An area from Armatree northwards is dealing with a "full-blown" mouse plague, a CSIRO officer says.
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Steve Henry, the national science agency's lead mouse researcher, said they were getting reports of "really high numbers from the Coonamble area".
"But also we're starting to get reports of pretty high numbers from around the Parkes area as well," he said.
"So some of those areas where we've been working in have just gone from sort of high to very high, would be the information that we're getting."
The Daily Liberal asked Mr Henry in January when it was that an outbreak of mice was classed as a plague, at which time he said it sounded like "we're starting to get to the point where there's really high numbers of mice across the board", but that he was "reluctant to say the 'p' word".
By Tuesday the situation had changed.
"Certainly there are areas of northern NSW that you would have to say is a full-blown plague," Mr Henry said.
"Armatree north, basically."
Mr Henry, whose work is funded by the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC), reported of the pests devastating some summer crops.
"We're hearing stories of almost total losses of some crops of sorghum, and obviously it's a really distressing scenario but unfortunately there's so much food in those systems now, and particularly with the amount of food that's been knocked on the ground, it's just really hard to actually find the toxin in amongst all of those seeds that are there," he said.
Mr Henry acknowledged the stress for farmers and others battling the rodents.
"Yes, absolutely it is [overwhelming] and it's easy for me sitting back here in Canberra to say 'well you've just got to keep applying bait', because I'm not the one losing crops to mice," he said.
"And it's unfortunate that some of those summer crops there's so much food in the system that the impact of the bait is significantly reduced because there's heaps of food on the ground now, and mice are really focused on eating sorghum and it's really tricky to find the bait in amongst all of that sorghum."
...hopefully mouse numbers will start to decline through the winter, because conditions are tougher in the winter in general.
- CSIRO mouse researcher Steve Henry
His message for farmers was to stay vigilant.
"In the lead-up to sowing the winter crop, and we understand there are lots of people who will be sowing the winter crop, they need to be getting a really good handle on what's going on in those paddocks, and be either baiting now, six weeks ahead of sowing, to try and push numbers low, and then being prepared to bait straight off the back of the seeder as they sow the crop," Mr Henry said.
"...because most of the damage happens in that first 24 to 48 hours after the crop's sown.
"The other advantage is when you sow the crop, you get a little bit of soil throw, and that buries a lot of the residual food that's in the paddock and if you're spreading mouse bait straight off the back of a seeder, then that mouse bait is falling on the freshly-tilled soil and it's the first thing mice will find when they break out of their burrows and they start to scurry around to look for food, and they've got a really good chance of finding that bait."
Winter, when the "breeding will slow down", could offer some relief, the mouse researcher advises.
"And so instead of in this population that's increasing exponentially, it will start to plateau off, and hopefully mouse numbers will start to decline through the winter, because conditions are tougher in the winter in general," Mr Henry said.
"But in terms of causing that monumental crash in numbers, frosty or cold or wet weather, that probably won't happen, but certainly the numbers should slow down as we go into winter, as winter progresses, and they stop breeding.
"...when they do start to decline, we do hear about it, because at the end of an outbreak, the crash in populations is very dramatic and very sudden, and people actually start ringing us and say 'hey where did all the mice go?'
"And of course, we're hopeful it will get to that point shortly, but we just can't predict it."
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