Predator Free 2050. It’s about being a good ancestor

There’s a Maori word “taonga” which means treasured or prized – especially culturally. And that applies hugely to our land and the flora and fauna in Aotearoa/New Zealand. This post is about doing our bit to preserve our precious taonga for future generations. About being a good ancestor by helping us become predator-free by 2050.

The unique genealogy of our home

Our land has been basking alone in the South Pacific, separated from the ancient continent of Gondwana for around 85 million years. In that time its inhabitants – our taonga – have diversified and evolved on the only large landmass on earth that was free from ground-based mammals (our only mammals being bats). Here birds filled every niche that mammals usually filled. With no ground-based predators for millions of years, the danger came from the air, resulting in many bird species becoming flightless. They nested in ground cavities or in hollows of trees, safe from the danger of air attack. Only recently, geologically speaking, humans arrived, bringing with them other mammals and plants and ever-expanding human activity. This immediately spelled disaster for our unique environment.

Here come the predators

First, we had the Kiore, or Polynesian rat, that arrived with Maori. Waves of introduced predators that came with the first Europeans followed: Ship Rats, Norway Rats, Possums, Stoats, Weasels, Ferrets, Tahr, Deer, Pigs, Goats, Rabbits. All the introduced predators, alongside the removal of habitat for human activities, have resulted in our native animals and plants paying horrific consequences. We are now at a biodiversity crisis point and have the highest rate of threatened indigenous species in the world.

I had no idea

In my head, there was this vague notion that introduced predators were making it tough for our native animals. I knew we’d lost some amazing birdlife over the years, but also knew some success stories: Takahe brought back from the brink, and Kakapo (a large flightless parrot) often making hopeful news stories. Until I somehow happened across a podcast episode of “Untamed Aotearoa“, about the work one conservationist was doing with Kea (our cheeky mountain parrot), I didn’t know that things were as bad as they were. Kea are under threat! And not just Kea, but so many of our native birds. And the other thing I didn’t grasp (but should have) was the extent to which our native animals help our plant life, by things like spreading seed and pollinating. This means a crisis for our fauna breaks this symbiotic relationship and is therefore also a crisis for our flora.

This podcast also directed me to a four-part documentary (and accompanying podcast) called “Fight for the Wild“, which on one hand was just awful, to see and hear about the state of things, but on the other, was hopeful, with a national effort to do something about it.

What can we do?

A lot, it turns out. A groundswell of separate activities came together into a national effort and challenge called Predator Free 2050. The challenge started in 2015 by then Prime Minister Sir John Key. He established the overarching and audacious goal of ridding our land of the devastating impacts of stoats, rats, and possums by 2050. As a result, there has been a ton of research and passionate people doing amazing work towards this goal. There are the macro efforts of specialised organisations who are getting government and private funding, and community-based efforts by groups of everyday kiwis (the human kind) who have grouped together to become a collective force. And this is where we’ve dipped our toes into the water. We’ve joined a trapping group and have started to trap rats in our neighborhood.

First trapping success!

A quick search online put me in touch with the Kapiti Rat Pack, our local collective working towards this aim. They put me in touch with the Kapiti MenzShed who make tunnel traps, each with a rat trap and a mousetrap. We bought a couple of traps and put them out in our backyard with no success whatsoever after some weeks. We figured we either have no rats and mice around our property (we do have a very efficient cat) or they are more cautious or clever than we gave them credit for.

One of the cool things about the trapping groups is that you can see where the traps are and what success they are having via an online tool. On this, we’d seen that this lovely big park across the road from us, that has a stand of regenerating bush, had no traps in place and figured we’d have a go there. So, we put out one trap in the park. Two days later, we checked it whilst out walking the dog and woop woop! Success! A huge rat in the trap. Yuss! So, we’re on the board. I’ve since been out and put the other trap in the park and will log any successes.

How’s our little patch of the world doing?

Waikanae is overlooked by a large bush reserve that itself connects back to the huge Tararua Forest Park. In the township, there are many pockets of reserve land covered in native bush. So, it’s a leafy green suburb with a connection to forested mountains behind us. We also have a river on one side whose surrounds are being reforested. This provides a mountains-to-the-sea ecological corridor.

We have a good-sized population of Tui and Kereru that often visit our place, with the occasional bellbird also. We don’t see them but hear Ruru (Morepork) at night, and we’ve even spotted Kākā in our backyard.

Kākā are an endangered parrot and to see one in our backyard was amazing. They are very vulnerable to predation and we would only see them in predator-free reserves. There has been a huge success with Kākā in Wellington with their reintroduction into the sanctuary at Zealandia. Alongside concentrated predator trapping by community groups, these efforts have seen their population grow and expand. However, Waikanae is 65km north of Wellington so we’re not sure if that success story is affecting us here. Whatever it is, it’s an encouraging sign. Of course, it’s nothing like our ecosystems once were, so there is much to do.

A call to action!

Encouraged by our initial success we will build up the number of traps to see what difference we can make in our park. Protecting our taonga seems like a total no-brainer to us. Have a look at the below documentary and decide for yourself if this is something worth fighting for.

We also really recommend listening to the podcast series – which fleshes out the documentary a lot more. Have a listen and be amazed.