Tuesday 25th
September
How can I write about this
concisely and in a balanced way whilst also being informative? I’ll try my best. There is a very contentious and unique issue
here in NZ. It goes back to evolution and the fact that this fine country
separated from Australia about 55 million years ago BEFORE mammalian pests
evolved. This led the birds, amphibians and reptiles of NZ to evolve without
the need to fly or protect themselves from said predators. The only native land
mammals here are two species of bat, now also in danger of extinction. Fast
forward to the 1500s when Polynesians were the first humans to discover NZ,
followed by Europeans a couple of hundred years later and an influx of alien
species – rats, mice, pig, goats, dogs, cats and later possums, stoats, weasels
etc. Effect= DISASTER! There are many species extinctions known about (giant
Moa for example - pic) but potentially many more unknown and this is the big
conservation battle being fought here. A well-respected ecologist has estimated
that 68,000 birds are killed PER NIGHT in NZ by these ‘pest’ species. Now, you know I’m an animal lover and
wouldn’t want any animal to suffer in an ideal World. It’s not a quick and
painless death with poison and it’s not the pests fault they’re here, they’re
just doing what comes naturally to survive. But the consequences of their
actions are catastrophic.
I’m not going to explain the whole history and
science behind 1080 but it is, in effect just Sodium Fluoroacetate produced
naturally in certain plant species as a defence from grazing animals. It is
also found, scarily, in your cup of tea, which is just an interesting fact I
thought I’d throw in there. So anyway, I digress, I don’t like the idea of
using poisons to control animals. It would be great to live in a world where it
isn’t necessary. So, when faced with the decision to poison some creatures to
save the native fauna or to leave things be and watch all of New Zealand’s
unique and precious wildlife disappear it is a tough call. But my thoughts are that the native birds
don’t stand a chance. They aren’t just being out-evolved. They are being wiped
out because of human actions of the past so do we not owe it to them to
intervene to try and save them for the future?
It’s seems most people have very
strong and emotional views either against or for the use of 1080. As a newcomer
I didn’t feel in the best position to understand the arguments, so I’ve been
doing research (below).
Mistakes
and using the poison at very high dosages in the past have led to deaths of
non-target species and there is a social media frenzy here with the anti-1080
brigade essentially arguing that ‘1080 kills everything’ and that Department of
Conservation (DOC) is part of a money-making conspiracy with the manufacturers
of 1080! My main question to them is this – why would people who have chosen
conservation/ecology as a career and so work in the field fulltime, support the
use of any chemical that causes more harm than good to the very wildlife they
are working to protect?! The sad fact is that, despite research into
alternative chemicals and trapping, 1080 currently is the only tool for the job
when it comes to treating large and extremely remote mountainous areas.
It is right to acknowledge that
mistakes have been made. However, these errors have led to progress to reduce
the amount of by-kill. For example, the concentration of 1080 used in bait
pellets now is tiny (whilst still effective against target species), the
pellets themselves are too large for small birds to be able to eat and are dyed
green – a colour that birds are not attracted to, and the quantity sown per
hectare has been massively reduced.
There are all sorts of ridiculous
conspiracy theories about the poison remaining in animals’ bodily tissues
forever or poisoning the waterways that have all been debunked by science but
the anti-brigade seem to choose not to listen to science! As a visitor to NZ
back in January I recall seeing ‘ban 1080’ signs around the countryside and
looked into it briefly, thinking ‘that poison must be bad’, I can tell I’m not
going to like THAT. A genuine but nevertheless knee-jerk reaction to the
thought of animals suffering by the ‘fluffy’ animal lover that I consider
myself to be!
There has been a build-up of
tension recently due to a 1080 operation planned for the Hunua Ranges. So, in
an unexpected turnaround, I now find myself in support of this operation as a
volunteer in the kokako recovery project with the hope that the near
extermination of rats and possums in the forest will lead to a bumper breeding
season for all birds, not just the kokako. The drop was due to take place
during the fine weather week when I was on Tiritiri but the anti-1080s applied
for a court injunction to stop the operation and this postponed everything for
a week. There was a worrying few days
there when it looked like social media hysteria would win over fact and science
– scary! Thankfully, due to all the evidence and arguments to support the drop
going ahead the application was eventually dismissed.
