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Recent rains fuel invasive buffel grass crisis across South Australia

Recent significant rainfall across South Australia has triggered an extensive and dangerous surge of buffel grass, prompting urgent calls for the state government to release its long-delayed government-wide strategy and commit to a $2 million per year, multi-year plan.

Buffel grass burns hotter, faster, and more frequently than native grasses, threatening lives, infrastructure, and culturally significant areas. The green growth now is next bushfire season’s catastrophe. 

‘Buffel grass is surging across the state as a result of recent rainfall and our landscapes are rapidly changing before our eyes into buffel monocultures – this surge now is tomorrow’s firestorm in the making,’ the Invasive Species Council Senior Advocate James Johnston said. 

‘In late February, I was out in Mambray Creek to see the main front where buffel has spread south. This week, I was sent photos side by side from then to now and was absolutely shocked to see how much the buffel had grown in such a short period of time. 

‘Buffel grass is aggressively choking our waterways and sacred sites. Road and rail corridors have become super spreaders, turning our critical transport infrastructure into tinderboxes that warp rail lines and cut off remote communities when they burn.

‘While the South Australian government held a roundtable back in 2024, the government-wide strategy to tackle this crisis is still sitting on a shelf.

‘In the absence of leadership, buffel grass has continued its relentless spread – pushing as far south as Port Pirie and now threatening some of the state’s most productive agricultural land.

‘This is what delay looks like – while reports sit unreleased, invasive species don’t wait – they spread. We have written to the new Environment Minister, Emily Bourke and the Treasurer, Tom Koutsantonis, urging the government to take action.

‘The window to protect the Flinders Ranges, which is currently seeking world heritage listing, is closing.

‘We have the plan; we now need the political will to fund it. In the upcoming state budget, we hope to see the government-wide buffel plan enacted and funded before our desert ecosystems are lost forever.’

The Invasive Species Council is calling for an immediate commitment to the following six-point plan:

  • Fund the whole-of-government business case: Provide $2 million per year over 7 years to move from reactive control to proactive eradication.
  • Appoint a statewide coordinator: Establish a central authority to synchronise efforts across transport, environment, and emergency service agencies.
  • Empower landscape boards: Grant regional boards the specific resources and legal authority needed for strict compliance and enforcement.
  • Targeted research investment: Fund the development of new treatments and tech-driven strategies to tackle established infestations.
  • National advocacy: Secure the listing of buffel grass as a Weed of National Significance (WoNS) and push for a federal threat abatement plan.
  • Drive behavioural change: Launch statewide educational campaigns to prevent travelers and the industry from unknowingly transporting seeds.

Media inquiries: (02) 8006 5004

Before and after photos are available here.

Related Content

Science not politics should drive decision-making on buffel grass
Statement on Northern Territory government declaring buffel grass as weed
Traditional Owners bring buffel grass crisis to Canberra

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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]