Invasive weed vanishes from popular tourist attraction thanks to tiny 'miracle'
Scotch broom was first introduced as a garden plant in the early 1900s, however it quickly spread across Australia's southeast, smothering native vegetation and destroying wildlife habitat — ultimately landing itself on the list of Weeds of National Significance.
Now, in what Tim Faulkner, managing director of sanctuary Aussie Ark, has deemed an 'ecological miracle', the pesky plant has completely vanished from the conservation organisation's site situated near NSW's Barrington Tops, which is also a popular destination for eco-tourists.
'It's thick, short canopy chokes out native flora and wipes out wildlife,' Faulkner said. 'It was all over the Ark. We've been fighting it for years, a decade in fact, with more traditional methods like spraying [and] clearing, with very limited success.'
What is Scotch broom?
Scotch broom (cytisus scoparius) is a deciduous shrub that grows up to four metres tall and has deep-yellow flowers that can also feature a tinge of white and red.
It is regarded as one of the worst weeds in Australia, partly because of its economic and environmental impacts, according to the Centre for Invasive Species Solutions. The plant, which is spread solely by seeds, can reduce grazing areas and harbour feral animals such as rabbits, foxes and pigs in its dense thickets, NSW's Department of Primary Industries states.
It is toxic to humans and some animals and will cause discomfort and irritation, but it is not life-threatening. The poisonous seeds can cause high blood pressure and nausea if ingested.
Scotch broom favours disturbed sites such as roadsides and cooler areas with higher rainfall. Along with NSW, the species has been recorded in Victoria, South Australia, and Tasmania.
How did Aussie Ark finally eradicate Scotch broom?
In 2016, Aussie Ark teamed up with Scone Landcare, Landcare NSW and the Department of Primary Industries to release English broom gall mites (aceria genistae) — a tiny insect that specifically targets the invasive plant.
'It's an environmental hero, a natural control solution,' Faulkner said, adding that the ambitious biological control program was a 'slow burn' for the first eight-and-a-half years. 'Then it went boom, and the magic happened.'
Last week, Aussie Ark confirmed the insects had destroyed all remnants of the weed, which was once quite prevalent in the area.
The eradication 'from such a significant sanctuary is not just a local win', Jodie Lovell, enabling program manager at Landcare NSW said, but it's 'a model of success that could be replicated across the state'.
💦 Region's battle against sinister threat lurking at popular waterfall
🌳 Property owners warned after council finds 'significant' weed in garden
💰 How Aussie farmers are turning the tide on $4.43 billion weed problem
Local landowners, state forests and national parks called to action
English broom gall mites sit dormant each winter before becoming active again in the spring. 'That's when Aussie Ark wants to strike,' Faulkner said, encouraging local landowners and its neighbouring state forests and national parks to 'get involved'.
'Aussie Ark has the mite — a surplus of them. If you would like to join Aussie Ark to help roll out this natural, biological environmental control program, come join Aussie Ark's war on weeds.'
To find out more, contact Aussie Ark at admin@aussieark.org.au.
Do you have a story tip? Email: newsroomau@yahoonews.com.
You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and YouTube.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
15 hours ago
- Yahoo
Caravan family witness 'lucky moment' off Aussie coast: 'Pretty incredible'
A family travelling the country in their caravan were treated to an incredible display off the Australian coast right from their campsite. Renee Pike and her husband David, who have spent the past several months camping in Western Australia's Ningaloo region with their two children, aged 6 and 3, couldn't believe their eyes when reviewing drone footage of a reef manta ray cruising right by their home on wheels. Mum Renee, who witnessed the incredible moment at Winderabandi Point in June, told Yahoo News the encounter was "pretty incredible". "We saw the manta cruise past our camp," she explained, adding they decided to throw up their drone to get a closer look. The stunning creature was gliding through the water before it suddenly breached the surface and "did a backflip" in the water. "I've never seen that before," Renee said. She added that the manta captured in the footage is the "biggest" they've spotted during their extensive travels. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Australia's Coral Coast (@australiascoralcoast) Why do manta rays do backflips? Ningaloo is well known for its remarkable marine megafauna, including manta rays, whale sharks, humpback whales, turtles, and even the elusive dugong. Despite countless daily encounters on the reef, Dr Amelia Armstrong, principal researcher at the Ningaloo Manta Project, described what Renee and David saw as a very "lucky moment". While breaches themselves aren't rare, she said catching one on film is "less common". Dr Armstrong said that because the manta's cephalic lobes, the lobes near her mouth, are rolled up, it suggests she wasn't feeding. "With no other animals visible nearby, I think it's likely she was trying to shake off a remora (sucker fish), which often cling to large marine animals and can irritate the skin," she said. Even more amazingly, Dr Armstrong was able to identify the animal in Renee and David's footage as a manta nicknamed The Hoff. The stunning creature was first photographed in Coral Bay in 2005, and has been spotted more than 50 times around the region since then. The belly markings of a manta ray remain unchanged throughout its lifetime, as a useful and unique 'fingerprint' for identification. The Ningaloo Manta Project's citizen science has collected thousands of photos over the years, helping scientists keep track of the rays that call the Ningaloo home. "Every sighting adds a valuable piece to the puzzle of understanding these animals and their mysterious lives along our coastline," Dr Armstrong said. "It's fantastic to see people sharing their footage and stories as it helps us learn more to better protect these beautiful animals, and can inspire others to care." Local residents amazed by incredibly rare sight off Aussie coast Tourists 'totally outraged' by fishing crew's confronting act at sea Incredible event 'triggered by full moon' off famous Aussie coast Family's incredible caravan adventure around Australia Renee and her family, originally from the Gold Coast, have been traveling full-time since March 2023 and show no signs of stopping. While the West Coast holds a special place in their heart for its rugged terrain and incredible reef wildlife, spending two months in Tasmania was another highlight. Renee runs her consulting agency, helping female-founded businesses while on the road. David, previously a construction worker, enjoys quality time with the kids. Travelling around the country has been fantastic for "unplugging from the grind" and realising that "there is another way to do life" for Renee and her family. "It's a really cool way of life," she said, adding that meeting like-minded families has been a highlight of their travels. "It takes a lot to leap, but it kind of shakes you up a bit and makes you realise what's important," she said. Do you have a story tip? Email: newsroomau@ You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and YouTube.
