Trapper Monthly, December 2025

Dear Trappers and Fantail Friends 

Last report of the year! It’s been a good year on all sides. For the birds and for the forest and for the predators. Maybe not so much for the predators but you get my gist. That is simply amazing. When I get to the gorge from on high up, I hear a veritable chorus of birdsong. An explosion of chirping, chittering, chattering, twittering. It makes me happy. And I hear it again and again from walkers how many birds they can hear and observe in the canopy. To me the best moments are when I see the kereru! Just the other day I saw three of them sitting in a cabbage tree and one after the other took off, flew high into the sky, then dived steeply and lifted themselves back on to the cabbage tree, landing somewhat clumsily. But fly then can! Just for fun I would have thought. Birds having fun in the Rakaia Gorge. And so am I.
 
I dedicate this trapper monthly to the birds. But first some statistics. We caught during the month of December 11 possums, 19 rats, 1 hedgehog and 1 weasel. The possum number is a bit on the high side but almost half the average for December. Quite some more than the last few months but it might be due that about four of the dead possies should be allocated to November. There were four very old and decomposed possums on Central Line, which had not been checked for some time. 

Now the yearly statistics are interesting as well. The possum numbers are half from last year. They are in fact steadily in decline. The main problem we have is that they are always coming back into the area. Just the other day we drove a short distance from Middle Rock Station to Terrace Downs and saw two possums wanting to cross over the road. In the end they will get to the Rakaia Gorge. Funnily enough, I took evasive action to avoid killing one of those possums! How silly is that! 
​
The overall numbers look impressive too. We got 1216 possums so far, 1832 rats, 306 hedgehogs, 169 mustelids and 175 others. For reasons of charity I cannot divulge what the ‘others’ might be. The total number since the start of the project is 3698 predators removed. To this number I should add the catches recorded on the A24 traps which would add more than 500 to the tally! The reason is that not very often I come across a dead animal underneath these traps. There are rats on occasion or a mouse. Hard to know what effect these traps are having on predator numbers but I have to believe that the numbers I get from the traps are real catches that just quickly disappear, removed by other predators, birds maybe, cats or even pigs. 
 We have nearly 600 traps out there and just this last week I deployed 15 more DOC150 traps down Penny Lane. That area is going to be a lovely new native forest from what I can judge by the growth of natives coming up all over the place in between the gorse and broom, which are getting old and are opening up for the light to get in and stimulate the pittosporums, the broadleaf, the cabbage trees and even the kowhai. Care needs to be taken because sycamore trees are sprouting up as well even though Ecan has undertaken a lot of weeding of these and the pine trees. We must be vigilant as our gains could very quickly be lost again. 

I give you a little impression as to how it is to ‘deploy’ 15 DOC traps down Penny Lane. And sorry about the convoluted description. I cut this track last year and it goes in a semi-circle around a peninsula jutting out into the river. On one side is the walkway, so there is one entrance and one exit. Barry from next door helped me to get the traps down to the walkway with his four wheel drive buggy. We deposited eight traps on one end and seven at the other. And there I left it all.

But that is no good. So, one day I get to the top end and deploy five traps. D170 to D174. It means carrying two traps at a time and then instal them, getting a little platform so they are even and stable. Rats do not like wobbly traps! And then I left it at that. Bad weather. 

The drama starts when I took up deployment again a few days later. It’s got to be done! Nice morning it was even if a bit windy. Now there were three traps left at the depot at the top end of the lane and of course they had to go past all the traps I already had in place. I can only carry two of these traps. They are heavy and clumsy. 

I take two of them and get to the first one I placed a few days earlier, D170. Drop them there and walk back up to get the third one. Then from there I take two again and get to second trap already in position, D171, drop them and make my way up again to get the other one. And so on until I had all three traps at D174. Which to my astonishment had already a rat in it! A brand new trap and a rat in it! Maybe there are a lot of rats around here!

