Problems plague mouse app
GRAIN growers and researchers are having a “significant rethink” about the best way to collect meaningful data on mice to warn farmers about mouse plagues.
This follows severe damage to crops this season.
The rethink comes as a phone app, Mouse Alert, designed for growers to report mouse damage – has come up short for meaningful data collection.
Information provided by farmers to Mouse Alert did not provide adequate data for researchers to be able to model potential outbreaks. And the app’s effectiveness has been termed “miserable”.
This is according to CSIRO mice research officer Steve Henry, one of three Grains Research and Development Corporation-funded staff monitoring mice across southern and eastern Australia.
Mr Henry said Mouse Alert still provided some useful information for growers on a local basis.
He said historically state agriculture departments would employ people to monitor mice, in order to predict and warn farmers about plagues, but now there were fewer extension staff.
Mouse Alert was managed and delivered by the Invasive Animals CRC, now known as Centre for Invasive Species Solutions.
A GRDC spokeswoman said the agency hadn’t “specifically invested in Mouse Alert as a separate initiative, it was developed and delivered as part of the overall (mouse) investments ... delivered by the Invasive Animals CRC”.
In the three years to 2015-16 the GRDC invested $668,902 with the Invasive Animals CRC, which delivered a series of mouse projects including Mouse Alert.
Centre for Invasive Species Solutions chief executive Andreas Glanznig admitted Mouse Alert had not been as successful as its community driven monitoring projects for rabbits and wild dogs.
Mr Henry said the industry was working out the best way to monitor mice numbers, which could involve remote sensing technology, potentially located at weather stations.