Protecting our Native Wildlife from Predators

The annual Kiwi Coast collation of animal pest control results has now been completed for 2014. A staggering 36,040 animal pests were removed by 48 groups, projects, landowners, iwi, agencies and organisations in eastern Northland last year.

This is a huge achievement. Well done to the sheer hard work of an ever-growing range of projects and people along the Kiwi Coast with the common goal of reducing the impacts of introduced predators and helping native wildlife to thrive.

Thanks to the Kiwi Coast project, some managed populations of the Northland brown kiwi are not only stable, but actually increasing. This is largely due to the efforts of community-led conservation projects, working in partnership with government agencies, other organisations and private landowners to carry out predator control, release kiwi back into the wild and advocate for responsible dog control.

But there is much more to be done to protect the juvenile kiwi who are moving out of intensively trapped areas into unsafe territory and are not surviving. Kiwi Coast is working with landowners to create a kiwi corridor along the eastern coastline of Whangarei.

The Kiwi Coast project is a good example of the innovative work of the Reconnecting Northland programme, led by a local steering group and supported by WWF-NZ and NZ Landcare Trust.  It is currently funded by The Tindall Foundation, HSBC Bank Global Water Programme and ASB Community Trust.

Said Trevor Gray, Special Projects Manager at The Tindall Foundation, “Reconnecting Northland is the first trial in New Zealand of a ‘Large Landscape’ approach.  It seeks to enhance biodiversity in the whole region through improved connectivity, primarily between habitats, but also including social, economic and cultural factors.

“Linking the Kiwi Care groups with neighbouring land-owners along Northland’s East Coast, demonstrates what is possible on a larger and more integrated scale.  These stunning results in pest eradication are an example of what can be achieved through intentional connectivity, and working together towards a big, audacious goal.”

See more on the Kiwi Coast website.