The big challenge
Three introduced predators – rats, possums and stoats – are generally accepted as the main agents of ecological decline in New Zealand. Aside from the estimated 25 million native birds they kill each year, they cost this country billions of dollars annually, and they impact on the country’s primary production base through the transmission of diseases such as bovine tuberculosis.
New Zealand is a world leader in removing invasive predators from islands and predator fenced areas. However the need for a defendable barrier (e.g. the sea) or the social and geographic challenges of predator fencing, limit the scale at which they can be used. Therefore on the mainland, the current predator management approach is ongoing suppression of predator populations using traps or toxins. This carries a significant long-term cost as reinvasion must be continually managed.
How we’re helping
Zero Invasive Predators Ltd (ZIP) was established to develop operationally ready, innovative, strongly supported technologies to completely remove rats, possums and stoats from large mainland areas, and then protect those areas from reinvasion. We call this model Remove and Protect.
The Remove and Protect approach, if successful, will make it possible to:
carry out predator control in terrain where it is neither desirable nor possible to construct predator fences
reduce our dependence on the repeated wide scale application of toxins at chosen sites
enable progressive expansion of a protected area as funds and confidence allow
create an environment on the mainland where, in time, ecological integrity could rival that of predator-free offshore islands