Thou shalt not cull

The late rising but thin crescent moon last night cruising between the unexciting constellations of Aquarius and Capricornus gave us just enough light to see their shapes in the trees. The annual Northern Rivers Tasmanian Tiger cull officially started at midnight on the eleventh and we were determined to at least half fill the chest freezer with Thylacinus cynocephalus before autumn takes the leaves from the gum trees. We have been experimenting with baroque violin excerpts as a lure but last night stuck with the tried and true method of weighted odd socks cast from a six foot 9wt fly rod. The recent rain has left their normal dry billabong habitat a little soggy and we had to keep wringing the socks out but managed to bag, gut and skin 43 of them before the dawn paled the sky. Arthur reckons four of them were probably koalas, but a marsupial is still a marsupial, carnivorous or not. We will submit the largest jaw bone from the batch to the local government council office to hopefully win their annual prize of a set of SA80 style SUSAT night vision scopes with explosive tipped harpoon mount adapter brackets.

Perhaps it all was just a dream, but at least it wasn't about whaling ships with RESEARCH written on the side. Maybe I ought to see if Greenpeace wants to borrow those telescopic sights.