The Whareroa Pest Control Team have now caught over 2,000 pests since 2013

Are the rumours sweeping Kapiti true that the Pest Control Team have now caught over 2’000 pests since April 2013?

You betcha!

The latest pest control results to June 2015 have been posted here…www.naturespace.org.nz/docume…/whareroa-pest-control-results or you can check out the Whareroa Guardians Community Trust on Facebook

Whareroa Trapping results for June 2015

The total pest catch was 126 in June (May: 218, Apr: 151, Mar: 132, Feb: 101 and 38 in Jan).

All Box Traps (BTs) were checked minimum 3 times and over half 4 times. It should be noted that May 2015 was an exceptional month with a lot of pest control activity (beyond the usual average) and – apart from the days of flooding – we often had a lot of optimal pest catching weather and the possum catch was much higher than usual.

Shane W has been pursuing ongoing exchanges in particular with Paul Callister (as well as others) and as far abroad as Hawkes Bay to develop further new pest control strategies (arising from the Restoration Day and in connection with the Kapiti Coast Biodiversity Project) and to assess new recording systems.

In June 2015, we broke the 2’000 pests-caught barrier; Possums: 359, Mustelids: 73, Rodents: 1’610, Hedgehogs & other: 73, totals to 2’115 pests caught since April 2013

Box Traps (BT):

There have been 2 new BTs placed on the Horse Track; one of these replacing a BT which was stolen in Jan. Total number of active BTs is now at 97

We assume the past months have put a good dent in breeding populations and the cold weather in June likely reduced the activity of the remaining pests.

The 22 Box Traps set close to the Weta Motels caught 15 pests in June (May: 42, Apr: 37, Mar: 26, Feb: 23, Jan: 6, Dec: 17).

Possums:

Total catch of 29 possums with only 4 trapping nights, but a higher than usual number of possum leg-hold traps (PTs) activated (Jason was doing a lot of walking!).
4 trapping nights, average traps per night: 60 (total trap-nights: 240) and with 29 possums a hit-rate of 12%

Jason has expanded the actively trapped areas in mainly in May and a bit further in June to Ramaroa, Big Bush and Little Bush in addition to the existing lines in Kohekohe, Upper Bush, Matai, East Ridge and Old Pines.
Last month the statistics were: 13 times trapping, leading to 279 trap nights (average 21 traps set per night) and a hit rate of 19% for 53 possums. Trapping in new areas was the main reason for the exceptionally large catch in May.

Regards from the Pest Team