Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research and Predator Free Rakiura have joined forces to eliminate possums, rats, feral cats and hedgehogs from Stewart Island.
The two organizations have signed a major research partnership agreement worth $2.8 million over four years.
Stewart Island is approximately 180,000 acres in size and has a population of 400 permanent residents.
The project will be the largest extermination of island predators ever attempted and, if successful, a world first on an inhabited island.
The research partnership will lead to insights into achieving predator freedom, a critical part of which is understanding the social aspects of resources, achieving and maintaining predator freedom from the perspective of the local community and iwi.
Paul Norris, co-chair of Te Puka Rakiura Trust, said the organization was delighted to partner with Manaaki Whenua.
“Together as a partnership this will go a long way in understanding the areas where we need to learn further to achieve the ambitious goal of a predator-free Rakiura.
“The learnings at Rakiura will also help teach lessons for a predator-free New Zealand on the road, I’m sure.”
Predator Free Rakiura project director Campbell Leckie also said more research was needed to make the island-wide eradication a reality.
Manaaki Whenua will provide $350,000 per year for the next four years to carry out the fundamental underpinnings of the science.
That includes research into the behaviour, distribution and density of predators and the social and economic impacts of the project.
Forest and Bird spokesman Dean Baigent-Mercer said it was an ambitious and important vision that would pave the way for environmental protection in the rest of New Zealand and around the world.
“As well as being a game changer for native species such as the Stewart Island brown kiwi, hoiho, New Zealand dotterel and many more native and endemic species, Predator Free Rakiura would be a major attraction for wildlife tourism and the local economy, as well as for the expression of mātauranga Māori.”
Baigent-Mercer said there are currently forested areas of Stewart Island in active collapse, with tōtara being eaten to death by possums.
“Reversing this situation will be a milestone and help restore native forest as a carbon sink.”