SER in the News
War on new pest grass gets rhino by the horns
03 May 2005
The Australian
Reported by Brendan O'Keefe
A LEADING Top End scientist has called for African grazing animals to be brought into the Northern Territory to control a pestilent grass described as the "plant equivalent of the cane toad".
No native animal could halt the spread of African gamba grass, a strong bamboo-like plant that grows to about 4m tall and which is spreading in thousands of patches around Darwin and across the territory, said David Bowman, of Charles Darwin University's Centre for Tropical Wildlife Management.
"If you've got an African grass, why not have African animals to graze it - like rhinos," Professor Bowman said.
"One obvious control is grazing, and we may be able to be creative about that and use not just cattle but use African animals to do it ... that could be fantastic as an alternative," he said.
Elephants could also be used, Professor Bowman confirmed.
But paleontologist and former Australian Museum director Mike Archer warned against the idea.
"We definitely don't want to be bringing another large African herbivore to Australia - the mind boggles," he said. "It would be like importing piranha to control carp."
Pastoralists introduced gamba grass to the Top End in the 1950s, and Professor Bowman says the plant has been slowly sorting out its best genetic strains since then.
"It's like they're fiddling around on a combination lock and once they've got it, they're unleashed and then they go through an explosive stage. We're now entering the explosive stage," he said.
Gamba grass's dense growth adds vast amounts of fuel to the natural and man-made fires that ravage the Northern Territory throughout the dry season.
Native trees are unable to cope with the bigger blazes and are dying, leaving more ground for the gamba grass to invade and colonise.
"Eucalypts are acclaimed for their fire resistance, but they just can't compete ... they've got no immunity to the intensity of the fires and they're just curling up their toes," Professor Bowman said.
Poison was not the solution because it was unlikely the effect could be limited to the gamba grass.
Professor Bowman said out-of-the-box thinking, such as the use of African animals, was vital.
"I'm not saying to do that in national parks but in certain areas ... I don't think it's outlandish at all."
A fenced range would give hope for animals that were "going down the tubes in marginal countries", Professor Bowman said.
"Australia has got this fantastic opportunity being a tropical country - maybe we should be thinking about using some of our landscapes in a more creative way."
