Animal Pest Control Strategy

Draft 21 September 16

Objective

To increase the quantity and diversity of local native flora and fauna.

Authority

The Drayton Reserve Volunteers undertake work in Drayton Reserve for the Christchurch City Council with the support of the Mt Pleasant and Redcliffs Residents Associations.

Target Pests

We will target introduced pests known to be in our locality and known to eat or damage native plants or birds or their eggs or reptiles or insects. These include possums, mustelids (stoats, ferrets, weasels), rodents (rats & mice) and hedgehogs.

Volunteers

We will encourage local residents to be involved, especially those adjoining or near the Reserve who could install their own traps (especially rat traps) which would provide a wider coverage than just the Reserve. Residents who want to help check traps in the Reserve can be on a roster to share the workload.

Safety

This will be a priority. Signs will be placed at Reserve entrances to warn visitors that there are pest traps operating in the area and not to touch them. Traps will be made as inconspicuous as possible. Volunteers will be trained on how to set traps and release and dispose of dead pests. No poisons will be used and most traps will be “sudden kill” traps. We will use best practice methods.

Traps

We aim to maintain: 2 DOC 200 traps for mustelids and rats, in secluded sites; 7 Sentinel traps for possums, installed high on tree trunks out of sight, at about 100m intervals along the valley; 18 covered snap traps for rats, mice and mustelids and 2 Good Nature self-resetting traps for hedgehogs, rats and mice, at about 50m intervals along the valley.
Traps are checked about weekly and any pests are recorded, then carried out, or buried and covered with a rock to deter dogs etc from digging.

Monitoring

We will record the date and location of all pests killed and hope to see a gradual reduction in numbers over time until a very low annual kill can be maintained. We will also undertake bird counts annually and hope to see a gradual increase. Damaged and dead trees and locations will also be monitored to identify causes and remediation required. We will review the effectiveness of this strategy annually.