Farmers in the Victorian Western District have used non-indigenous cypress trees as shelter belts for almost a century, protecting their livestock from winter winds and summer heat with the characteristic spreading form of the cypress which has proved to be well-adapted to the Western District’s mostly volcanic soils.
Shelter for livestock is crucial to maintaining farm productivity. Many farmers are becoming alarmed by the rapid spread of the cypress canker fungi, Seiridium which can rapidly kill whole shelter belts, depriving farms of all their windbreaks where cypress is the only existing species.
The fungus exists world-wide but in Victoria seems to be spreading because the natural resistance of cypress trees has been weakened by a shift in environmental conditions from settled seasonal variability to longer dry periods mixed up with warmer wet periods. There is no proven cure for the disease.
Replacing shelter belts is expensive, but farm productivity is likely to plummet if dead cypress shelter belts are not replaced. In large parts of the Western District, cypress are the dominant species and the canker is having a devastating effect. At this stage, there appear to be no government programs available to assist farmers in bearing the costs of tree removal and replanting.
Carbon credits represent an opportunity to receive an income stream that could help to offset the costs of shelter belt replacement. Shelter belts such as the long-living but now dying cypress plantations are uncontroversial and necessary farm infrastructure that have provided amenity and productivity benefits to farms for generations. Carbon credits can be earnt by replacing the cypress with native species. The highest returns will be available where the shelter belts remain for at least 100 years. This will produce an income stream for the life of the plantation, at the same time as providing all the other benefits such as shelter, firewood, habitat for native birds and animals etc.
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