Fears over floating fire ants in wake of ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred

Footage has emerged of thousands of potentially deadly fire ants “rafting” in Queensland floodwaters, sparking fears they could spread out of control.

A frightening new threat has emerged in the wake of Cyclone Alfred - floating fire ants.

Footage has emerged of thousands of the potentially deadly pests “rafting” in floodwaters, sparking fears they could spread out of control.

The footage, from the Scenic Rim, shows the fire ants floating in colonies in what experts say is a “perfect storm” for further infestation.

Invasive Species Council advocacy manager Reece Pianta said the floodwaters were transporting tens of thousands of ants to areas they had not previously infested.

“When the water comes through, the fire ants come to the surface, lock their legs together and float with the water as a whole colony to new locations to re-establish themselves,” he said.

“In the past, I’ve seen colonies in Queensland with hundreds of individual ants doing this, but some of these videos look like thousands or even tens of thousands of ants.

“They look like large mature colonies to me. What people have been observing around southeast Queensland is that there’s reproductive queen ants in these colonies and they can re-establish and start spreading wherever they find themselves on dry land.

“They evolve to survive flood events and it just so happens that they don’t just survive, they thrive.”

Mr Pianta said flood-swollen rivers such as the Albert and Logan risked carrying the fire ants to turf farms and landscaping yards which was “a big concern”.

“If they get into those, they’ll spread to other parts of the country,” he said.

“People might have checked or treated their land (for fire ants) before the cyclone and might not have had fire ants, next week they might find themselves with a mature and growing fire ant infestation on their property.”

Mr Pianta said rafting fire ants was “something we’ve been warning about for a while”.

“We think there needs to be an urgent boost to the suppression work and the containment work to stop this spiralling out of control,” he said.

“There are obviously more resources that are required to combat this fire ant infestation, particularly in that Logan-Albert river region, and we think it needs to be a federal election issue.

“It’s worth noting that (Opposition leader) Peter Dutton’s electorate is in the fire ant zone and some of this (fire ant infestation) is happening in the Treasurer’s (Jim Chalmers) electorate.”

Logan cane farmer Mick Herse on his flooded property after Cyclone Alfred.

Eagleby cane farmer Mick Herse is no stranger to floods on the Logan River.

Over the years, he and his farm have endured floods in 2011, 2013, 2017 and 2022.

But this time he expects to avoid any major damage apart from an influx of fire ants.

Over night a nest was found on the riverside property and Mr Herse expects to find up to 80 nest as the ground dries out.

“We’ve had a lot of rain here in the past three days – in fact the rain gauge overflowed,” he said.

“Some of my paddocks have already flooded and without further rain I believe we’ve avoided a bullet.

“But I have noticed new fire ant nests already which means I have to keep everything up off the ground.

“The council has failed to upgrade our drainage system in this street which is why we are cautious.

“I had the mayor and the local councillor here before Christmas because of the lack of drainage maintenance.

“They keep building houses and units but have not upgraded the drains since 1950.”

Mr Herse said the Coomera Connector was to be built on the neighbouring property to cross the Logan River to join up with Skinners Park at Carbrook.