Feral donkeys were first brought to Australia as pack animals to replace horses, which had succumbed to native poisonous plants. Now numbering 5 million, they have been declared a pest, owing to their damage to vegetation and erosion of soil. Culling is mainly carried out by marksmen in helicopters, and experiments are being made in fertility control.

History

Feral donkeys in Australia (and elsewhere) are

donkey The domestic donkey is a hoofed mammal in the family Equidae, the same family as the horse. It derives from the African wild ass, ''Equus africanus'', and may be classified either as a subspecies thereof, ''Equus africanus asinus'', or as a ...

s (scientific name ''Equus asinus'') which escaped from captivity, and are living and breeding in the wild. Donkeys originated in

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

and in parts of

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...

. They are a part of the family

Equidae Equidae (sometimes known as the horse family) is the taxonomic family of horses and related animals, including the extant horses, asses, and zebras, and many other species known only from fossils. All extant species are in the genus '' Equus'', ...

. While donkeys display many

horse The horse (''Equus ferus caballus'') is a domesticated, one-toed, hoofed mammal. It belongs to the taxonomic family Equidae and is one of two extant subspecies of ''Equus ferus''. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million y ...

-like characteristics, they are more closely related to wild asses. Donkeys were brought to

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

from 1866 for use as pack and haulage animals. Up until that point, the Australians had been using the

as their main mode of transportation. However, problems arose when the horses used in transportation began to become sickened by some of the native poisonous

plant Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae exclud ...

s. When donkeys proved to be invulnerable to the plants that were making the horses sick, more donkeys were brought in. Escape was common because of the lack of fences, and there were reported herds of donkeys by the 1920s. In western Australia in 1949, there were enough donkeys for them to officially be declared a pest. There were almost 5 million feral donkeys in Australia in 2005.

Food sources

Donkeys are

herbivores A herbivore is an animal anatomically and physiologically adapted to eating plant material, for example foliage or marine algae, for the main component of its diet. As a result of their plant diet, herbivorous animals typically have mouthpart ...

, and only eat vegetation. All year round, the donkeys graze for grass, shrubs, and tree bark. Donkeys usually graze for 6 to 7 hours a day and can go a fair distance from water sources. There are over 1 million donkeys living in Australia, which means that the donkeys eat a significant amount of vegetation. The donkeys can readily find food in winter if it is wet; however food is much less plentiful in times of

drought A drought is defined as drier than normal conditions.Douville, H., K. Raghavan, J. Renwick, R.P. Allan, P.A. Arias, M. Barlow, R. Cerezo-Mota, A. Cherchi, T.Y. Gan, J. Gergis, D. Jiang, A. Khan, W. Pokam Mba, D. Rosenfeld, J. Tierney, an ...

Ecological effect

The donkeys seriously affect the environment they live in. Their presence can cause a wide range of problems: they may spread weeds by carrying seeds in their hair and feces, they may damage vegetation through overeating, they may foul watering holes in the drought season, and they can cause

erosion Erosion is the action of surface processes (such as water flow or wind) that removes soil, rock, or dissolved material from one location on the Earth's crust, and then transports it to another location where it is deposited. Erosion is distin ...

with their hard hooves. These damages, particularly those to the watering holes, have the potential to make native plants and animals locally extinct. The donkeys also affect local agriculture. They sometimes can over eat pasture grasses and destroy fences. They are also known to infect

domestic Domestic may refer to: In the home * Anything relating to the human home or family ** A domestic animal, one that has undergone domestication ** A domestic appliance, or home appliance ** A domestic partnership ** Domestic science, sometimes c ...

animals with diseases. On the contrary to above, some researchers claim that donkey's ecological niche, like that of other introduced large herbivores, may also correspond to lost niches of extinct

Australian megafauna The term Australian megafauna refers to the megafauna in Australia during the Pleistocene Epoch. Most of these species became extinct during the latter half of the Pleistocene, and the roles of human and climatic factors in their extinction are ...

and benefit native ecosystem.

Control

Since the donkeys in Australia are considered a pest, they are often controlled by being mustered.

Helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

s with highly trained and accredited shooters have replaced this technique in places where the terrain makes mustering too difficult. Also seeing some limited use is fertility control. This, however, is difficult with large numbers of undomesticated animals and it is unknown whether this technique will make a difference on such a large number of animals. Some good cattle breeders are using donkeys against dingos and foxes. There is some

trafficking Smuggling is the illegal transportation of objects, substances, information or people, such as out of a house or buildings, into a prison, or across an international border, in violation of applicable laws or other regulations. There are various ...

of donkey skin for making

donkey-hide gelatin Donkey-hide gelatin or ass-hide glue ( la, colla corii asini) is gelatin obtained from the skin of the donkey (''Equus asinus'') by soaking and stewing. It is used as an ingredient in the traditional medicine of China, where it is called ejia ...

traditional Chinese medicine Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is an alternative medical practice drawn from traditional medicine in China. It has been described as "fraught with pseudoscience", with the majority of its treatments having no logical mechanism of action ...

References

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