Weed (invasive plants) control strategies

Taking a proactive approach to control weeds (called invasive plants in the Biosecurity Act 2014) is generally much better than waiting for problems to occur. Deciding on a weed management strategy early allows you to plan your activities and allocate a budget for dealing with your weed problems.

Doing nothing may save you money in the short term, but your property may suffer from weed impacts, which may cost you in the long term. You may also face penalties for non-compliance with invasive plant control laws.

Choosing a weed management strategy

To make cost-effective business decisions on weed control, you need to gather information on:

• the size of the problem on your property and how much it is costing you
• total costs of available control methods and likely benefits of each, including time frames.

Based on this information, you can perform a simple cost-benefit analysis on various pest management strategies for your problem. This may help you decide which of the broad strategies described below is best for your business.

Planned, ongoing management

Planned, ongoing weed management strategies have high initial and ongoing costs. Yet, this approach is also likely to deliver long-term benefits with reduced weed incursions and impacts.

Local eradication

If you have a small property with a well-defined problem, you may consider local eradication strategies. This approach has high initial costs but limited ongoing costs as only monitoring will be required. If successful, local eradication can deliver long-term benefits for your property.

Crisis management

If weed incursions are high and their impacts are obvious, you may decide to implement crisis management strategies. This approach has high initial costs but no ongoing costs. You will probably see reduced invasive plant impacts in the short term, but long-term benefits are unlikely.