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Ringwood residents have made a last-ditch plea to keep an unconventional weed management initiative going after local council moved to end goats grazing along Mullum Mullum Creek.
For the past year, Maroondah Council has paid horticulturalist Colin Arnold to station goats on a small portion of weed-infested creekside bushland near Mullum Mullum Reserve as a way of reducing invasive vegetation without using herbicides.
Local Beatrice Satalich said the goats had proved a hit, improving the environment while curious children and families flocked to watch them.
“On the weekend, it was like Bourke Street,” Satalich said. “We love them. It was the best thing they [council] could’ve done.”
However, the council told The Age the grazing would now end as grant funding had dried up and the goats had fulfilled their purpose.
“The goats have done a great job of eating the vegetation on site down to a manageable level,” Maroondah Mayor Linda Hancock said in a statement.
“Council’s bushland team will continue to manage the site with targeted vegetation control that allows indigenous vegetation to establish. They will also continue to monitor the vegetation to determine if goats need to return.”
But more than 350 people have signed a petition calling for the goats to stay.
“The goats have also become a source of joy, connection and wellbeing for the community,” the petition states.
“Locals regularly stop to watch them, chat with neighbours, bring their children to visit, or simply enjoy a peaceful moment by the creek.”
Petition organiser Annalise Lawn wanted the council to consider paying for the goats’ work to extend to other sites too.
“If we had to add an extra $20 on our rates to keep the goats, we’d be happy,” she said.
Maroondah Council said it previously received $40,000 from Melbourne Water for vegetation management works along the creek before contributing its own funding for an $85,000 package.
Arnold said his company, GrazeAway, was paid about $12,000 for the two adjacent goat sites near Norwood Football Club over the last year, but started to take down fences on Tuesday.
Arnold manages about 200 goats across Melbourne, but said tightening council budgets meant he had received little new work recently.
“It’s always cheaper for local governments to spray weeds than to manage it properly,” he said.
Satalich has lived behind the goat grazing site since 1982 and said the dense pocket of bushland was an overgrown fire hazard before the goats arrived.
“It was a jungle,” she said. “One cigarette butt, and we’re up in flames.”
Satalich previously complained to council that herbicide sprayed on the overgrown vegetation harmed her nearby bees and was ineffective.
“The latest fashion is to spray everything with poison,” she said, urging council to spend her rates on goats instead.
The mayor, however, said herbicides were regulator-approved and only used if required. Council funds were spent on goats only thanks to the Melbourne Water grant facilitating a bigger work package, Hancock added.
“The vegetation management for this site does not require them to be placed there permanently.”
Supporters, however, believe goats could still maintain the improved landscape.
GrazeAway says certain native plants are less palatable to goats and remained, while the animals – which are rotated on and off grazing sites – ate more invasive weeds.
An environmental consultant’s evaluation at two Dandenong Creek sites several years ago raises doubts about their cost and effectiveness compared to herbicides, but Arnold takes issue with how that study was conducted.
Mullum Mullum Creek goat supporters also say shorter goat-grazed grass has allowed native reeds to grow back, encouraging more frogs, birds and rakali (Australian water rats) to return.
Conservation biologist Dr Marissa Parrott, who lives nearby, said the goats may help ward off local foxes too.
“I’ve certainly noticed this year there has been a lot of calling from frogs. And there has been an increase in the sighting of rakali,” Parrott said.
“I certainly couldn’t say it was just because of the goats, but it might be the initial effect of the goats allowing the habitat to grow back.”
Maroondah Council said it still funded goat grazing at the Croydon retarding basin, HE Parker Reserve and Dorset Recreation Trail.
A council spokesperson said they believed the grant stream that helped fund the creek works was no longer available, but Melbourne Water said the Liveable Communities, Liveable Waterways program offered $10.1 million this financial year.
Service delivery general manager Sue Jackman said Maroondah was given $40,000 under the scheme in November 2024 for tube stock plant purchases ($4000), planting materials ($2000), and weed management, including spot spraying and targeted weed control ($34,000).
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