Sure, possums are cute… but they do a lot of damage to our native forest by eating all the tender shoots and berries and clawing their way up the tree trunks – not to mention their hunger for native bird’s eggs and chicks.
DOC (Department of Conservation) assumes that there are more than 80 million of these pests in New Zealand and the fight against proliferation is extremely difficult. Having seen the evidence of the damage the possums are doing to lots of rata and rewarewa trees, we got together with a group of 5 of our closest neighbours and applied for a grant from the Waikato Regional Council to purchase possum and rat traps.
To our surprise, the “Upper Old Coach Road Possum Project” application for funding was approved and we were able to order a number of possum and rat traps which we will be setting up on our respective properties. These traps will be monitored and we hope to be able to, if not reduce, at least control the number of possums and rats that are damaging our native flora and fauna.
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