BLACKBERRY CONTROL BY GOATS

Shannon News, 8 February 1929, Page 4

BLACKBERRY CONTROL BY GOATS

Striking Success on | Hawke's Bay Station

(By H. Guthrie-Smith, Tutira Station, Hawke's Day in the Agricultural Journal.)

The local origins of the blackberry in Northern Hawke's Bay are Petane and Tangoio, where in the "seventies" hedges of this terrible weed had already been planted. On Tutira in ISS2, tberc grew a few scattered plants, which, be it said to our credit, were there, and then dug out; in fact, though neighbouring properties became gradually overrun, Tutira was practically clean of blackberry until the war.

Then, during the period between 1914 and 1919, certain areas on the station "got away." Owing to the shortage of men in New Zealand it was impossible longer to dig out the scattered bushes. These—in 1914 probably insignificant seedlings or actually not yet dropped by birds—in'creased both in numbers and size. By the end of the war they had possessed themselves of a valley or gorge facing south and another locality facing east, ; the one of 150 acres and the other of double that extent. This country had mostly, been under light bush. When in 1919 I returned from the Old Country I was horrified and astounded at the state of the run. There were enormous blackberry bushes actually, on the homestead lawn; there were 5-ft.-high thickets on the swamp '■''lands, where blackberry had been unknown; on every eligible site individual thriving plants had established themselves. The two areas already mentioned had got far beyond the ;spade; ploughing or spraying with poi,son were alike imposisble, because of landslips, limestone boulders, and dead timber.

Prior to the advent of goats the methods of defence adopted were digging, poisoning, ploughing, chipping, superphosphating and salting. Of these digging is the least expensive and most satisfactory where only scattered bushes exist; indeed, even before the coming of goats, nine-tenths of the run had been thus cleared—a man having been put on with orders to the manager that nothing short,of. murder and arson was to call bim off his job. The time taken in digging out a bush varies, of course, with the soil and situation, but the first work is the heaviest. A blackberry bush Bft. by Bft. will tnke an expert 8 hours; at a second handling of the soil is half an hour; at a third ten minutes. After that, until grassed over, two or three further inspections are necessary to pick out odd rootlets and seedlings.. The great bulk of the hill country on Tutira is new clean, and was cleaned by spade apd fork On the alluvial swamps, where dry enough, the largest patches were ploughed out —a comparatively easy for the roots on good soil..do not •penetrate deep; the bruising and tearing, moreover, of its root system seems to hurt the plant more than the clean cutting of the spaile. Elsewhere on the swamps poisoning with arsenic and weedkiller was the means employed. The difficulty was to get the poison at all seasons of the year to the spots required; the flat lands from time to t'nie becoming impa-s-able to hor.*C3, sledge and barrel, through continued wet w(-.iU:e J the plant hall-.' ..rippled th-»* obtained a new lease of life. The danger to stock, especially cattle, was, moreover, considerable. O.ie ,tin from which perhaps a drop per hour of weedkiller had been escaping cost the station six bullocks. On another occasion I lost eight round a single newlysprayed bush. The smell of arsenicwithered leaves and tendrils attracts cattle from miles around.

I may say here that except to destroy the greenery, I have found all such cures for blackberry absolutely worth-: less. Even greater waste of energy was chipping the young shoots as they appeared. The cost of saltpetre was prohibitive—in the end it cost more than spade work. Superphosphating blackberry I have tried only as an interestitng experiment, and when experience of goats had made me comparatively careless as to the result. Blackberry will get out of hand with sheep alone on land wintering five sheep to the acre, but whether sheep alone on supei'phoosphated light hill soils would keep blackberry in check I do not know. If the land was sufficiently barren and miserable probably they would. / These various attempts at control were made elsewhere than on the main plaguespots—the patches of fallen bush already mentioned. There for several seasons gangs of Maoris were employed annually to cut the bushes level with the ground. This had the effect of metamorphosing the cone, into which in the open the natural bush develops into a creeping star, the terminal bud of each ray shooting early in March. I have calculated that each season the blackberry thus out —for in practice no scythe would get the flattest shoots —more than doubled its size. In the end, to make a long story short, the station was paying many hundreds of pounds a year in labour almost absolutely unproductive, the blackberry area was fast increasing, and the difficulty \v, obtaining men for this particularly distasteful' job was getting more pronounced.

