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New fire ant discovery a wake-up call

Biosecurity Queensland received a rude shock recently when deadly fire ants turned up 70km north of Brisbane’s containment zone.
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Fire ants have been found in a new location in Australia. An infestation at Beerwah on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast was reported to Biosecurity Queensland by a keen-eyed property owner.

Confirmed by genetic tracing, this new infestation came from Brisbane and shows how easily and unpredictably fire ants can spread into new areas. Biosecurity Queensland acted quickly, alerting the public, running ant identification workshops and training sessions and mobilising community support for survey and control operations.

While this work is underway, the new find has broader implications. This infestation, about 70km north of the fire ant biosecurity zone, demonstrates controls put in place to prevent fire ant movements are insufficient. It is also a reminder that the window to do something about fire ants is closing rapidly.

The eradication program is ramping up, but we are still waiting for the meeting of Australia’s agriculture ministers on July 26 to provide a clear and unequivocal statement that fire ants are being taken seriously and that every state, territory and the federal government is ready to go the distance on a full eradication program.

We need you to add your voice to the call for action on fire ants by joining our social media Thunderclap!

[button link=”https://www.thunderclap.it/projects/59440-eradicate-fire-ants-now”]Create your Thunderclap now[/button]

Why fire ant eradication failed in the past

In the early part of last decade Australia’s fire ant eradication program suffered from short-term funding, only operating for five years at a time. Victory against the country’s fire ant infestations was declared too soon, and as funding was cut undiscovered fire ant nests required the work to start over again.

While the infestation area continued to grow, funding remained fixed and increasingly unstable. For the last four years, funding was approved one year at a time.

The program was secretive, closed to the community and cumbersome and many of the findings from past expert reviews were ignored.

Of course, it is easy to second guess these mistakes with the benefit of hindsight but how do we avoid making serious mistakes in the future?

We have developed a report on what we consider to be the seven essential governance recommendations for the national red imported fire ant eradication program. These are:

  1. Design an effective governance approach, including by consulting stakeholders and seeking the advice of experts
  2. Ensure structures and processes provide robust oversight and accountability to funders, industry and the community.
  3. Make sure decision-making is transparent so that stakeholders understand the rationale for decisions and can have confidence in the program.
  4. Develop a comprehensive eradication plan that includes techniques, costings, assumptions, milestones, roles, and responsibilities.
  5. Create an independent body to ensure the program is managed effectively.
  6. Involve experts from relevant fields for program design, advice and review.
  7. Make sure the community and industry is meaningfully engaged in the program.

We call this governance – it’s the detailed management structures and decision making about the most effective way to spend the fire ant eradication money.

Our last chance

The independent review of Australia’s fire ant eradication program released in December was very clear that the window of opportunity to eradicate fire ants is closing – the identification of fire ants on the Sunshine Coast is a terrible reminder of how easy it is for these ants to spread to new areas.

If Australia’s agriculture ministers do not set a clear course at their meeting later this month it will almost certainly mean we have missed our chance to eradicate this deadly invader.

The federal government, New South Wales and Victoria have all publicly committed to full funding of the fire ant program. Several states have told us off the record they will be supporting the program.

Many organisations have joined our statement of concern calling for a full, ten-year, $380 million eradication program, including the National Farmers Federation, AgForce, the Nature Conservation Council of NSW and the North Queensland Conservation Council.

Join our Thunderclap campaign

We now need you to support our last push by joining our Thunderclap campaign. You can sign up with your Twitter and Facebook account to participate in the social media blast >>

By joining us on Thunderclap, on the morning of July 26, when Australia’s agriculture ministers meet to decide the fate of the fire ant eradication program, a message will be automatically posted to your Facebook or Twitter accounts calling for full funding of the program.

We hope our Thunderclap campaign, along with last-minute lobbying efforts and media coverage, ensures Australia gets the fully funded, well-governed fire ant eradication campaign it deserves.

There is no aspect of our lives that will not be impacted by a fire ant infested Australia. This is the last opportunity for us to do something about it.

More info

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    Dear Project Team,

    [YOUR PERSONALISED MESSAGE WILL APPEAR HERE.] 

