Farmers Ben Evans, Alison Wright and Christine Sebire with a colony of 3500 dung beetles. Photos: Steve Huntley
Photo by
Steve Huntley
A business in Canberra has donated 20,000 dung beetles to five flood-impacted farmers in northern Victoria. ADAIR WINDER has the story.
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Dung beetles are a valuable addition to a farm’s ecosystem.
The beetles can not only be used to break up and take away cow dung from the ground’s surface, providing the farmer with more pasture space, they can also reduce the number of flies and larvae.
Alison Wright has a small beef cattle farm that was under floodwater for about six days in October.
After the floods she realised there was no dung beetle activity any more, meaning cow dung was just sitting on the ground and taking up space.
“I have a farm that is 160 acres [65ha] in size,” Alison said.
“It’s not big and we have about 20 cows, so for us, every inch of space is incredibly important and we try not to waste any.”
She looked into purchasing a colony of dung beetles from a company in Canberra called Soilcam and was blown away by the cost of beetles — $2000 for one colony.
Soilcam came back to Alison and generously offered to donate 20,000 beetles to a group of flood-impacted farmers.
Alison then engaged with community members and asked them to put the call out to farmers.
Christine Sebire, a dairy farmer from Bamawm Extension, was one of five farmers to put her hand up for the beetle donation.
She thanked Alison for coming up with such an innovative idea.
“It’s just such a great initiative,” Christine said.
Close up of the different dung beetle species in compost soil.
Photo by
Steve Huntley
In a Soilcam brochure, it says the average cow produces 10 to 12 litres of dung per day.
Left alone, the dung can foul waterways and create fertile breeding sites for pests and weeds.
Alison encouraged farmers to monitor the level of dung beetle activity on their farm.
She said farms impacted by the floods might still have dung beetles on their property, but most likely not to the level they should be.
“They don’t upset the natural ecosystem because they only eat cow poo,” Alison said.
“If you rotate your cows to a different paddock, they will often follow, and they also reduce nitrogen output into the environment because they move the dung under the ground.”
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