Bush Encroachment Control in Namibia, Botswana and the Northern Cape

Bush encroachment — the thickening of woody species at the expense of grass — affects an estimated 26–45 million hectares of Namibian rangeland alone, with Botswana and the South African interior facing the same trajectory. Carrying capacity collapses as thornbush crowds out grass, and government restoration tenders have become a major, recurring market for arboricides.

Three active-ingredient families dominate tender specifications. Tebuthiuron granules (200 g/kg, e.g. Limpopo 200 GG in 25 kg) are scattered on soil around target shrubs and kill through root uptake over 6–24 months — slow but thorough, with grass recovery following shrub death. Picloram mixtures (with fluroxypyr as ME, or with triclopyr as gel) give faster foliar and cut-stump control. Triclopyr 480 EC in a mineral-oil carrier is the workhorse for foliar and basal-bark application on species like black wattle and prosopis.

Cut-stump gels such as the triclopyr 120 + picloram 120 combination (Kaput class) deserve special mention: applied to a freshly cut stump, they deliver near-complete kill with a fraction of the chemical load of foliar spraying — increasingly preferred in environmentally scored tenders.

All of these actives are persistent by design. Application must respect buffer zones around watercourses, boreholes and desirable vegetation, and operators need the mineral-oil adjuvants (Actipron Super class) that carry stem applications into the bark. MedQ stocks the full toolkit in the pack sizes the tenders specify.