What's happening with stoat research? Report on the five-year stoat research programme

Abstract

In the May 1999 budget, the New Zealand Government announced that an extra $6.6 million over five years would be given to the Department of Conservation to fund an integrated stoat control research programme. Stoats, ferrets and weasels were introduced to New Zealand in the 1880s in an attempt to control rabbits. Although stoats were implicated in the decline of some native bird species soon after their introduction, the extent to which they are still contributing to the decline of native species is only now becoming clear. Their impacts on threatened and endangered birds are of particular concern. Stoat control in New Zealand will have to be ongoing if some endemic species are to survive on the mainland. Currently, stoat control relies largely on labour-intensive trapping and the use of poisoned hen eggs. New, more cost-effective and sustainable approaches to controlling stoats are urgently needed. The extra funding means that there is now a real opportunity for finding cost-effective solutions for managing stoats. A Stoat Technical Advisory Group (composed of experts from the Department of Conservation, Lincoln University and Auckland University) has been established to develop and oversee this new research programme. Funding for the first year is $338,000 with funding increasing in 2000/01 to $1.406 million and for the subsequent three years, $1.631 million, each year.