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Campaign Against Canned Hunting (CACH)

Armyworm - the new threat to African wildlife

2/7/2017

13 Comments

 
Picture
The Armyworm is a greater threat to African wildlife than all the the hunters and Rhino poachers put together.

And I am prepared to bet that no one reading this blog post has any idea why. But I do because I’ve seen it all before.

Droughts are endemic in Africa and are often followed by floods. When that happens, there is an explosion of growth of grass and other plant matter, and Nature in its wisdom, tells all the little locust and other insect eggs to hatch and go on the rampage.

Of course Nature in its wisdom knows that the locust swarms and insect pests will create a feeding frenzy for Africa’s bird and small mammal populations. But Mankind does not live by Nature’s rules. Mankind thinks it is smarter than nature. What would be a feast for bird and small mammal populations are a plague to humans. Worse, they threaten economic interests and therefore insult the great God Money to whom all humans pray daily, regardless of the subsidiary religions that they claim to worship.

Anyone who speaks out against economic interests is regarded universally as an heretic of the worst kind.

Here is how  this situation will play out and how so much of Africa’s wildlife is going to be wiped out.

I was farming in the Western Transvaal during the last drought and when the rains came we had locust swarms and a plague of army worms. Those army worms were awful things because they covered the ground like a carpet and everywhere you walked they stuck to the bottom of your shoes in a horrid squashed mess.

Of course all the landowners received government aid - in the form of poisoned corn, which they laid out and spread in long lines on their land. Sure enough the marching ranks of insect pests devoured the poisoned corn and died - but not before they had done great damage to the crops.

Insects provide the prey base for African wildlife. So behind the insect plague came every bird and small mammal in the affected area, gratefully feasting upon the plentiful insect food – and dying from poisoning in their thousands. All the little guinea fowl flocks, the meerkat families,the foxes –etc, they ate and died.
​Once the poison has entered the food chain, up it goes to the raptors, and kills them too.

I did not spread poison on my land. Instead I waited to see what Nature would do. After a week or so of army worm infestation there arrived on my land hundreds of sacred ibises. Where they came from I know not, but I had never seen ibises on my land before. They cleaned up the veld until it was hard to see any army worms left. And then they flew away.
The grasses and vegetation soon recovered and within a month there was no evidence of any army worm damage.

But, I have little doubt that after cleaning up my land for me, the ibises would have landed on farms most of whom had spread poison out for the insects - and been wiped out.

The big chemical companies will deny that their product causes secondary poisoning and they will reassure the public with sophisticated public relations that their organophosphate poisons are eco-friendly and will break down in the soil once they have done their job.

Do not believe these blandishments. The poisons may break down in time but not before they have wiped out much of Africa’s wildlife. This PR may fool the public, but you can’t fool Nature. 

And who will stand up for the wildlife in South Africa? We have a Department of Environment of course – the very same department that eagerly promotes canned lion hunting as 'conservation.' And we have the wildlife unit of the Department of Agriculture (DAFF) which eagerly promotes the use of gin traps and other forms of indiscriminate mass killing, which are aimed at small predators like caracals and jackals, but actually decimate bird and small mammal populations on South Africa’s farms.
 
In other words no one in SA will stand up for the wildlife. So buy shares in Bayer and Monsanto; the big chemical companies are going to make billions out of this calamity.
And turn a blind eye to the environmental destruction which you’re about to witness.

Do not forward the link to this post if you are afraid of being called ‘elitist’ or ‘racist’ or any other epithet dreamed up by chemical industry PR firms.


13 Comments
RICH Russom link
2/7/2017 05:55:00 am

Not good at all!!!

Reply
Julien Crowther
2/7/2017 06:19:00 am

We have already seen this in the UK.

The last 50 years have seen a massive decrease in wildlife - the population of hedgehogs for instance has declined from an estimated 35 million in the 1950s to fewer than one million now.

Our native and migrant insect-eating birds have no food - those migrants which manage to escape the onslaught of hunters and trappers all around the Mediterranean find their habitat degraded and food scarce.

Car windscreens, which formerly were spattered with insects in the summer, now stay clean all year round, apart from mud.