From this spot I have to measure the distance to next deployment which is forty metres. I have a blue tape twenty metres long. I stick one end, which has a kind of needle attachment, into the ground and go my way. After the twenty metres are out I have to pull the tape towards me to continue. And you think that you could just pull it, but no, it always snags somewhere which means I have to go back and disentangle the thing. Then stick the end again into the ground and walk another twenty metres. And that is the spot where the next trap will go!

For that to happen I need to walk back again to my depot of traps, get two of them and get to this location, make a flat area with my hammer, put the trap on to it, put an egg into it and peanut butter, close the thing, label it and put it on my GPS on trap.nz. 

From here I measure another twenty metres,  and then come back, pick up the tape, and then measure another twenty metres. Go back pick up the other traps and install one, then measure again and back to pick up the last trap. It is amazing how in this forest the tape can snag anywhere and everywhere. A little branch or a log. And then it goes all into knots and it takes ages to undo. Me in the forest undoing knots and entanglements of the tape or rope which I use. Hard work!

Finally, I walk towards the end of Penny Lane, where there are seven more traps to do. Arrrgh! In between I use chain saw to cut the track again because in high winds it all got blown over with trees and branches. Then I put in more blue marker ribbons so that other people can find their way through this maze of bush. 
 
I manage three more traps to put further down the lane but not to activate them. Just too much. Then I realise that I got the numbering wrong somewhere! The last trap I installed should have been D177 but it was D178. One too many! Which means I have to go back and sort it all out. What a nuisance. On top of it I lost the little wrench to open the traps with. I am exhausted. Still have to walk home. Made it in five hours! A day in the life of a trapper!

The other pleasing thing is that the shop down by the coalmine has done exceptionally well in December. We sold Christmas cards and other festive things and we can hardly keep up stocking the shelves! The post box is used quite a lot too. It always puts a smile on my face when I open the box and see three or four letters or postcards in there to be posted. With the help of Juliana Child, our friend next door, we have ordered special stamps from the post office with a fantail on it and the words: ’The Fantail Trust’. It looks beautiful. If you like to receive a post card with the stamp on it, please give us your address, donate ten dollars to the fantails and we send you one. The Fantails account number: BNZ, 02 0868 011730 25. Reference: Post Stamp. Thank you. Make my day!

---

​We will retrieve the visitor’s book for 2025 and put the new one into the box. I must say the 2025 book is amazing with all the entries and comments. Sue Whitty, another friend, has indicated that she might transcribe the book and give us another statistic as to how many persons signed, where they came from and what they might have written.

To the birdies now: 

The Fantail or Piwakawaka: 
















Song of a fantail:

www.doc.govt.nz/globalassets/documents/conservation/native-animals/birds/bird-song/south-island-fantail.mp3

The fantail has done reasonably well in New Zealand despite a greatly altered environment. It has adapted to feeding in exotic forests, gardens and orchards. Part of the reason is that fantails have a very broad range of insects to live on, but they also produce lots of eggs and so it is likely that a few will always survive. Having said that they are still vulnerable to predation by rats, cats and stoats. 
They are able to move quickly in all directions with their wide tail to catch insects either by flying directly into a swarm of insects, or by disturbing them in bushes or catching them by following walkers or other larger birds like silvereyes.  
They surely are one of the most beloved birds in New Zealand.


The Bellbird or Korimako

---

Song of a bellbird

https://www.doc.govt.nz/globalassets/documents/conservation/native-animals/birds/bird-song/bellbird-06.mp3

Bellbirds are usually recognised by their song which Captain Cook likened to the sound of ‘small bells exquisitely tuned’. The song can vary a lot from one place to another. Bellbirds were very common when Europeans arrived but then declined sharply and were even thought of being in danger of disappearing completely. 

They have recovered somewhat but are still missing north of Hamilton, are rare in Wellington, Wairarapa, and inland of Canterbury and Otago. Not so in the Rakaia Gorge where there seems to be a healthy population of bellbirds. 

They like to feed on the kowhai flowers in spring which flower along the walkway from early June to the end of October providing delicious nectar during the breeding season. Then they also like the fuchsia flowers, again for their sweet nectar. 


