Update July 2012

We are pleased with the reponse from the Adopt a Hectare initiative and have just adopted the 60th hectare. It's fantastic to see members and supporters committ to this project. Still lots of hectares available (although most of the lakefront hectares have been adopted out already). If you would like to consider adopting a hectare at Rotoponam, to ensure the work can be carried out year after year, go to www.tongariro.org.nz/adoptahectare

Latest tracking tunnel results

Line 1 - Rats x 4
Line 2 - Rats x 4
Line 3 - Rats x 3
Line 10 - Rats x 0
Line 11 - Rats x 1
Line 12 - Rats x 0
Line 13 - Rats x 1

This equates to a rat tracking rate of 19%, which in comparison to last year's increase of rats over the winter, looks to be increasing at a slightly faster rate. The lines with high numbers of rats are all close to the block boundary and is what we would expect from new rats migrating in to the block. We should look to run tracking tunnels again at the start of August to get a clear idea of how it is going. At this stage there are no concerns that the rat numbers are going to increase to a rate that will be uncontrollable when we start to run the bait stations. We know that we can control large numbers of rats in a short period of time using the PestOff 20R as demonstrated by the graph below (October 2010).

Latest Trap Clearing

While major bait station work is paused over winter, the 50 traps along the shores of Rotopounamu are still set and cleared throughout winter months.

On 23 June 2012, dedicated Project Tongariro volunteers, Noel and Lyn Thomas, cleared five rats from the traps. With a bit of clever kiwi thinking, volunteer Kevin Griffiths has added a nifty design feature to make his work more efficient. See the pics below.