Intensive farming, along with over-use of chemicals and a massive increase in the human population, has meant our land is no longer teeming with wildlife.

Reply
manuela bosi
2/7/2017 10:29:19 am

the same is happening in italy....very few bats left and swallows and hedgehogs so much that in summer we are invaded by mosquitos: it is almost impossible to stay outdoors in the summer evenings because of all the mosquitos biting you...30 40 years ago it was not like thistr

Reply
Stephen Palos link
2/8/2017 04:14:58 am

This would probably have been useful information and possibly even made a difference if it hadn't started by insulting the readers intelligence and then deviating in the end firstly into anti hunting rhetoric and then a bunch of nonsense about elitism or racism...
You're clearly a miserable individual and it shows in your wri(ant)ing

Reply
Alan Snooker
2/8/2017 07:45:25 am

Stephen, I don’t wish to insult your ‘intelligence,’ but you are looking at an article (very useful indeed, I agree) on a page from the Campaign Against Canned Hunting (CACH), so you should surely expect there to be comment on the lack of regulation of captive hunting quite widely dispersed on the pages within (?). Then it appears you have posted a link by your name to the Confederation of Hunting Associations of South Africa's (CHASA's) own propaganda page – which seems filled with nothing but rhetoric and deluded, scientifically unsubstantiated claims. You are clearly a miserable man filled with hatred and a need to kill wildlife for fun, but if your ranting on CACH helps you let off steam whilst displaying your 'intelligence,' then no real harm done I suppose.

Reply
Stephen Palos
2/8/2017 09:49:02 am

You're funny :-)
I happened to find the link because a Facebook newsfeed intrigued me, the title of the article being about threats to wildlife and all...
I was certainly a bit miffed early on when I read "And I am prepared to bet that no one reading this blog post has any idea why" as I thought that a bit opinionated, but still, the subject mattered so I soldiered on. I then thought, this deserves sharing. It's common sense, but people do need to be reminded of getting back to basics (hunters are good that way... ;-) )
Only when the deviation into lame-brained, anti-everything rhetoric arrived did I even realize I was at the fringe element of the absolute twilight zone in a rabid animal rightist space. Well, as usual when going to Cloud-cuckoo land, it's been fun!

Gwen Merrick
2/8/2017 07:40:28 am

Our hawks are diminishing fast in Britain and you won't find one nightingale in Barclay Square. No squirrels last year (we usually see grey ones in North London). I would never have thought that secondary poisoning could be one of the causes.

Reply
Che Venter
2/10/2017 08:26:54 am

Hi Chris, what are your thoughts on the use of BTi for control of Army worm

Reply
Chris Mercer
2/10/2017 10:58:44 pm

Che I favour biological control like BTi over the popular use of organophosphates, but know very little about it.

Reply
Che Venter
2/12/2017 11:28:46 pm

As I understand it, it is being promoted currently for use against the Fall Army worm. If it has been registered (emergency registration) I am not sure. I think it is important to acknowledge that this threat is not only for the commercial farmers, but also for the small scale farmers and to them the effects can be quite detrimental. BTi is quite expensive and that is why most farmers go for cheaper OPs. I think DAFF and DEA should take some responsibility here and assist farmers to obtain the BTi affordably? I can't find any communication from DAFF on what has currently been approved for emergency use, but I promise you a nice cheap OP will be on there. Just on a side note, as I understand it the African Army worm and Fall Army worm are different, the Fall Army worm is resistant to pyrethroids (safer options against secondary poisoning - when used according to the label which not many farmers do), thus OPs and other options are explored. Most OPs DO pose a very high risk of secondary poisoning and we need to make this aware to the public. I don't think the answer is do nothing, I think the answer is give the farmer all the information and support the use of a safer alternative.... but that probably won't happen

Chris Mercer
2/13/2017 05:03:28 am

Thanks Che for your enlightening post about BTi.

Reply
Henry van Biljon
2/10/2017 11:26:01 pm

This is a potential disaster of THE GREATEST PROPORTION!!!!

Reply
Chris Mercer
2/13/2017 10:58:52 pm

Here is a more detailed scientific explanation of the threat from army worm
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox/15a381c9e285a8db

Reply



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