FERAL pests have a significant impact on primary production and biodiversity, as well as potentially spreading disease, on the Darling Downs but the work of the Queensland Murray-Darling Committee and a range of land managers will help to control the threat.
Darren Marshall, senior pest animal management officer for Swift NRM – the commercial arm of the Queensland Murray-Darling Committee – said a control program at Origin Energy’s Spring Gully, Scotts Creek and Strathblane properties in July had removed 17 wild dogs and 24 feral pigs.
“Since then, ongoing trial work, including catching the behaviour and movements of pest animals with strategically placed remote cameras, has been carried out to help us determine how significant the positive outcomes are for our native animals,” Mr Marshall said.
Origin Energy property supervisor Trent Vincent said as a significant landholder in the area, the company was keen to do its best to control feral animals and was particularly interested in the long term impact of the program on biodiversity.
“Origin has commissioned an intensive integrated control and research project on their properties that they hope will provide an excellent opportunity for collaboration for neighbours,” Mr Vincent said.
“Through a research and investigation component, we will provide our neighbours with information about improved control techniques and practices for our local area. We are working with the Queensland Murray-Darling Committee, through Swift NRM, to both control pests on our properties in the Spring Gully area and also taking part in research to find out the best integrated control techniques,” Mr Vincent said.
Mr Marshall said staff had benchmarked and indexed the feral animal population on Origin’s properties in May.
“This means we can develop a clear picture of the project’s impacts in the coming year,” Mr Marshall said.
“We are also analysing the stomachs of the feral animals captured to determine exactly what they are eating: crops, young livestock, native marsupials or reptiles. However, the next step of this process is to expand the project beyond the Origin properties and onto neighbouring enterprises.”
Mr Marshall’s work with landholders in other parts of the Queensland Murray-Darling Basin shows that although integrated pest management on one property has good production and biodiversity outcomes on that property, the best results are achieved when a larger group of land managers are working together.
Mr Vincent said broadening the extent of the project would benefit the local area.
“The success of this project relies heavily on a high level of cooperation and involvement from all land managers in the area to ensure a significant impact on pest animal numbers,” Mr Vincent said.
“One of our company goals is to take all feasible steps to eliminate or minimise any adverse impacts of our activities on the environment.
“As a significant land manager in rural Queensland, that includes ensuring our properties are run with an eye to best practice management from both an environmental and production point of view.”
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