This leads me to what I ended up
doing today (about time I hear you say). Following the drop everything possible
is done to remove any of the baits that have landed on or around tracks or
roads that are accessible to the public and therefore could pose a risk to
human or animal. This means walking each
of these tracks a minimum of three times… in BOTH directions slowly to look for
the things. A heck of a lot of man hours. Planned like a military operation, I
made my way to the secret rendezvous point at 730am to receive instruction:
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| Highly organised chaos |
I was allocated a team by the Auckland Council Rangers and we were
provided with a vast quantity of health and safety information, personal
protective equipment, radios, secret call signs and radio codes in case of
protesters overhearing radio traffic. My team today was tasked with clearing
the land at the 440 Mountain Bike Park on the northern boundary of the Hunuas. There were six of us and several different
tracks that needed checking before the park was due to re-open this weekend.
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| Yikes - that's steep! |
Just like with ski slopes, the tracks were graded by colour
with the black runs being the most extreme. There were these wooden ramps set
up that I find it hard to believe people are brave enough to cycle down!
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| One of the tracks through the pine forest |
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| A bait containing 1080 |
Thankfully, we were able to walk around these obstacles but the tracks were
steep and slippery enough as they were. As
we wandered through the pine forested area I found a couple of things that made
me nervous. Firstly, a dead blackbird, susceptible to the effects of the poison
as they eat insects from the ground, and then a dead fantail. Of course, I don’t
know what these birds died of but the obvious conclusion would be as a result
of the 1080 drop. Maybe I’d been wrong? Maybe this stuff kills everything BUT
the stuff it’s supposed to kill?! In a strange way I started to feel more
comfortable when we then started finding deceased possums, four in total, and
saw no more bird casualties for the rest of the day. Here’s what a pellet looks
like on the ground (right). As I said, the colour and size are designed specifically to
try to target the pest species and the vast majority of this block consists of
grain holding a tiny percentage of actual poison.
We managed to dodge most of the
hail storms and I only fell over the once. It was a good day for meeting more
Park Rangers and getting to ask them questions about their jobs.
We were done by early afternoon
and returned to sign out safely from the operation headquarters.
Wednesday 26th
September
There were far fewer of us
today, but more faces that I knew as colleagues from my usual mid-week
volunteering had also offered to help as the Ranges were closed to everyone not
involved in the operation. Even better than that, I was paired up with Robin
who I know well and we were sent to do a track that I haven’t had a chance to
do yet, the Massey and Cossey loop track.
We were sent to walk clockwise, whilst another pairing walked the loop
in the opposite direction. This led to competition – we didn’t want to miss any
baits and then discover that the ‘boys’ had found them on a piece of track we’d
already supposedly ‘cleared’! Robin and I were also being audited by a lady
from Auckland health department. Not us personally, but the entire process is
carefully audited by other government bodies to ensure that public safety is at
the forefront of the operation. It was slow process, but we didn’t want to miss
anything. 
Despite being super-cautious
we didn’t find a SINGLE BAIT before stopping for a break half-way round by the
reservoir!
We thought team 2 were joking when they told us
they’d found 12! Not expecting to find any more, we set off to complete the
loop. But we did find some! Evidence of how important walking tracks in
opposite directions is. Some of the baits are only visible from one direction
due to being obscured by foliage. Test yourself – can you spot the bait in this
image (below)? Not easy is it? But we found four more.
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| Spot the bait competition |
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| I got to visit the Giant Kauri for the first time as they're usually out of bounds for their protection |
We covered a greater distance
today than yesterday and I was tiring by the end of two long days walking in a
row. But it was nice to see some parts of the Hunuas, like the giant Kauri trees (right) and the Falls (below), with no
tourists around to get in your photos!
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| Hunua Falls (with NO tourists in the way!) |
I’d done my bit to get involved
and experience the process of organising a 1080 drop, and the aftermath,
first-hand. I wonder how many of the
anti-1080 side spend hours in the bush actually doing that and getting hands-on
with pest-control to save the wildlife they are supposedly so passionate
about? The real proof of the pudding
will be during this summer. I will be
making my own judgement on whether I notice an increase in the numbers of birds
and wildlife I see when tramping in the Hunuas. I will hopefully be able to
tell if 1080 has killed everything or has in fact given the native wildlife a
fighting chance this breeding season.
Good luck birdies, it’s time for you to
get busy!
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