Insecticide blitz may cover thousands more hectares

By ANNE BESTON environment reporter

Biosecurity authorities are preparing for an aerial insecticide blitz of thousands of hectares of Auckland if first attempts do not eradicate a moth pest.

A technical advisory group of more than 20 scientists and specialists has recommended that the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry begin planning blanket spraying of areas where the painted apple moth has been found.

Some have been arguing for months that blanket spraying is the only option.

The original $11 million plan to spray targeted areas will begin on Saturday if the weather is fine.

Painted apple moth is a voracious feeder belonging to the same family as the white-spotted tussock moth, which was tackled in 1996 in a $12 million East Auckland campaign.

The ministry's director of animal biosecurity, Dr Barry O'Neil, said Biosecurity Minister Jim Sutton would be briefed next week on the possibility that a much bigger spraying operation would be needed.

Saturday's spraying will be undertaken over areas of West Auckland by a BK-117 helicopter using a biological insecticide called Foray 48B, or Btk.

Dr O'Neil said a paper already before the Government included a second plan to attack the painted apple moth by blitzing 9000ha of Auckland's western suburbs in a $20 million, three-year campaign if the helicopter operation did not work.

But the final plan could be bigger than that. "It may even be more hectares and more dollars."

The ministry would have to begin the resource consent process before a fixed-wing aircraft could take to the skies.

"If we were given the yes today it would still be three or four weeks before it could possibly happen."

Initial discussions with the Civil Aviation Authority had indicated that it would approve aerial spraying by planes already in the country.

That would save time by not having to call back the DC-6 aircraft used to spray the eastern suburbs.

The ministry will wait until three complete sprays of the target spray zone in West Auckland have been carried out before scientists decide whether a larger campaign is needed.

Suburbs targeted in the first operation are Glendene, Kelston, the Avondale Peninsula and the seaward margins of Pt Chevalier and Waterview, as well as the worst-infected areas of Waikumete Cemetery, the margins of the Whau River and Traherne Island in the upper Waitemata Harbour.

The chairman of a community group MAF appointed to relay residents' concerns about the project, Kubi Witten-Hannah, said targeted spraying was doomed to fail because MAF did not know where the moth was.

nzherald.co.nz/environment