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“Stings that make you feel like you’re on fire.”
For red fire ants, it’s not one bite, but hundreds in a swarm, all at the same time.
They are on the march toward Toowoomba and are moving into the Murray Darling Basin and if we don’t act quickly, they will spread into NSW and Victoria. These relentless killers even create a flotilla style raft to survive floods and their queens can fly many kilometres to form new nests.
They affect the environment, human health, food systems and our lifestyle. If we do not stop them, in this area alone it is predicted 45% of birds will decline, as well as 38% of mammals, 69% of reptiles and 95% of frogs. In America, they have already killed at least 85 people and have stopped children playing in their backyards.
It’s not just red fire ants either.
Yellow crazy ants are also wreaking havoc across northern Queensland.
They too are tiny but swarm in great numbers, killing much larger animals like lizards, frogs, small mammals, turtle hatchlings and bird chicks. They can re-shape entire ecosystems by removing these creatures that are vital for pollination and regulating bushland.
Politicians know that Australians care about eradicating killer ants before they cause permanent damage to our environment and economies.
The newly elected federal government has committed $24.8 million to eradicate yellow crazy ants, who like red fire ants, are on the list as one of the top 100 worst invasive species in the world.
The red fire ant eradication program is still at risk of failing due to red tape and a shortfall in funding.
The yellow crazy ant eradication program needs to go from an election promise into concrete action.
We must ensure that funding for yellow crazy ant eradication is delivered effectively across northern Queensland.
We must ensure that the red fire ant eradication doesn’t get deprioritised and ensure permanent damage isn’t done to our environments and economy.
Please make a tax deductible donation now and help ensure the Australian government prioritises our most damaging invasive pests and funds eradicating red fire ants and yellow crazy ants.
You can also leave a Gift in your Will, and help support a lasting environmental legacy.
Donations are tax-deductible for Australian taxpayers. The Invasive Species Council is an Australian registered charity.
Andrew Cox, Invasive Species Council CEO
The Invasive Species Council was formed in 2002 to seek stronger laws, policies and programs to protect nature from harmful pests, weeds and diseases.
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.
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.
