This year’s “Seed of Light” award for grains research communication in Queensland and northern New South Wales has been won by two entomologists who helped farmers manage the potentially destructive pest, heliothis.

The award, made annually by the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC), has gone to David Murray and Melina Miles of the Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries in Toowoomba.

The “Seeds of Light” are unique works of art in glass by Stephen Procter, head of the Canberra School of Art class workshops at the Australian National University.

GRDC managing director Peter Reading and the chairman of its Northern Panel Ian Buss presented the 2004 “Seed of Light” to Dr Murray and Dr Miles during a break in the Queensland Department of Plant Industry & Fisheries (DPI&F) heliothis workshop in Toowoomba today (Tuesday, June 22).

It is the first time the award has gone to joint winners.  In 2003 it was won by the 20 –strong DPI&F led team managing GRDC supported sustainable farming research in Central Queensland.

Before that, previous winners were individuals, including recently retired senior DPI&F agronomist Wayne Strong and, from NSW Agriculture, pathologist Kevin Moore and climate researcher Peter Hayman.

Mr Reading told his presentation audience heliothis was a serious threat to the future of the grains and cotton industries on the Darling Downs before Dr Murray and Dr Miles began encouraging collaborative area wide management research and adoption in 1999.

“Dr Murray and Dr Miles set about encouraging a cooperative effort against heliothis through area wide management across an ambitious 300 square kilometres of the Downs,” Mr Reading said.

“They were able to involve cotton and grain farmers in geographic areas in the coordinated use of management tools to contain heliothis.

“The project also encouraged a cooperative effort in rural communities as well as information sharing, and because of its great success, area wide managements has been adopted in other parts of the Darling Downs as well as elsewhere in Australia’s grain belt.

“Farmers believe area wide management has helped reduced heliothis populations as well as adding to the knowledge of heliothis ecology and biology and ways of using the natural enemies to control it through integrated pest management techniques.

“The Australian grains industry is embracing integrated pest management as readily as it is area wide management.”

Mr Buss said Dr Murray had joined DPI&F in 1972 and had been involved ever since in pest management research in horticulture and broadacre crops.

Dr Miles joined the DPI&F in 1999, specifically to work on the area wide management project, after working with the Victorian Department of Agriculture on pest management strategies for native budworm in field peas.