On a fine day, views along The Old Ghost Road stretch across the winding Mokihinui River and over alpine vistas, valleys of tussock and dense native forests. The 85km West Coast trail, once a drawcard for fortune seekers during the Gold Rush and now a popular tramping/mountain biking route, runs through some of New Zealand’s … Continue reading Predator professionals: the next generation
New Zealand is the albatross capital of the world, with more than a dozen varieties. So where do they all live and why are so many of them classed as vulnerable? It can be difficult to imagine how big an albatross is until you’re standing next to one. The Southern Royal albatrosses were nesting when … Continue reading Wind beneath their wings
Shona Riddell travels to some of New Zealand’s precious and isolated subantarctic islands: the Snares, Enderby Island, Auckland Island and Campbell Island. Halfway into our five-hour guided trek across the wild and remote Enderby Island, as we huddle together above a sea-lashed coastline, clutching our cameras to snap a colony of rare Auckland shags settling into … Continue reading Call of the wild
Imagine this: you’re the new manager of Glenfern, a 260-hectare sanctuary on Great Barrier Island in Auckland. There are over 1,000 tunnels and bait stations to monitor, both inside and bordering the sanctuary. Would you head out for several hours at a time, clutching a waterproof notebook, and then return to manually enter any captures … Continue reading Mind the Trap: Data Capture a Time-Saver on Great Barrier
When Kiwi kids are planning their future careers, there’s an option they may not have considered: working in the possum industry. New Zealand has tens of millions of possums running riot after being introduced here in the late 1800s, destroying native plants and gobbling up the resources needed by our vulnerable native species. But this … Continue reading Project Possum: it’s business time
In February 2015, as part of a maths project, the students of Elsthorpe School set up some possum traps in the area to see what happened. The results may surprise you… Elsthorpe School is a small, rural school in central Hawke’s Bay with just over 40 students. It’s surrounded by beautiful reserve land that’s filled … Continue reading School kids take on the possums
Auckland Council biodiversity officer Ben Paris, aka NZ Batman, is on a mission; not to save Gotham by defeating criminal masterminds, but to protect our bat population (yes, we have bats) through education and conservation. Here, he takes on our bat questions. ‘NZ Batman’… was that title self-coined? This is an occupational hazard of working … Continue reading A Different Kind of Dark Knight
The suburb of Birkenhead sits on Auckland’s North Shore, with views across the Waitemata Harbour, thriving bush reserves, a bustling shopping village, and it’s just a few minutes’ drive over the Harbour Bridge to the central city. However, like many New Zealand neighbourhoods that border bushland reserves or waterways, there’s a bit of a rat … Continue reading Ratatouille: Birkenhead’s Urban Rat Blitz
A few years ago Otatara resident Russell Evans underwent a heart bypass. While at home recuperating from the surgery, the bird sanctuary owner gazed out of his window at all the native tui and kererū and decided that more needed to be done to protect them. Otatara is a suburb of Invercargill, with 3,000 residents … Continue reading Pestbusters: Bringing Back the Birdsong to Otatara
It could be a Tom Cruise blockbuster: one man leads an army into battle against thousands of relentless predators. However, it’s not a movie (yet) – it’s the true story of a Wellington neighbourhood working to rid itself of rats, mice, possums, stoats and weasels. “It’s a military exercise,” says Kelvin Hastie, who has spent … Continue reading Don’t get mad, get trapping
Ever heard a possum lurking outside your bedroom window in the middle of the night, breathing heavily, or a rat’s tiny feet scuttling across the roof overhead? Neither experience is pleasant. Instead, imagine hearing native birdsong, a mini bird sanctuary of dawn chorus in your own back yard. Imagine a rat or possum trap feeling … Continue reading Caught in a Trap: Halo Takes on Wellington’s Predators
