Northern Territory Cattle Produce John Khan in a follow up to last weeks article, writes:
After the Batchelor Gamba Meeting which I wrote about last week a committee called Gamba Action Group - GAG- was formed in our local council area Coomalie Northern Territory. An experienced weed control man was employed as project coordinator.
An ‘expert’ had told GAG “Gamba seed would not travel more than four meters and it was spread by motor vehicles.”
Personally I have seen the seed rising in smoke columns during bush fires and it would have traveled for many kilometers. Wallabies and other animals would certainly carry it in their fur.
The GAG’s first project was to spray and burn the road verges. This was not successful.
It killed the native grass but the Gamba re-shot soon afterwards. The spraying continued. Below is an example of the road side spraying. These photos were taken just a few days ago in and around the Coomalie district. The Gamba Grass is growing from the spray line back into the trees.
I spoke several times to the Project Coordinator about the waste of money the spraying is and the damage it’s doing to the environment. He agreed with me that herbicide was not the answer and that Gamba could be controlled by grazing cattle.
When his contract expired, GAG did not renew it.
The new Project Coordinator was the local Greening Australia rep and the level of herbicide spraying increased. Water catchment areas and river banks were now included and trees near the roads were killed too. The overall amount of Gamba has not altered. Below is a photo of Gamba sprayed on a water way on a road.
Below is an area sprayed. Notice there is now a multitude of worthless weeds growing back.
The radicals are hoping to completely eradicate Gamba. If this is attempted, they would have to do it from the air, as a lot of the terrain is too scrubby and rough to access with vehicles. To try and kill all of the Gamba the strength and amount of poison would affect every living thing in the area.
The photo below shows how the herbicide they use kills everything including the young trees.
Half of Coomalie is suitable for Gamba and would support a herd of cattle which would control the Gamba, open the local meat-works which is currently closed, and bring additional income to landowners and service providers.
This concept horrifies the radicals who hate cattle for no logical reason.
Below is a photo of Gamba growing up a hillside. Grazing cattle would easily control it.
If the Government brings in legislation to outlaw an excellent pasture grass because they have been influenced by a mob of radical loonies, they will bring financial hardship to a lot of farmers and damage the economy.
I’d suggest that people calculate the personal losses from government sponsored attempts to eradicate Gama.
They include the loss of good pasture, cost of spraying herbicide, and the damage to soil biota, the cost of establishing new pasture (and it may be next on the list), loss of income while all this is happening and the loss of native biota.
When we have calculated the total dollar cost of attempting to eradicate Gamba I suggest we send this to the Minister with our bank details for the compensation cheque to be deposited.
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Tags: Environment, Gamba Grass, Northern Territory
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