Thursday, August 3

The conversations which occur on the bus I drive to Swimming on Wednesdays are amazing.  My passengers are all long-term residents of Deloraine and have a farming background, so they can talk with equal authority on the town gossip and things agricultural.  Yesterday, there was a comment on dung beetles and my ears pricked up.  I didn't even know we had dung beetles in Tasmania.  I thought they only lived in Africa, living their miserable lives shoving around great lumps of elephant manure.

But, yes, there are a couple of native species, and they have been supplemented in recent years by the introduction of other species from Africa and Europe.  Checking the Internet, I found a company called Dung Beetle Solutions (am I the only person who finds this hilarious?), and a 1950s Government initiative called The Dung Beetle Project.  Apart from being a great film title, this is a good example of the 1950's thinking that all our perceived problems could be solved by introducing another species - think cane toads.

It began with arrival in Australia of Dr George Bornemissza from Hungary who noticed that our paddocks were covered with ugly brown cowpats.  This was unlike Europe where the local dung beetles did a sterling job keeping the fields green and disease-free.  It turned out that our Aussie beetles would only deal with marsupial poo.  So was born The Dung Beetle Project and, after Sixty years, these industrious little creatures have worked tirelessly to clear our paddocks.

Everybody is happy, except my ladies who can't get a decent cowpat for their roses.