THORNY PROBLEMS - Rethinking Invasion Ecologies from the Environmental Humanities - page 126

country struggling you know, after it has been droughted or strangled with those
trees' (Pastoralists C, B, S, interviews, 2007). Once they decided that this could
not go on, they mobilised all their resources to free the land from prickle bushes.
Over a period of ten years, they used chemicals, bulldozers and aerial spraying to
eradicate the trees. This was done by members of the family with help from paid
labour and labour 'barter days' with neighbours. Large thickets were sprayed by
helicopter, widely dispersed individuals removed by quad bikes, and others were
uprooted using bulldozers. The son, who has taken on the project as his personal
mission, believed that, 'The fight is a long-term thing.' Pointing to an area of
grassland that had previously been a forest of prickly acacia, he declared, 'I think
that if we keep going for another ten, twenty years we may finally see the seed
bank disappear' (Pastoralist S, interviews, 2007).
Unsuccessful Battlers
Not all pastoralists were as successful as the Pragmatists in clearing prickle bush from
their land. Older pastoralists, who saw themselves as being at the forefront of land
improvement and forging the pastoral industry in the region, were disheartened by
the difficulties of clearing the trees from their land. They pointed out that their life
experiences, local knowledge of prickly tree behaviour, and understanding of the
physical character of their pastoral properties were often ignored by the 'best
practice' approach advocated by government agencies for eradicating the trees.
They knew from experience that chemical application and uprooting did not affect
large seed banks of prickly acacia in the soil and that new seedlings would spring
up in profusion following the wet season. They were also frustrated by the
contradictory policies and regulations that worked against prickly acacia clearance
(Pastoralists G, J, L, Ja, Sa and N, interviews, 2007). One of the chief sources of
irritation was the Queensland Vegetation Management Act, 1999 (VMA). This Act
was instituted following widespread concern over the rapid rate of vegetation and
tree clearance and conversion of freehold land for potentially unsustainable uses. It
rules against removal of native tree species and requires landholders to obtain
permits to clear trees - even those deemed non-native or invasive - from riparian
areas (Queensland Government, 1999). An older pastoralist claimed he was flabber-
gasted at the stupidity of the Act which prevents landholders from using tractors
and bulldozers within 20 metres of waterways in their properties, and requires
permits to clear declared weeds even outside the waterway boundaries. 'We are
trying to eradicate it, that's the goal,' he explained, 'but how's this? It took four
months to get a permit to kill a declared weed, and by this time the permit was a
complete waste of time as [the weed] spread rapidly and destroyed half the property
while we waited' (Pastoralist G, interviews, 2007).
Many of these Unsuccessful Battlers are of an older generation that remembers
when government agencies vigorously encouraged the planting of prickly acacia
in the past as much as they vigorously advocate its eradication in the present
(Pastoralists G, J, C, Sa and N, interviews, 2007). They pointed out that the idea