Hudson Pear out of control around the Ridge
Farmers, opal miners and residents in Lightning Ridge district are calling for more government support to control a growing outbreak of a noxious weed called Hudson Pear.
The Lightning Ridge Area Opal Reserve and farmers alike say that a Hudson pear infestation is well beyond the point of landholder responsibility and that a fresh approach from the government is needed.
Hudson pear is a highly invasive cactus that was brought to the country sometime in the 1960’s and has since found a home in the Lightning Ridge area.
Lightning Ridge Area Opal Reserve Manager, David Sullivan, said attempts to control Hudson Pear on the 8,000 hectares of land managed by the community-run organisation have failed despite thousands of dollars in government funding to pay contract sprayers.
“This is a matter of urgency,” Mr Sullivan said, “it’s not just Lightning Ridge and Walgett; this weed is spreading further and has been found in the Brewarrina Shire, Coonamble Shire and Narran Lakes, where it is just 5km away from the water’s edge, and further afield in Queensland.
“If this continues to spread, it will be an environmental and economic catastrophe.
“There will be less usable land for agricultural means, biodiversity will be threatened in National Parks, and if it gets into the waterways at Narran Lakes, especially at a time like this when the rivers are flowing, it can move into the Barwon, the Darling and down to the Murray River in South Australia.”
Mr Sullivan said that the wet weather had caused a dramatic increase in the spread of Hudson pear, so much so that some farmers have 40-50% of their land infested and unusable.
He said that the biocontrol agent that the government is using now, the cochineal bug, is making some good inroads, but it is a long-term solution, and it could take ten years before it gets the outbreak under control.
“There is a view that this problem is landholder responsibility, but we are saying that it has gotten past that point and it is now a major government issue,” Mr Sullivan said.
“It has been ignored for the past 20 years, so the days of landholder responsibility are gone because we are talking about millions of dollars’ worth of chemicals to spray the amount of land that needs to be sprayed.
“We are asking the government for urgent funding and assistance; we want positions dedicated to this problem, and we want an organisation that will manage these positions and control the spraying of these pests.
“We also want the government to immediately reinstate the Free Chemical Program for landholders, which ceased about a year ago.
“But the program needs to be a bigger and better model; in the past, a farmer may have got a couple of drums of chemicals per year, and that just isn’t enough; they need palettes of chemicals to get this outbreak under control.
“I recently attended budget estimates at NSW Parliament where the Agricultural Minister, Dugald Saunders, was asked about the current measures.
“I asked the minister about reinstating the free chemical program, and the minister said he wasn’t aware of this and took the question on notice.
“I can’t emphasise this point enough – this will spread throughout Australia, and if we don’t catch it now, people will be looking back in history asking why we didn’t stop it, so that is why we are trying so hard to get this issue under the spotlight, to get the politicians out here, and force them into action.”
Local farmer, Nick Deshon, who has a farm between Lightning Ridge and Grawin, said he had also been unable to control the spread of the cactus on his 20,000-hectare property.
40 per cent of Mr Deshon’s land has been affected by the uncontrollable spread of the cactus.
Layton Holley
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