by Sharon McGaffin
What would you prefer to have in your backyard - a cat or a kiwi? Last month cat owners celebrated International Cat Day but once New Zealand was the land of birds. In the absence of mammals, unique birds evolved including the kiwi. That all changed when humans discovered our remote islands in the South Pacific. First, kiore, a small species of Pacific rat, arrived with Māori explorers.
Rats and cats arrived on the sailing ships of the early explorers in the eighteenth century. In the late 1800s large flocks of native parakeets (kakariki) attacked orchards and fields of grain and were shot in their thousands. Bushmen and gold miners staved off starvation by cooking plump kakapo, still wandering around in native forests at that time.
Worse was to come. Rabbits, brought to New Zealand by early settlers as a food source, bred in ever-increasing numbers and threatened the livelihood of farmers, so weasels, stoats and ferrets were introduced in an attempt to control the rabbits. Like the nursery rhyme “There Was an Old Woman Who Swallowed a Fly”, animals were introduced to fix problems but in turn became problems themselves. The new arrivals soon found that it was easier to catch naive native birds, unused to mammalian predators, than frisky rabbits. Meanwhile, possums introduced from Australia in a failed attempt to establish a fur industry, found New Zealand native trees more nutritious than their former eucalyptus diet and began expanding in numbers too. Increasing numbers of possums threatened the remaining native bush and supplemented their diet with birds’ eggs and baby birds. As a consequence of all these introductions, the populations of native birds plummeted and some were wiped out altogether.
Fast-forward to 2016. The government announced its goal of eradicating all the pests that threaten New Zealand’s native birds by 2050 and invested an initial $28 million in Predator Free New Zealand Ltd, to drive the programme alongside the private sector. The focus was to be on eliminating rats, stoats and possums. Since then, councils and community groups across the land have been getting on board and working to eliminate pests in their areas.
What about cats? Some think cats have a positive role to play in controlling rats and mice but research has shown that cats kill more birds, skinks, geckos and weta than rodents. Consequently, others think that cats should be removed from the New Zealand landscape too. But cats are popular pets in this country, companions for many and loved family members. Does it have to be either or? Can we have cats AND kiwi in our urban areas? Maybe “yes” if responsible cat owners:
Rats and cats arrived on the sailing ships of the early explorers in the eighteenth century. In the late 1800s large flocks of native parakeets (kakariki) attacked orchards and fields of grain and were shot in their thousands. Bushmen and gold miners staved off starvation by cooking plump kakapo, still wandering around in native forests at that time.
Worse was to come. Rabbits, brought to New Zealand by early settlers as a food source, bred in ever-increasing numbers and threatened the livelihood of farmers, so weasels, stoats and ferrets were introduced in an attempt to control the rabbits. Like the nursery rhyme “There Was an Old Woman Who Swallowed a Fly”, animals were introduced to fix problems but in turn became problems themselves. The new arrivals soon found that it was easier to catch naive native birds, unused to mammalian predators, than frisky rabbits. Meanwhile, possums introduced from Australia in a failed attempt to establish a fur industry, found New Zealand native trees more nutritious than their former eucalyptus diet and began expanding in numbers too. Increasing numbers of possums threatened the remaining native bush and supplemented their diet with birds’ eggs and baby birds. As a consequence of all these introductions, the populations of native birds plummeted and some were wiped out altogether.
Fast-forward to 2016. The government announced its goal of eradicating all the pests that threaten New Zealand’s native birds by 2050 and invested an initial $28 million in Predator Free New Zealand Ltd, to drive the programme alongside the private sector. The focus was to be on eliminating rats, stoats and possums. Since then, councils and community groups across the land have been getting on board and working to eliminate pests in their areas.
What about cats? Some think cats have a positive role to play in controlling rats and mice but research has shown that cats kill more birds, skinks, geckos and weta than rodents. Consequently, others think that cats should be removed from the New Zealand landscape too. But cats are popular pets in this country, companions for many and loved family members. Does it have to be either or? Can we have cats AND kiwi in our urban areas? Maybe “yes” if responsible cat owners:
- Get their cats de-sexed
- Put bells on their cats
- Consider not replacing their cats when they die
- Keep their cats inside at night.
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