AFCMP Newsletter - February 2011

Camel damage - on the ground

This month a technical workshop will be held in Alice Springs to explore ways to measure the environmental damage caused by feral camels across a range of landscapes. These scientific methods of assessing the damage camels cause to plants, water holes and other wildlife will help to track ecosystem changes over time as feral camel densities are reduced and so give a clear picture of the effectiveness of control strategies. The workshop will involve ecologists, botanists and a range of other people with Natural Resource Management experience.

Rain and camels

The Australian spring was the wettest on record for Queensland, New South Wales, eastern Australia and the Murray-Darling Basin, according to the Bureau of Meteorology, due to exceptional rains in many parts of northern and central Australia which are normally dry at this time of year. As a result there has been outstanding growth of native vegetation and water supplies are abundant. These could potentially lead to an increase in feral camel numbers, and their dispersal across the landscape in smaller family herds – and signs of this have already been noted. The Australian Feral Camel Management Project is keeping a close eye on the situation through its partners.
 

Camel spotter

One person who has witnessed the camel incursion at first hand is David Hewitt, a long-time resident of Central Australia. (David and his wife Margaret Hewitt were both awarded the Order of Australia Medal for service to remote Indigenous communities and to the community in 2009. They have spent over 40 years travelling and working extensively across remote and central Australia.) David is an invaluable member of our network of camel spotters.
 
He says that in recent years the situation with feral camels has changed dramatically. “Out at Kalka community near the corner of the three States, a couple of years ago we counted about 600 [camels] in the community there. They were destroying everything in sight, including thirty desert kurrajongs planted as street trees. We’ve seen beautiful rock holes totally destroyed,” he says.

David is worried about risk posed by feral camels to mail planes and the Royal Flying Doctor Service at remote community airstrips. “The airstrip at Amata was fenced at great cost to keep camels away. At Tjirrkarli we had to hunt camels off the airstrip before the mail plane could land.

There are risks to drivers as well. Just two weeks ago staff from Warakurna were travelling on a gravel road west of Kata Tjuta when they hit a camel; now their vehicle is in Alice Springs, undergoing repairs. A staff member at Docker River hit a camel last year, wrote off the vehicle and she finished up in hospital.

FeralScan

FeralScan is a new national web-based feral animal mapping tool that will have direct benefits to farmers, community groups and individuals managing feral pests and their impacts – especially camels.

The FeralScan website can be used by landholders and the community in general to record and map feral animal sightings, feral animal damage, and areas where control has been conducted. It will start with a re-launch of RabbitScan (originally released in 2009), followed by the release of online mapping of feral camels (called CamelScan) this month, A series of other pests will get their own websites in the months ahead.

The project is led by Industry & Investment NSW and the Invasive Animals Cooperative Research Centre and has many partners, including Ninti One Ltd. Seewww.feralscan.org.au