    I support the amendment to the Kosciuszko National Park Wild Horse Heritage Management Plan to allow our incredible National Parks staff to use aerial shooting as one method to rapidly reduce feral horse numbers. I want to see feral horse numbers urgently reduced in order to save the national park and our native wildlife that live there.

    The current approach is not solving the problem. Feral horse numbers have rapidly increased in Kosciuszko National Park to around 18,000, a 30% jump in just the past 2 years. With the population so high, thousands of feral horses need to be removed annually to reduce numbers and stop our National Park becoming a horse paddock. Aerial shooting, undertaken humanely and safely by professionals using standard protocols, is the only way this can happen.

    The government’s own management plan for feral horses states that ‘if undertaken in accordance with best practice, aerial shooting can have the lowest negative animal welfare impacts of all lethal control methods’.

    This humane and effective practice is already used across Australia to manage hundreds of thousands of feral animals like horses, deer, pigs, and goats.

    Trapping and rehoming of feral horses has been used in Kosciuszko National Park for well over a decade but has consistently failed to reduce the population, has delayed meaningful action and is expensive. There are too many feral horses in the Alps and not enough demand for rehoming for it to be relied upon for the reduction of the population.

    Fertility control as a management tool is only effective for a small, geographically isolated, and accessible population of feral horses where the management outcome sought is to maintain the population at its current size. It is not a viable option to reduce the large and growing feral horse population in the vast and rugged terrain of Kosciuszko National Park.

    Feral horses are trashing and trampling our sensitive alpine ecosystems and streams, causing the decline and extinction of native animals. The federal government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee has stated that feral horses ‘may be the crucial factor that causes final extinction’ for 12 alpine species.

    I recognise the sad reality that urgent and humane measures are necessary to urgently remove the horses or they will destroy the Snowies and the native wildlife that call the mountains home. I support a healthy national park where native species like the Corroboree Frog and Mountain Pygmy Possum can thrive.

    Kind regards,
    [Your name]
    [Your email address]
    [Your postcode]


    Dear Project Team,

    [YOUR PERSONALISED MESSAGE WILL APPEAR HERE.] 

    I support the amendment to the Kosciuszko National Park Wild Horse Heritage Management Plan to allow our incredible National Parks staff to use aerial shooting as one method to rapidly reduce feral horse numbers. I want to see feral horse numbers urgently reduced in order to save the national park and our native wildlife that live there.

    The current approach is not solving the problem. Feral horse numbers have rapidly increased in Kosciuszko National Park to around 18,000, a 30% jump in just the past 2 years. With the population so high, thousands of feral horses need to be removed annually to reduce numbers and stop our National Park becoming a horse paddock. Aerial shooting, undertaken humanely and safely by professionals using standard protocols, is the only way this can happen.

    The government’s own management plan for feral horses states that ‘if undertaken in accordance with best practice, aerial shooting can have the lowest negative animal welfare impacts of all lethal control methods’.

    This humane and effective practice is already used across Australia to manage hundreds of thousands of feral animals like horses, deer, pigs, and goats.

    Trapping and rehoming of feral horses has been used in Kosciuszko National Park for well over a decade but has consistently failed to reduce the population, has delayed meaningful action and is expensive. There are too many feral horses in the Alps and not enough demand for rehoming for it to be relied upon for the reduction of the population.

    Fertility control as a management tool is only effective for a small, geographically isolated, and accessible population of feral horses where the management outcome sought is to maintain the population at its current size. It is not a viable option to reduce the large and growing feral horse population in the vast and rugged terrain of Kosciuszko National Park.

    Feral horses are trashing and trampling our sensitive alpine ecosystems and streams, causing the decline and extinction of native animals. The federal government’s Threatened Species Scientific Committee has stated that feral horses ‘may be the crucial factor that causes final extinction’ for 12 alpine species.

    I recognise the sad reality that urgent and humane measures are necessary to urgently remove the horses or they will destroy the Snowies and the native wildlife that call the mountains home. I support a healthy national park where native species like the Corroboree Frog and Mountain Pygmy Possum can thrive.

    Kind regards,
    [Your name]
    [Your email address]
    [Your postcode]