacked off the ground.

We shared it, and then swapped some drinks and some yarns.

Use country yokels rarely came into contact with city folk, it was fun.

It reminds me of the time some burly men knocked on our farmhouse door late one Friday night. Our farm was at the end of a gravel road in the Mallee, people rarely came calling.

They said they came from far-off Footscray and there was a carload of them out front in the dark.

They wanted to shoot quail and picked our farm at random.

Dad showed them a paddock where they might find some, asked them to shut the gates when they left and avoid sparking a fire in the stubble.

Apparently they had a great night, and returned to chase the little birds for years.

Country and city, came together for sport.

The utes and boat trailers lining the streets of Kerang, the heaving masses waiting for the gun raffle to be drawn at the Mystic Park Hotel, the campfire yarns.

There's a strong tradition at risk here as well, hunting is not just about the dinner table.