Farmers that have tried work for shooting access

[AndyBangFlop]

Morning,
Just wondering who out there has tried something along the lines of help on the farm for permission to hunt/shoot.

We have a smaller set of blocks close to Adelaide which I really have neglected a bit in terns of weed control, there would be 100 acres or so of a blackberry infested gully that I keep meaning to get in there and slash, its steepish so it would have to be done by hand. So there are a few OH & S concerns I have but I would be interested in letting people go fox hunting/whistling and rabbit shooting down that gully if they spent a bit if time, each time, doing a bit of weed control.

But I am seriously worried about the consequences if something went wrong, hence the question, anyone done this sort of thing?

The size of block, its location, the fact the house on the block is rented out, the risk involved in the work and it being unsupervised after the first couple occasions has got me wondering how it could all work, or if it goes in the too hard, too bad so sad basket.

Cheers, oh and fish how does it work out for you? Problem is I doubt I would be able to cull people with the tyranny of distance, this particular block is only 1hr from the states capital...

[17fireball]

Andy,I think this could become a legal minefield should someone be hurt on your property.Contact your insurer as anyone working for access to your property could be deemed as employees,ie receiving payment in kind.If it were my property I would contact a cropdusting company to spray blackberry killer on the block

[Jed Clampett]

Well howdy there Andy,

Owning a slightly larger block I can see your dilemma. The shooting aspect is not so much the issue if you took the time to find shooters whom you could trust to do the right thing and are SSAA members. Membership entitles them to a certain amount of Public Liability cover and presume you already have this for the general public anyways?

The tricky bit is the work, as they would be in your employ so there for you would need to cover them in some way against a work related accident. This particular area would leave yourself a little more open for mitigation and have the larger risk factor than getting to know and allowing a couple of responsible shooters on to help with your rabbit and fox problem.

You also could employ a professional shooter to do a OH&S plan for you, to give the recreational shooters to abide by... but that still leaves the issue of you using them to clear land.

Don't right off the idea, you may just find a couple of shooters who are contractors whom do weed and tree control of work for a profession.

Kind regards,

Jed.

[fishphillott]

Tried it once Andy
Never again
It's too hot, its too cold, its too hard, your a cant of a boss
Spent most of the time teaching people how to work wire strainers
Your better off charging for access then using that money to pay someone to spray weeds
Fish

[AndyBangFlop]

Cheers for the replies,
Insurance i figure could be covered as public liability through SSAA coupled with our own public liability insurance so would cover both aspects individually,
re. Work, I imagine it could be deemed volunteer work, much like land care volunteers, which we have had on this particular block before, doing weed control as we fenced off a 30 acre section to protect a endangered native fish as part of the deal.

I think it does go in the too hard too bad so sad basket unfortunately as you all re confirmed my concerns. Thanks for helping think,

For the record it is an off shoot of a much larger property so we do spray with helicopters, they do a great job but it is so thick that it really needs cutting piling and burning, it is just that the valley does seem to contain a lot of foxes and you read a lot of people complaining about not having anywhere to hunt... I refuse to give broad acre access but I was thinking along the lines of the above as a way to assess people.