State investment in science and entrepreneurship for environmental change in Queensland, 1912–16
The story of Cactus Estates Ltd
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1017/qre.2016.3Keywords:
Cactus Estates Ltd, 'Prickly Pear Destruction Act 1912', local ecologies, nineteenth-century plant transfers, applied scienceAbstract
Governments across the globe use public–private partnerships to foster entrepreneurship while limiting their risk. The Prickly Pear Destruction Act 1912 enabled the Queensland government to enter contracts with private entities for land heavily covered with prickly pear (Opuntia and Nopalea species). The story of Cactus Estates Ltd, the first negotiation under the Act, provides an opportunity to analyse this response to local ecologies changed by nineteenth-century plant transfers. Most scholarship on the invasion of prickly pear focuses on the science of entomology due to the spectacular success of the introduction of Cactoblastis cactorum in 1926. This article examines an earlier period in the history of applied science in Queensland. The Queensland government, along with scientific and business communities, pursued poisons for controlling the density of plant growth as the preferred mechanism for eliminating plants. Cactus Estates Ltd experimented with arsenic-based poisons for this purpose. An examination of Cactus Estates Ltd provides evidence of the state’s willingness to produce a multifaceted approach to dealing with invasive species in Australia in the early twentieth century.
References
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These amounts were variously reported in government documents of the Public Lands and Agriculture and Stock departments. They were always rough estimates, and depended upon the density of infestation — hence the large spread between cost amounts. For a fascinating economic analysis of land lost, see H. N. L, ‘Prickly pear problem 1 — extent of infested country’, The Queenslander, 20 September 1913, 35.
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The Act refers to the party negotiating with the government as the contractor.
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So much so that, in 1915, Dr Jean White married Victor Haney, the industrial chemist Roberts had brought from America. ‘Telegram exchange’, Jean White DSc, Personnel File Appointment 414, QSA Item ID 606682; B.H. Ford, P.A. Ford, and V. St B. O. Sturrock, The camp at Dogwood Crossing, Miles, 1878–1978 (Chinchilla: Chinchilla Newspaper Co., 1978), p. 93.
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‘Prospectus of Cactus Estates Ltd’.
The following photo essays appeared in The Pictorial Queenslander: ‘Dulacca Prickly Pear Experimental Station’, The Queenslander, 4 October 1913, 25; ‘Map of Queensland showing distribution of prickly pear’, The Queenslander, 27 September 1913, 36, ‘Prickly pear destruction by gas’, The Queenslander, 27 September 1913, 21.
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