Orana region residents besieged by mice are being told it will take burrows being flooded with water to wipe out the pests in large numbers.
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CSIRO lead mouse researcher Steve Henry advised it was too early to tell if this week's widespread falls - including 80mm of rain at Dubbo in the past three days - would "make a real difference".
He said the rain would benefit control efforts, but until the point where it started to "basically drown litters that are in the burrows, we don't think it will have a major effect".
"If burrows are flooding, then that will be drowning babies and that's obviously a good thing in terms of reducing the mouse population," he said.
"The other benefit is all of this rain is going to be germinating a lot of the residual food that is in these systems, and when farmers can get back on their country to spray out those germinations, that's also going to take a lot of food out of the system for mice.
"So certainly this rain is not advantageous to mice, and just the magnitude of the event is going to determine whether it's detrimental or not."
All eyes have been on the skies in recent days with rural communities desperate for relief from the rodents that have ruined some summer crops and stored hay and invaded silos, sheds, homes and businesses across a large tract of western NSW.
Mr Henry will head to the Orana region next week at the invitation of Coonamble and Castlereagh District Landcare to deliver a series of workshops for farmers about mouse control and minimising damage in the lead-up to sowing the winter crop.
The workshops will start on March 29 at Collie and proceed to Armatree, Coonamble, Burren Junction, Walgett, Baradine and Tooraweenah.
For more information and to RSVP people can contact Coonamble and Castlereagh District Landcare coordinator Nikki McKeown at coonamblelandcare@gmail.com or on 0457 221 872.
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