The Goats and Their Work. * I had heard of goats and the work done by them, but as in graver^matters fear of the unknown makes u» unwilling to test new methods, so for, months I boggled over their purchase. However, goats finally were bought about

seven* years- ago; Several of the small lots acquired 1 were* well-bred Angora; the others the- very refuse of the race — terrible looking brutes of every size, colour and make. Year by year this .unprepossessing herd has increased, o.i:ly the best Angora kids being retained as billies and fast the flock is becoming white. Wo have now six hundred mature goats—an amply, supply for our requirements—and this year got over 200 kids. So far no attempt to utilize the fleece has been made, but at the. next docking the best will be roughly taken off and bagged. Since arrival of the goats the annual cutting of the blackberry has altogether ceased. The bushes on the twin <plague-spots—portions of 700-acre and 800-acre paddocks—are now browsed flat. At first some care was exercised in .barking the goats back to . these infested corners, but after a week or so the newcomers settled down and since then have been left pretty much to their own devices. In summer they somewhat, spread to search for and devour the prickly tops of three or four, species of prickly thistle growing on the run; in autumn and winter they contract their range and confine themselves to a diet of hard, thorny stems. I have reason to believe that during their summer'excursions any outlying lawyer or blackberry discovered is never afterwards forgotten. No doubt the goats do take a certain amount of grass, but the area of .land kept open by them and now also grazed by sheep, more than makes up for the pasture devoured. They prefer, in fact, blackberry, lawyer, and coarse hard herbage to the best grasses. I have known a mob to -pass over newly laid down grasses and clovers of two ior three inches high—excellent sheep feed—to reach the roughest of herbage. Scattered blackberry bushes on the rich alluvial flats are more than held in hand; I have no doubt whatsoever, . that even blackberry in lucerne would be discovered and nibbled back. Certainly ,too, goats eat much seedling manuka of an inch or so in height; they also trim the bigger bushes. At first I did not care to see goats in every paddock, but nowadays we let them go where they like sure that they can do no harm; and sure, too, that any seedling blackberry that may have escaped human eyes, will never be allowed to grow more than an inch Oi so in height or spread. They are the; police of this country; they arrest all sorts of vegetable ne'er-do-wells. We are glad to see them establishing themselves in paddock after paddock. The success of the goat as a blackberry destroyer is the more remarkable in that—on Tutira at any rate —the most virulent and luxuriant growth of Rubus fruticosus u to be found on steep aspects, hillsides facing due south and therefore damp, cold, and almost sunless throughout the winter months. There, nevertheless, goats do most congregate, and there they have nibbled the bushes as box edgings are trimmed by garden shears. This-means in practice that maybe by an inch or so a year the bushes in the most extremely wet places do enlarge themselves. Any big bush, however, thus increasing, becomes a mass of dead cane, and will burn readily in spring or during a spell of summer heat. It can then be blackened to ground level and the process of the weakening plant starts again. So much is blackberry being hampered that I am beginning to think that on heavily goat-stocked land the plant may eventually altogether disappear.

So far there is a local demand for goats, but what eventual use will be made of the several hundred thousand that will be required permanently in this part of Hawko's Bay I know not To shear them entails the risk of a cold snap, and goats are far less hardy than sheep. Although our flock spends the year roaming whore they will, as the expression goes, 'u*p to their eyes in feed," they do not show commensurate results in weight. I know of only one wether J'at enough to kill, and some of the Toggenburg and An-glo-Nubian crosses are very greyhounds in their lenten leanness. I confess, however, that neither shearing nor fattening have been much in mind—we have been content to regard goats as mere animated scythes. They give us no trouble in mustering; except at docking time, the mixed mob of sheep and goats is given a few minutes at gateways when they separate themselves naturally—the goats being allowed to draw off and return to their good work. So far, in a climate of 55Mn. average rainfall, no foot-rot among goats has troubled us.

Conclusion.

To reiterate: Since the stocking of Tutira with goats at the rate of 60 per 1,000 sheep, scything and poisoning of blackberry, have altogether and absolutely ceased. Spade work, too, has been stopped.in paddock after paddock; now, indeed, it is practised only in the hedges and plantations of the policies, where, however, already tic number of seedlings brought by birds is sensibly diminishing. The G jvr cent, of goats carried has niade no difference in the feed available for sheep. In paddocks of six and seven hundred acres goats work the blackberry areas without shepherding. During the winter months goats crowd on the cold, wet steep, sunless southern slopes. Goats are reasonably amenable; they give no trouble in mustering, and stay put to a much greater extent than would appear probable from their known activity. They do juni-p fences, and they do straggle, but when brought back they remain. At the worst they arc no worse than Merinos; indeed, in my recollections they are less restless and wild than this breed of sheep. Nor must it be thought that only large areas of ground can satisfactorily be treated with goats. Several of the settlers in this neighbourhood on 800 and 1200aore farms are making a good job of the pest, and so flattening to eart-Ii the

horrid cone-shaped excresenccs that the countryside is in appearance, improved cut of all knowledge. Sections that have until lately been regarded as practically worthless will again support settlers.

The stocking of Tutira with goats to the extent of 60 to 1000 sheep has been in my estimation an unqualified succes. si do not see how this method of blackberry control can be bettered.