Crops and Wildlife
Introduction
The growing of fruit and vegetables requires intensive use of land for production. Many horticulturists are seeking to maximise productivity from their properties, while retaining and revegetating areas for windbreaks, water quality and wildlife habitat.Horticulturists can encounter problems with native birds and animals eating or damaging crops. There are a range of options to manage these problems. Many horticulturists see the benefits of having a biodiverse farm system and manage their properties to allow for a diversity of wildlife.
Horticulturists are reducing their use of chemicals to meet consumer demands, cut costs and reduce environmental impacts. Reductions of up to 60% of chemicals have been achieved in apple, tomato, capsicum and eggplant production in the past few years. These reductions have reduced the effects of chemicals on beneficial insects and predators and have allowed nature to keep pest numbers under control.
The Queensland Fruit and Vegetable Growers have initiated a Code of Practice for Sustainable Fruit and Vegetable Production in Queensland which includes advice for growers on soil, water and biodiversity issues.
Pest management
Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is the integration of all available pest control methods in property management. This enables flexibility in pest control, but requires:- an openness to attempt to work with nature, rather than against it:
- know the difference between pests and beneficial insects; and
- know how much pest numbers a crop can tolerate, before resorting to spray.
The use of 'soft option' biological sprays does not harm non-target pest controlling species, such as predatory insects, spiders, frogs and birds eat pest species.
"We flogged the soil something terrible. I was spraying every two or three days, now I only spray when I have to, maybe once in ten weeks with a biological spray."
Over the years, the beneficial species have built up, forming a natural pest control team. "I'm finding green frogs in the cabbages and birds flying through the crop eating moths."
Thanks to the efforts of Kevin and the DPI's Queensland Horticulture Institute at Gatton, about 25% of Lockyer Valley growers are using IPM, with more moving in that direction. Kevin has participated in a FutureProfit course for local growers.
A new label identifying IPM produced crops is being discussed to help Kevin and others to market their produce.
Fruit orchard
Mick and Margaret McGinnis operate a 20ha sub-tropical fruit orchard on a north facing slope in the Sunshine Coast hinterland. The property was initially mostly bare pasture. The McGinneses first planted bananas and pawpaws but moved into sub tropical varieties of peaches, nectarines and persimmons for improved returns.The property includes a strip of riparian vegetation along Petrie Creek which has been retained as wildlife habitat. Native vegetation planted as windbreaks along property and orchard boundaries provides corridors and further habitat for wildlife. Swales and grassed waterways intercept and slow runoff, reducing erosion and trapping sediment. The water is discharged to storage dams through planted filter strips. The lowest dam in the system is planned to incorporate a constructed wetland planted with native aquatic plants that further filter runoff, and provide grazing, harvestable material, and wildlife habitat. Stored water is used for irrigation, while any storm overflow to Petrie Creek is low in nutrient and sediment, helping maintain water quality.
Animals found on the property as residents or visitors include:
- Birds that eat insects, pollinate plants and disperse native seed
- Antechinuses and microbats that eat insects
- Wallabies that browse shrubs and disperse useful root fungi
- Flying foxes that pollinate native timber species
- Reptiles that eat insects and rodents
- Spiders that eat insects
Banana plantation
Allan Sellars' banana property near Tully is a Landcare award winner for the standards of best practice management used in minimising chemical and fertiliser runoff, soil conservation and eroded area remediation, water conservation and wildlife habitat.The property is within the Wet Tropics World Heritage area and is bordered by rainforest.
The property includes significant rainforest remnants as well as a network of vegetation along creeklines and across the property. This network of vegetation acts as a wildlife corridor, allowing rainforest animals to move across the property between the rainforest. Endangered southern cassowary are regularly seen moving across the property.
The Sellars also set feral pig traps and hunt pigs who eat cassowary eggs and chicks.
The southern cassowary Casuarius casuarius is often seen wandering across the Sellar's property. Their farm management provides wildlife corridors for the cassowaries and other native animals.
Polly wanna peanut
The peanut growers of Lakeland in Cape York have found an innovative way to stop Red-tailed Black-Cockatoos Calyptorhynchus banksii from eating their peanut crops - they grow a field of peanuts specifically for the cockatoos.Growers had suffered significant losses to the birds, who have been visiting the area for hundreds of years to eat seeds from bloodwood trees, and have in recent years developed a liking for peanuts. Growers were forced to shoot birds to scare them away, but the birds invariably returned. Killing birds didn't work.
The 'sacrifice' crop allows the birds to eat their fill on a community and industry sponsored field while leaving commercial crops alone.
Farmers still have concerns about the project, particularly that the cockatoo population will increase rapidly as a result of the free food. For at least the next two years Birds Australia volunteers will count cockatoos regularly to see whether there are increases and management can be adjusted accordingly.
In the meantime the farmers have an alternative to killing that actually works.
Last updated: 28 November 2003
