In response, Lock the Gate says the civil disobedience has been used only as a last resort.

APPEA and MCA say they recognise there is legitimate interest among landholders and communities on how resources are produced, but insist those issues are best addressed through open and transparent dialogue based on facts rather than fear and threatening behaviour.

"In recent weeks we've witnessed protesters chain themselves to vehicles, dangle from machinery dressed as bats, lie in the path of vehicles and intimidate landholders who are happy to have exploration take place on their properties," the groups said in a statement.

"In Bentley, in the Richmond Valley of northern New South Wales, there are reports today that anti-gas activists have installed steel spikes at the entrance to a dairy farmer's property and on previous occasions have welded his entrance gate shut.

"Yet the Greens continue to openly endorse civil disobedience classes as part of an untruthful campaign that claims to protect the rights of farmers.

"Apart from dangers to life and property, such campaigns prevent workers from getting to jobs that support their families and drain police resources from where they're needed most."

The groups say the Greens have the opportunity to show leadership and debate policy on fact, not emotion, and stop civil disobedience.

Meanwhile, Lock the Gate has brought an unusual alliance of farmers, traditional owners, tourism operators and conservationists from across Australia together in Canberra to highlight what it says are the health, social, cultural and environmental threats posed by coal mining and unconventional gas extraction.

National Lock the Gate coordinator Phil Laird said titles for gas and coal exploration covered more than 54% of Australia's land mass, or 437 million hectares and communities nationwide were worried at the potential impacts from mining on their land, water and country.

"Australians have supported the mining industry for generations, but current plans for a vast unconventional gas industry and a massive expansion in coal mining are threatening our land and water like never before and putting communities at risk," Laird said.

The delegation plans to meet with more than 30 ministers and members of parliament over the next three days.

"Rural Australians are locking their gates to the unconventional gas industry in ever growing numbers and, as a last resort, have been forced to use their bodies as barriers to drilling rigs," Laird said.

"Just yesterday a 58 year old farmer from Coonamble locked himself to a rig truck in the Pilliga forest in a desperate attempt to prevent coal seam gas operations from going ahead in northwest NSW."

Laird said some of Australia's most prized agricultural land and much of its precious groundwater was under threat from unconventional gas extraction.

He called the unconventional gas industry a "short-term destructive industry" that could contaminate land and water for generations.