The sight of thousands of flying foxes returning to the hills at dusk is a fascinating spectacle. But according to Shadow Environment Minister Jackie Trad, the LNP government has "declared open killing season on threatened and endangered flying foxes."

Ms Trad said the LNP is washing its hands of its environmental duty by passing decision-making responsibilities on the management of flying fox roosts to local councils.

“Let’s be absolutely clear – there are very stringent, environmentally responsible measures in place for the humane management of flying fox colonies,” Ms Trad said.

“What the Newman government has said...by telling councils they can now take over this area themselves is: Get out your guns.

“They will no longer have to follow the strict guidelines which allow councils to undertake such measures as using light and noise and, in some cases, smoke to move colonies on when they are a problem for local communities.

“They will no longer be responsible for giving mitigation permits in extreme cases to farmers to humanely dispose of flying foxes.

“The government has taken us back to a dark age where it’s OK for marauding crowds beating on saucepans with wooden spoons to frighten these animals away, endangering their young."

Ms Trad said, the management of flying fox colonies is a complex issue, but was confident the wider community understood their ecological significance.

Port Douglas Wildlife Habitat Operations Manager, Bruce Alexander, said the native flying fox population, which consists of several species and flows like a river in the sky from Port Douglas to the range each night, plays an important in the rainforest's cycle of life.

"I always use the expression they're a 'keystone species' that are absolutely vital for the diversity of the rainforest.

"People come up here to visit us in Port Douglas for the Daintree Rainforest and Mossman Gorge...if we don't have our flying foxes, down the track we don't have our Daintree."

Mr Alexander said habitat loss is a likely reason for their presence in populated centres as the flying foxes search for fruit.

"They have no choice, that's just the way it works. If you take something away from here is has to go somewhere else doesn't it?"

He said that moving flying fox populations from one location to another without simply moving the problem along with them was easier said than done

"If they are causing a health issue, which I guess could be the case in places. If we could move them on without causing a problem for anybody else or the animal, we could do it.

"But at the moment I'm not sure they've got the ability to actually move them on without inflicting them on other people. You can't just say 'flying foxes we want you to go over there', they just won't do it.

"Further south they've had the mitigation permits already, and they've been moving them on with noise and things like that but there's no guarantee that they won't come back to where they were, or go somewhere else.

"That's probably the problem their going to have in Cairns down at the library. That's going to the first (population) to be moved on, I'm sure."

Mr Alexander said flying foxes are protected by legislation and people can be prosecuted for harming them. He also gave this warning to the public;

"As interesting and as beautiful and as important as they are, they do carry diseases as everybody knows. You have to get close and personal to be scratched so just avoid them and you shouldn't have a problem.

Click here for the BatReach Rescue and Rehabilitation Centre in Kuranda.