Highway Pest Police

For a war zone, the scene is strangely peaceful. As night falls on Ceduna, the noise of traffic gradually recedes until all that can be heard at the highway roadblock are the dulcet tones of Margaret Pomeranz and David Stratton reviewing the new movie Jindabyne on TV. “If you had come between four and five,” says quarantine inspector Geoff Provis, 62, dressed in fishing hat and fluoro jacket, “you would have had caravans coming out your ears.”

It’s 48 years since Ceduna declared war on the fruit fly. A pest in other states, this blight of fruit- and vegetable-growers the world over is rarely spotted in South Australia, with its encircling deserts providing a natural buffer zone. Even so, as Australia’s biggest producer of wine grapes, the state is taking no chances.

And Ceduna, the clean coastal town famous for its oysters, is home to the westernmost of the state’s four roadblocks. “He’s the bad bugger,” says Provis’ offsider, Brian “Flash” Hoffrichter, 63, brandishing a dried specimen of the Mediterranean variety (Ceratitis capitata), which is not much bigger than a grain of sand. A gruesome color photograph on the wall shows the damage its maggots can inflict on oranges. “Doesn’t look real nice, does it?” Hoffrichter says. “Little things can do big damage.”

With school holidays bringing extra traffic to the roads, Hoffrichter and Provis (partners on the 4 p.m.-to-midnight shift) are alert but not alarmed. And with Ceduna being the first entry point for motorists coming from Western Australia, where Medfly has flourished since about 1900, they are in the frontline for any outbreaks, usually spread through egg-carrying fruit. A bin outside their hut overflows with confiscated produce; statewide, 45,000 kg were collected in the past six months. The low-tech operation is winning the war for South Australia’s $250 million fruit and vegetable industry. “We’re the only state free of fruit fly,” says Ceduna’s senior inspector, Peter Lowe, “so it’s working up until now.”

Town traffic is free to come and go through the roadblock, and Provis and Hoffrichter know the local number plates by heart. Eventually headlights cut through the gloom outside. “What have we got here, Geoff?” asks Hoffrichter, peering into the night. “A local?” Provis has the sharper eyes of the two. “Very local,” he says, waving the car through.