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Nigerian Govt scales up aerial spray to control quelea bird in N/East
The Federal Government has begun aerial spray of pesticides to control quelea bird invasion in the North-East region.
Alhaji Usman Ciromari, Director, Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD) in Yobe, told newsmen in Damaturu, that the exercise was designed to destroy quelea bird nesting colonies in Yobe and other parts of the region.
Quelea also called red-billed quelea, or dioch is a small brownish bird of Africa. It occurs in such enormous numbers that it often destroys grain crops and, by roosting, breaks branches.
The birds are long-distance migrants with a range covering well over 10 million square kilometres of Africa’s semi-arid, bush, grassland and savannah regions.
Intensive farming and an increase in cereal crop production throughout the continent resulted in an explosion in their numbers; according to some estimates quelea populations have increased anywhere from 10 to 100 times since the 1970s.
According to Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), efforts to control quelea populations have had poor successes.
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Although they prefer the seeds of wild grasses to those of cultivated crops, their huge numbers make them a constant threat to fields of sorghum, wheat, barley, millet and rice.
The average quelea bird eats around 10 grammes of grain per day, so a flock of two million can devour as much as 20 tons of grain in a single day.
With an estimated adult breeding population of at least 1.5 billion, FAO estimates the agricultural losses attributable to the quelea above US$50 million annually.
To control the menace, Ciroma said the aerial spray which began on Aug. 10, aimed at eliminating nests of the migratory birds had so far covered Ngalda, Wachakal and Gadaka areas of Yobe.
According to Ciroma, spraying the birds’ colonies with avicides is the only available method of controlling them at the moment.
The director, however, said if African countries could coordinate and conduct aerial spray simultaneously, the birds would be eliminated.
