Wellington, first predator free capital city in the world?

Te Whanganui-a-Tara – Wellington could soon be the first predator free capital city in the world.

Predator Free Wellington (PFW) is on a mission. They want to be the predator free and so far, the project has been a huge success. The Miramar Peninsula is now free from Norway rats and weasels.

Native birds have increased by 33 percent since the project began, with kākā, kākāriki and kererū all flocking to the peninsula, while populations of tree wētā have doubled.

But there’s one more hurdle for the team to jump, eradicating the port’s ship rats. To sink the ship rat problem, the PFW team has gotten crafty with how they trap.

They are using special bait stations, personalised rat menus and hundreds of chew cards sent have been to Wellingtonians to help them identify the presence of predators in their backyards.

They also partner with other key organisations. Zero Invasive Predators (ZIP) helps monitor introduced predators with cameras and Motolures, to identify hotspots of activity. Researchers from Victoria-Te Herenga Waka University study how tree wētā are responding to the project.

When the work first began in Miramar, the PFW team thought Norway rats would be the biggest challenge. They soon realised that the ship rat is a trickier customer.

Ship rats are smaller than Norway rats and are the most common rat species in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Norway rats can climb, they prefer to keep four paws on the ground. Ship rats are competent climbers, living up trees and in roofs, which can make it difficult to lure them into traps.

Norway rats were brought into New Zealand in the late 1700s on sailing ships from Europe and they rapidly spread across the country. Weasels (along with stoats and ferrets) were introduced to New Zealand as early as 1879. At the time some people believed that these mustelid species would control rabbit plagues that were destroying sheep pastures.

Eradicating introduced predators from a city is a world first so PFW has come up with some creative solutions to the ship rat problem.

To get baits onto cliffs and into mats of cape ivy, they invented what James boomerang bait stations tied to the end of a rope and thrown off a cliff. To check the station, they just haul in the rope.

Although eradicating ship rats has been difficult but they have been putting out QR codes on traps. This means if a someone is walking or jogging, they can scan the code to let the team know.