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Massive cost to make NZ predator free
Topic Started: Mar 19 2013, 03:16 PM (84 Views)
Kahu
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Massive cost to make NZ predator free

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A scientist has worked out how much it would cost to make New Zealand entirely free of introduced pests – $24.6 billion or about 12 per cent of gross domestic product.

Helpfully, Dr James Russell, a quantitative ecologist in the University of Auckland's schools of biological sciences and of statistics, suggests it might be easier to stagger his proposed programme over a decade.

Writing in the university's Uninews, he said there was a general consensus that New Zealand could be free of introduced mammalian predators in 50 years.

He suggests Great Barrier and Stewart islands could be the first to be made predator-free.

The North and South islands could be cleaned up through grassroots organisations.

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Delphi51
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How would the job be done? An army of hunter killers could be hired for those billions. Maybe it could be done by the real army?
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Kahu
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It's not that simple Delphi. We have enough idiots killing their mates thinking they were deer! Possums are night feeders and because we've had fatalities with spotlighting that's now been banned too. It's more likely to become achievable through offshore and mainland arking and the progressive removal of feral cat populations.
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Trotsky
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Big City Boy
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Massive cost to make NZ predator free


Won't there be many complaints since clearly any such plan would mean the killing of 4,405,000 people.
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Delphi51
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Arking?
Ah, Trotsky, even the most ardent environmentalists don't really want to eliminate humans. They just want to go back to the good old days (sometime after the flush toilet was invented).
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heatseeker
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I seem to recall that china under Mao reduced the fly population by decreeing that every citizen must swat a bunch of them every day.

Are possum good to to eat?

The roads in this part of the Yucatan are littered with dead possum. Europe is going need a replacement for all that horse meat in the lasagne and meatballs..
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Kahu
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Trotsky
Mar 20 2013, 12:26 AM
Won't there be many complaints since clearly any such plan would mean the killing of 4,405,000 people.
True enough biggrin 04 But it's a bit like the comment Delphi made .... I've been to only two places, no three, where predators (except humans) have been eliminated and it really is special!!! A cove down in Queen Charlotte Sound, Kapiti Island, and Zealandia in Wellington City.
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Kahu
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heatseeker
Mar 20 2013, 03:45 AM
Are possum good to to eat?

The roads in this part of the Yucatan are littered with dead possum. Europe is going need a replacement for all that horse meat in the lasagne and meatballs..
I have eaten them as a stew in my 'bush days' .... and they were quite tasty. They problem is they are vectors for bovine TB, and for public consumption there has to be very high standards of production. There used to be a bounty paid on them, but that has been discontinued and I can't remember the reason ..... the pelts are very fine but do take some working on; the market for furs fell dramatically. Nowadays, in areas which can be reached on foot they are trapped and poisoned ..... the carcases are plucked and the fluff is mixed with fine merino wool to produce very fine warm wool blend yarns. In the hill country there are aerial drops of 1080 to decrease numbers.
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Kahu
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Delphi51
Mar 20 2013, 03:22 AM
Arking?
We have basically two methods for conservation ..... offshore islands, where all the predators have been removed and there is limited public access to preserve the habitat and which is carefully monitored.

The other method is to create an onshore island, or an ark, which is usually in an area which can be protected by a predator proofed fence.
Predator Proof Fence
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