For me personally, the short story with using herbicides in bush regen goes a little something like this. Prior to actively practicing revegetation and bush regen I was an avowed organic gardener. However the dominant paradigm I joined, is that if you’re a professional bush regenerator then you can’t do bush regen or revegetation (particularly in the subtropics) without using systemic herbicides to remove or control the rampant weeds that are getting in the way of ecological restoration works….
Before going any further and risking being cut stumped myself (bush regen in joke) for drifting too far from the true and correct path of professional bush regeneration, I’d just like to say that I’m not necessarily writing off the use of herbicides. They have proven to be valuable tools to the bush regen industry and will continue to be so for the majority, although a few “chemical free” operators are pioneering new (and old) ways of weed control.
A statement I’ve used in the past to defend use of herbicides in bush regeneration, is that “without herbicides we can’t practice bush regen successfully in the way we are currently practicing bush regeneration”. That statement would often be enough to convince me (as it is for so many others) that herbicides are central to the mainstream practice of bush regeneration (particularly within the industry itself). Professional Bush Regenerators have become part of a system / mindset that sees use of herbicides as crucial to its practice; that all weeds / introduced plants are bad and cause damage in all situations; that any questioning of the dominant paradigm is heresy…
So, the statement that “without herbicides we can’t practice bush regen successfully in the way we are currently practicing bush regeneration” – is true, but what I hadn’t challenged myself to do was think that this statement can be looked at in two different ways and that we can practice bush regeneration without (or with at least vastly reduced herbicide use) by simply practicing bush regeneration differently to how the vast majority of us are currently doing so.
The difficulty in being a bush regenerator and keeping your sights on ecological restoration work (which is what we are supposed to be focusing on!) is that predominantly what we do is weed control, so its very easy to get distracted into functioning as a weed control technician, especially when many of your clients are focused on year to year (short term) statistics and weed control is often the highest priority on their list… and it could well be argued that the most cost and labour effective way of controlling weeds when looked on a year to year (short term) basis is often with herbicides. Weeds Bad. Target Weeds. Kill Weeds. Move onto next Target… But hey, we’re Bush Regenerators and supposed to be restoring ecosystems, right? I would argue that this cant be done / can’t be done well / can’t be done effectively when done on a year to year basis. The way we use herbicides is a symptom of our short-term vision and lack of understanding of succession and ecological process’s.
At Brush Turkey Enterprises, we have practiced for over a decade, what I call “Successional Weed Management”, which has loosely encompassed the practice of managing natural successional processes (that even included exotic plants) to achieve ecological restoration / return of native vegetation communities. Put simply we don’t have to kill all exotic plants all the time as a) many will not survive on a site as the native vegetation community progresses through the succession process and b) some may even be beneficial in the successional process. I made up the term “Successional Weed Management” to justify to a council project officer our desire not to spray Ludwigia octovalvis (native but considered weedy – because of potential flow reduction) in waterway in a newly established revegetation project. My argument was that the fast-growing tree species e.g. Eucalyptus grandis, Eucalyptus robusta, Commersonia bartramia and Macaranga tanarius would shade the waterway within 2 years – which they did, and that the Ludwigia would not dominate or choke the waterway – which it didn’t, and in the meanwhile they provided many positive benefits including water filtration and habitat. There’s the catch we don’t often consider, many “weeds” can provide positive ecological restoration values when managed rather than eliminating them purely for the sake of eliminating them.
One of my key beliefs in ecological restoration practice and in business is not to get locked into dogma (which is an easy path to take on the road to professionalisation in an industry) and this year I have been fortunate to see and participate in several challenges to the dominant paradigm of systemic herbicides being crucial to professional ecological restoration work. The “Zero Chemical K’gari FCRC CEP” at Happy Valley, K’gari (Fraser Island) is an exceptional project that has been up and running for many years. I’ve also been fortunate to meet a dynamic duo who are operate a completely chemical free bush regeneration company on the north side of Brisbane. Last but not least the work of Ernst Gotsch in Brazil and Joachim Milz of Ecotop Bolivia have also provided much inspiration and information with regards managing succession to generate not only ecological restoration but also regenerative food and resource production.
Just to be clear I’m not arguing for a complete abstinence from herbicide use, certainly in our own business we continue to use (although useage is much reduced). I am arguing / suggesting / cajoling that we reconsider when and how, or (in many situations) do we need to use at all? Single use e.g. Glyphosate 360 applied via a Splatter Gun can be an effective step to converting lantana dominated slopes into rainforest in our area – but only with all of the ongoing manual work to ensure native regen’ gets ahead of exotic regrowth. Woody and Vine weed control, particularly thickets of shrubs, saplings or vines e.g Ochna, Privet, Cats Claw and Maderia are easier to kill with herbicides given current methodologies. Regular groundcover spraying (scorched earth) in revegetation where growth of trees could in 3-5 years shade out the exotic groundcovers, could be argued to be unnecessary, if not counterproductive. At the centre of all our decisions and actions should the pursuit of the most effective, wholistic practices that will deliver long term ecological restoration that lasts decades and centuries not just a few years.
So where to from here… for us at Brush Turkey we use and recommend our “successional weed management” methodology and also are trialing a range of other methodologies to reduce and potentially phase out systemic herbicide use. Close to home we are putting our money where our mouth is and have dropped use of systemic herbicides on our property “Forest Farm” and so far the results from practices we are trialling are looking good, well actually more that good, in many cases vastly improved results … and this will be covered more in future articles.
