Lovegrass, or more accurately African Lovegrass, has got a lot to do with farm viability.
African Lovegrass (Eragrostis curvula) (ALG) is an invasive weed that has infested many areas of Gippsland and beyond, divided communities and devalued properties.
Prior to March 2008, African Lovegrass was listed under State Legislation as a “Regionally Prohibited” Weed in East Gippsland prompting the development of an African Lovegrass Control Strategy for the Gippsland region. This resulted in considerable funding, investment and enforcement activity for around a decade.
After March 2008, African Lovegrass was reclassified as a “Regionally Controlled” Weed in East Gippsland, with funding and enforcement downgraded as a result.
Since that time, Toms Creek Landcare group has led the way amongst East Gippsland Landcare groups to inform and encourage landholders and government agencies to focus on identifying where the weed is most problematic and encouraging landholders to use best practice techniques in controlling the weed.
After initially concentrating on larger landholders, and running demonstrations on a number of properties, Toms Creek Landcare group eventually teamed up with Gippsland Agricultural Group to run demonstrations on the GAgG Research Farm.
Local consultant Alison Gunn from Herd Solutions was tasked with managing the project and designing a layout of demonstration plots at the Research Farm.
Alison recounts how she was talking to a member of one of her discussion groups, and he suggested applying for funding to start a project on African Lovegrass. The Toms Creek Landcare Smart Farms project: “Establishing and promoting best practise African Lovegrass control in East Gippsland” was born.
She describes African Lovegrass as “nearly the perfect weed. The seed can last in the soil for up to 15 years, the plant is tough and drought-proof and the seed is tiny and so easy to spread”.
She has seen the weed first-hand on her own property.
“It had drifted onto our farm from the roadside while we been working away for a few years, and we were spending at least a day a week for 4-5 months on the quad bike trying to get on top of it. It was very time-consuming as we tried to locate every plant including very small seedlings.”
“A policy on our farm is that you cannot ignore or drive past an African Lovegrass plant without doing something about it, so effectively it was given the highest priority.”
Hundreds of people have visited the plots at the Research farm since then to hear the story of the main chemical and physical treatments which can be applied to control African Lovegrass.
Alison says: “The work Toms Creek Landcare has done with demonstrations both on farm and at the Gippsland Research Farm has allowed good discussion and demonstration in the district of what does and does not work in ALG control. There are a number of farms that have taken the learnings from those projects and are using them to control ALG.”
East Gippsland Landcare Network released an interim African Lovegrass Best Practice Manual in 2012, and one of the tasks for the Toms Creek Landcare project was to update that manual. Alison Gunn prepared much of the source material for the manual, with oversight from Neil Moss, renowned agronomist and former Rural Consultant of the Year.
The task of turning all that research into a useful, readable Best Practice Manual fell to ex-local Sallie Geary, who describes her work as “knowledge translation: distilling complex technical or scientific information into clear, actionable strategies”. Her career has involved making technical or scientific information accessible to broad audiences, from the general public, to senior ministers. Born and raised in East Gippsland, with her family farm still in the area, she has also spent many hours hoeing out rogue ALG plants.
Sallie said she enjoyed working on this resource, and has become a bit of an expert in recognising ALG even in the most unexpected places, like on median strips in town.
She hopes the updated ALG Best Practice manual will become a useful resource and is proud to have played a role in revising and modernising that document and creating the ALG Ute Guide and Fact Sheets.
Toms Creek Landcare group realised early on that a 40-page manual would be useful for some landholders and government agencies, but a smaller ute guide that could live in a vehicle glovebox would be more useful to many landholders. So the ALG Ute Guide and Fact Sheets, which are double-sided A4 pages that will be made available at field days, etc, were born.
These are intended to be taken out in the paddock and referenced when suspicious plants are found in pastures or crops. And if they end up soiled and dog-eared, then replacement documents can be printed from online sources at no cost.
And the world of herbicides is a dynamic one. New chemicals are registered and older ones re-assessed for their suitability or cost-effectiveness. Online resources can be updated as new information becomes available.
Toms Creek Landcare president Suzy Claringbould welcomes all those who have an interest in African Lovegrass to attend next Sunday’s AGM where these ALG resources will be launched
“Toms Creek has provided a leadership role at a time when it was seriously needed,” she said.
“The production and distribution of these important ALG education and practice resources in 2026, rounds off our central role in the fight against this invasive weed.
“We continue to play a role, as do other groups and organisations on the ALG working group and research with East Gippsland Landcare Network”.
The resources developed by Toms Creek Landcare group will be available on the East Gippsland Landcare Network website as downloadable copies.
Agriculture Victoria’s Partnerships Against Pests program has provided funding over two years on three farms to run further demonstrations of ALG control alternatives. As work progresses on these sites, field days and workshops will be held to enable effective sharing of results.
