August 2020

Friends of Rotoiti Volunteers

have been busy despite the current level 2 covid regulations. We welcomed a number of new volunteers with the conservation week “ take a friend trapping” day.

Other volunteers have been busy with a trap upgrade - building new trap boxes and replacing traps with new stainless steel models.

Unfortunately we once again postponed the Friends of Rotoiti meeting.

News from the Rotoiti Nature Recovery Project

Kea – Little is known about kea in our area. There will be a summer project to gather data. Work will start soon on looking for nests, with traps and cameras to be placed around any nests located.

Kiwi – The GSK project should be underway again soon.

Feral cats – DOC have purchased 20 new cat traps which will be fitted with remote encounter devices. These devices will alert staff when the trap has been set off. Some FOR volunteers will be invited to the training on use of the remote encounter devices.

Feral cat trapping will start in Teetotal on 20 July and FOR volunteers will assist DOC staff.

FOR volunteers will trap the Mt Robert Road area prior to that – starting 6 July.

New Staff - Emma McCool has returned , Ricki Mitchell is a new staff member. She comes from the kakapo recovery team on Anchor Island.

1080 Application – Will occur in August

Double Set Traps – A project comparing run through versus current best practice is being written up. There was no significant difference between the options.

Forest Ringlet Butterflies – There is a proposed summer project.

Kaka Monitoring – Arrangements were made for FOR volunteers to restart monitoring.