Australia is home to an estimated 300,000 wild horses, the largest such population in the world. This abundance is believed to have put so much strain on the habitat that the Australian government has resorted to controversial mass culling campaigns to protect the country's national parks.Images of hunters chasing herds of galloping horses from helicopters and shooting them with semiautomatic rifles have sent shock waves across Australia, where horses are proud symbols of the country's pioneer spirit.
"Horses are exotic animals that don't belong in Australia," says Keith Muir, director of Colong Foundation for Wilderness, a Sydney-based nonprofit environmental group that supports the culling of wild horses. "If kangaroos got loose in America, they would be like the horses here. You'll be shooting them like mad to try and control them."
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