Thousands of Live Dung Beetles Shipped for Agricultural Exchange

On a brisk June morning, Tom O'Malley headed to his local post office to collect some unusual packages.

Waiting in line, the landcare facilitator said he could "hear it buzzing from five or 10 metres away".

To the surprise of post staff and other mailers, the packages contained thousands of live dung beetles.

The 8,400 Bubas bison tunnelling dung beetles travelled via express post from Reedy Creek in southern South Australia to Burnie in Tasmania's north-west

The packages are part of a yearly agricultural exchange that began five years ago, "a bit by accident".

It all started when South Australian farmer Matthew Robertson read an article Mr O'Malley wrote about Geotrupes spiniger "blue bomber" dung beetles for the Cradle Coast Natural Resource Management (NRM) newsletter.

Mr Robertson reached out, saying he was looking for some tunnelling dung beetles that were active during summer, and after chatting, the pair quickly realised they may be able to help each other.

Mr Robertson had an established Bubas bison population on his property that was active during winter and spring, while Mr O'Malley had an abundance of blue bombers that were active during summer and autumn.

The idea of a dung beetle exchange was born.

"Hopefully Matthew can benefit from a species we have a lot of here … when he doesn't have a lot of activity," Mr O'Malley said.

"And conversely, we can hopefully benefit … from a species that he has an absolute abundance of over there."

The beetles' role

Dairy farmer Matthew Gunningham had a thousand of the Bubas bison dung beetles released at his property in Montumana in north-west Tasmania as part of the exchange.

"As organic farmers, we have sort of very limited inputs that we can use, so we're always looking for ways to harness nature to make our farm more productive and more resilient," Mr Gunningham said.

The beetles take the livestock dung and mix it with the soil, which Mr Gunningham said is "great for aeration and drainage".

"Mixing the dung much more quickly with the soil and dragging it down further into the soil profile increases the amount of fertility that's available to the plants in the paddock," he said.

This is the third year Mr Gunningham has had Bubas bison beetles released at his property and he said he could see the population starting to establish.

Mr O'Malley plans to keep releasing the species onto Tasmanian farms until the species has fully established.

"We want to keep releasing them year after year to ensure that we can successfully establish Bubas bison in livestock dense districts in north-western Tasmania where we don't have them," Mr O'Malley said.

Getting the post ready

The yearly exchange is no easy process.

In Tasmania, Mr O'Malley begins the trapping process of blue bombers in early February.

"That involves getting half a dozen traps out, getting a couple of big buckets of cow dung and putting a layer of it on top of the trap and putting it out just before dusk," he said.

"They'll go through the mesh and into a plastic container and then I go out in the morning, collect them and put them in a tub and then hold them until we wash and send them."

After counting and examining each beetle, Mr O'Malley begins the "meticulous" washing and packing process.

"For six consecutive Sundays, I spend 12-15 hours cleaning and packing dung beetles," he said.

Once they are squeaky clean, the packing begins.

"We have to put them in a plastic box with air holes, cable tie the box shut, put that box inside a post pack and label the box very well to show what's in there," Mr O'Malley said.

Mr O'Malley said he drops the little critters at the post office first thing Monday morning so they arrive in South Australia before the weekend.

From there, the dung beetles are "at the mercy of the Australian postal service".