Aborigines take up camel hunting to tackle boredom and drug abuse

Aborigines in Australia's arid desert interior have hit on an innovative way of tackling the boredom and substance abuse that have ravaged so many of their communities - hunting camels.

Where their forebears pursued traditional prey such as kangaroos and monitor lizards, the younger generation is heading into the scrub to shoot plentiful dromedaries.

The camels were brought to Australia in the 19th century from what was then British India as beasts of burden to haul supplies for explorers, pioneers and prospectors. They became redundant with the advent of railways and motor cars, and thousands were released into the wild.

They adapted to Australian conditions and are now considered a pest, with about a million roaming the Outback, mostly in South Australia, the Northern Territory and Western Australia. Biologists say the population is doubling every eight years.

In the remote outpost of Kintore, a six-hour drive west of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory, Aboriginal teenagers venture into the desert once a week in search of feral camels.

Firearm licences are hard to come by, so the camels are mostly shot by one of the town's three police officers, who accompany the hunting expeditions.

'The first time we went out, we got three camels - two big ones and one small one,' said Farren Marks, 19, who like many young men in the community has no job.