Yahoo
17 hours ago
- Yahoo
Cockatoos can bust a move: Australian research
Cockatoo birds are renowned in Australia for their raucous singing, but researchers said Thursday they also boast an impressive array of dance moves. Many Australians regard cockatoos as something of a nuisance, a reputation owed in part to the parrots' cacophonous, screeching cries. But when they are not using their sharp beaks to rifle through rubbish, a new study found many cockatoo species seemed to enjoy shaking their tail feathers. Charles Sturt University researcher Natasha Lubke documented 30 different dance moves while studying various species of cockatoo -- from headbanging to body rolls. "I showed that dancing behaviour is more common in cockatoos than previously thought, and was seen in 10 of the 21 cockatoo species," said Lubke. Lubke scrolled through YouTube videos to document the dancing behaviours of pet cockatoos around the world, as well as observing the birds at Australia's Wagga Wagga Zoo. The research suggested that cockatoos "can experience pleasure and enjoy dancing", she said. Animal behaviour expert Raf Freire, who supervised the research, said it was a sign of "well-developed cognitive and emotional processes in parrots". The study was published in peer-reviewed journal PLOS One. Once dubbed "Australia's naughtiest bird", the sometimes irksome behaviour of sulphur-crested cockatoos is a source of constant fascination to scientists. Researchers earlier this year documented how a flock of cockatoos in urban Sydney had figured out how to use drinking fountains. The Australian government in 2017 spent US$50,000 (Aus$80,000) repairing damage to high-speed internet cables stripped and chewed by cockatoos. sft/djw
Yahoo
19 hours ago
- Yahoo
Great Barrier Reef records largest annual coral loss in 39 years
Australia Great Barrier Reef MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — The Great Barrier Reef has experienced its greatest annual loss of live coral across most of its expanse in four decades of record-keeping, Australian authorities say. But due to increasing coral cover since 2017, the coral deaths — caused mainly by bleaching last year associated with climate change — have left the area of living coral across the iconic reef system close to its long-term average, the Australian Institute of Marine Science said in its annual survey on Wednesday. The change underscores a new level of volatility on the UNESCO World Heritage Site, the report said. Mike Emslie, who heads the tropical marine research agency's long-term monitoring program, said the live coral cover measured in 2024 was the largest recorded in 39 years of surveys. The losses from such a high base of coral cover had partially cushioned the serious climate impacts on the world's largest reef ecosystem, which covers 344,000 square kilometers (133,000 square miles) off the northeast Australian coast, he said. 'These are substantial impacts and evidence that the increasing frequency of coral bleaching is really starting to have detrimental effects on the Great Barrier Reef,' Emslie said on Thursday. 'While there's still a lot of coral cover out there, these are record declines that we have seen in any one year of monitoring,' he added. Emslie's agency divides the Great Barrier Reef, which extends 1,500 kilometers (900 miles) along the Queensland state coast, into three similarly-sized regions: northern, central and southern. Living coral cover shrunk by almost a third in the south in a year, a quarter in the north and by 14% in the central region, the report said. Because of record global heat in 2023 and 2024, the world is still going through its biggest — and fourth ever recorded — mass coral bleaching event on record, with heat stress hurting nearly 84% of the world's coral reef area, including the Great Barrier Reef, according to the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's coral reef watch. So far at least 83 countries have been impacted. This bleaching event started in January 2023 and was declared a global crisis in April 2024. It easily eclipsed the previous biggest global coral bleaching event, from 2014 to 2017, when 68.2% had bleaching from heat stress. Large areas around Australia — but not the Great Barrier Reef — hit the maximum or near maximum of bleaching alert status during this latest event. Australia in March this year started aerial surveys of 281 reefs across the Torres Strait and the entire northern Great Barrier Reef and found widespread coral bleaching. Of the 281 reefs, 78 were more than 30% bleached. Coral has a hard time thriving and at times even surviving in prolonged hot water. They can survive short bursts, but once certain thresholds of weeks and high temperatures are passed, the coral is bleached, which means it turns white because it expels the algae that live in the tissue and give them their colors. Bleached corals are not dead, but they are weaker and more vulnerable to disease. Coral reefs often bounce back from these mass global bleaching events, but often they are not as strong as they were before. Coral reefs are considered a 'unique and threatened system' due to climate change and are especially vulnerable to global warming beyond 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) since pre-industrial times, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change proclaimed in 2018. The world has now warmed 1.3 degrees Celsius since pre-industrial times. That report said 'tropical corals may be even more vulnerable to climate change than indicated in assessments made in 2014.' The report said back-to-back big bleaching events at the Great Barrier Reef in the mid 2010s 'suggest that the research community may have underestimated climate risks for coral reefs.' 'Warm water (tropical) coral reefs are projected to reach a very high risk of impact at 1.2°C, with most available evidence suggesting that coral-dominated ecosystems will be non-existent at this temperature or higher. At this point, coral abundance will be near zero at many locations,' the report said. ____ Associated Press Science Writer Seth Borenstein in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.