The Grey Warbler or Riroriro












​


Song of a Grey Warbler

https://www.doc.govt.nz/globalassets/documents/conservation/native-animals/birds/bird-song/grey-warbler-song.mp3

Grey Warblers are tiny birds and are found throughout New Zealand. They are not threatened but still, trapping helps them to survive in larger numbers. They fly in and out of trees and bushes and are hardly ever seen but their song gives them away, a song which is amazing considering the size of these birds, about the third of a mouse, making them one of New Zealand’s lightest birds!
 
The nest of the Grey Warbler is prey to the shining cuckoo which removes an egg from the clutch of up to five Grey Warbler eggs and replaces it with its own. It is not rejected but when the cuckoo chick hatches it throws all the other eggs or nestlings out of the nest! Strange what nature does! 

It is only the male that sings the long melodious song during the breeding season. That is why they seem to disappear from the forest at other times. 


The New Zealand Pigeon or Kereru

---

Sound of Kereru

https://www.doc.govt.nz/globalassets/documents/conservation/native-animals/birds/bird-song/nz-pigeon-song.mp3

The Kereru is not threatened but still the numbers are in decline where there is no predation control or where they are still illegally hunted as in Northland. The threat also comes from rats, cats, stoats and possums which eat their eggs or fledglings. Possums also compete for seeds, flowers and leaves. Kereru are an important species for the native forests as they can swallow large nuts and disperse them to other sites. 
They lay a single egg usually between September and April and when fruit is abundant, they might lay twice in a season. It takes almost two months from egg to young fledgling. Both, male and female, sharing in the brooding and feeding of the chicks. 

While their preferred food is ripe fruit from native trees, they also eat the leaves of kowhai, the flowers and buds and they love tree lucerne! In Akaroa I have seen flocks of kereru feeding in stands of tree lucerne. 

The kereru in the Rakaia Gorge are to me a very special sight and very dear as they are a good indication that the trapping has an effect on their numbers. I hardly ever saw one at the beginning of the project but now almost every day I can observe them in trees, just sitting there looking out over the forest. 


The Silvereye or Tauhou














The song of a Silvereye

https://www.doc.govt.nz/globalassets/documents/conservation/native-animals/birds/bird-song/silvereye-song-22sy.mp3

Silvereye are considered to be a native species but have only been recorded since 1832. The Maori name means new arrival. They are not threatened and are often seen in large flocks among the matagouri or gorse making quite a lot of noise with their chirping! Real busy bodies among the branches!

During the breeding season, August, September and February, they raise two to three clutches each one of about three eggs. A population therefore can increase rapidly especially if there is no predation by rats or stoats. 

They are an omnivorous bird eating insects, worms, caterpillars and flies but they also like fruit, native fruit and exotic, often to the dismay of orchardists for whom they might be considered a pest devastating plantations of cherries, apples, peaches and all other fruits as well. 

In the winter they are readily attracted to bird feeders liking fat and lard and especially sugar water. We have such a bird feeder at the back of our house and some days there are up to twenty silvereyes fighting for a spot on the feeder. Occasionally bellbirds visit as well. 


These are some of the birds down in the Rakaia Gorge. Other species which I see sometimes are the New Zealand falcon, robins, tomtits, chaffinches, blackbirds, redpolls, yellowhammers and song thrushes. Not all of them natives but all are adding up to the bird chorus filling our little sanctuary with their song. My hope is that we will get over time other species as well like Tuis maybe, parakeets and the ultimate goal: kiwis!

As a Maori proverb says:

Tamina nga manu, ka ora te ngahere. Ka ora te ngahere, ka ora nga manu. Or in English:
Look after the birds and the forest flourishes. If the forest flourishes, the birds flourish.
​
To that I would like to say that if we look after the forest  and the birds then we save a little bit of our planet earth, a flourishing Earth, for future generations to enjoy. Enough incentive to keep on going. Thank you all for being such a big part of it. 

---