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One of the important features of wetland life is predation and George is here to tell us
about predation both pre and post contact.
Before people came to New Zealand, birds here were adapted to be attacked by other birds
and so they had beautiful camouflage but that was about it.
The disadvantage for them was that they smelled quite strongly
Which was fine until the Europeans and Maori brought mammalian predators to New Zealand.
Mammalian predators often hunt using smell. No matter how well you are camouflaged you
can still be smelled.
Things really heated up in the predator world with the introduction of mustelids and I have
a few here to show you.
Here is a weasel, the smallest of the mustelids and a very good predator of our birds.
Next size up is the stoat. You can always tell a stoat by the black tip on its tail
– the weasel does not have that.
The stoat is the number one predator – if we had to put them on a wanted list, this
would be top of the list.
Stoats are good swimmers, good climbers, very active, live in a whole range of altitudes
– from lowlands up to the mountains – and there are high numbers of them here.
Top of the size list, but not top of the predator list, is the ferret. It was brought over to
New Zealand for its fur, whereas the others were brought over to control rabbit numbers.
All bad predators but the stoat is the worst.
This one is obviously from a different family – from the cat family – still unfortunately
dumped out at Christmas when people want new pets.
These are feral cats – they are domesticated cats now used to living wild.
They have excellent senses and, more importantly, they’ve got a brain. They can actually work
out problems and this makes them really efficient predators.
So if you think of the animals I have just shown you, our birds don’t have a chance.
They are disappearing off the face of New Zealand.
We desperately need to control these predators if we wish to have our animals, our native
birds left in their own native places.
Very good predators but very bad for our native species and all brought over here for apparently
good reasons at the time but not looking back now.
They have become totally out of control and we do need to control them.
Indeed, well good luck with that George.