This immense worm moves slowly and gracefully underground and can grow to the length of an outstretched arm
The giant Gippsland earthworm already has an upbeat campaign song.
“I am a real worm, I am an actual worm,” bangs the chorus of Doctor Worm, a late-90s novelty hit by the American indie rock band They Might Be Giants.
Heavy rainfall expected to stretch from Queensland’s Sunshine Coast to the Victorian border, with the potential for isolated falls of up to 100mm
A wet and wild weekend is on the way for much of Australia, as heavy rain in Queensland moves east and a tropical low off the coast of Western Australia threatens to develop into a cyclone.
Sydney, Brisbane and Canberra can all expect a washout on Saturday, with heavy rainfall expected to stretch from Queensland’s Sunshine Coast down to the Victorian border, including the potential for isolated falls of up to 100mm.
Exclusive: Cost blow-out has experts worried people will use ‘huge’ volumes of pesticides to protect themselves from ‘tiny killers’
Australian households will spend $1.03bn every year to suppress fire ants and cover related medical and veterinary costs, with about 570,800 people needing medical attention and 30 likely deaths from the invasive pest’s stings, new modelling shows.
The Australia Institute research breaks down the impact of red imported fire ants (Rifa) by electorate, with the seats of Durack and O’Connor in Western Australia, Mayo in South Australia and Blair in Queensland the hardest hit if the ants become endemic.
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Blair: $1.7m in medical costs, $1.5m in vet costs and $5.1m in household pesticide costs.
Dickson: $1.4m in medical costs, $1.2m in vet costs and $4m in household pesticide costs.
Ryan: $1.5m in medical costs, $1.3m in vet costs and $3.4m in household pesticide costs.
Critics say industry threatens the endangered Maugean skate and laws were rushed through with ’no proper process’
Controversial legislation to protect the Tasmanian salmon industry has passed parliament after the government guillotined debate to bring on a vote in the Senate on Wednesday night.
Government and Coalition senators voted in favour of the bill, which was designed to bring an end to a formal reconsideration by the environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, into whether an expansion of fish farming in Macquarie Harbour in 2012 was properly approved.
Slow-moving trough drags tropical moisture inland, dumping widespread heavy rain onto an already saturated landscape, Bureau of Meteorology says
Heavy rainfall has closed nearly 200 roads and cut off multiple towns in Queensland as already saturated rivers risk more flooding.
The Bureau of Meteorology issued a severe weather warning for heavy rainfall across normally dry inland areas of central west Queensland, including parts of the Northern Goldfields and Upper Flinders, North West, Channel Country, and Maranoa and Warrego districts.
UN-backed research has found emissions of the potent greenhouse gas methane coming from Glencore’s Hail Creek coalmine are probably between three and eight times higher than officially reported. Two aircraft with different types of monitoring equipment and flying at different altitudes looked for plumes of methane coming from the coalmine in Queensland’s Bowen Basin – a site highlighted in a previous study as a major emitter. Glencore has challenged the results, saying in a statement it had ‘significant doubts’ about the research, claiming it used ‘out of date’ data