Imagine a friendly town bordering 140,000 hectares of forest parks, 40km from Pūkaha, Aotearoa’s premier wildlife centre. Imagine people working together so that the parks, reserves, streets, schools, businesses and backyards become welcoming sanctuaries for our native birds, lizards and insects.
Welcome to Whakaoriori Predator Free Masterton.
Whakaoriori Predator Free Masterton is a volunteer community effort to protect and encourage native wildlife in urban Masterton by targeting rats.
Why Predator Free?
We want to bring back native wildlife. With your help we can have the kereru, tui and morepork, lizards and other native species make their homes here again.
Rats are destructive. Eight percent of house fires are caused by rats chewing through electrical wires!
How does it work?
We are creating a community of backyard trappers. We want people to put rat traps in their backyards, keep them baited, and report catches. Simple!
Is it safe?
The traps are placed in wooden tunnels with wire mesh at each end to keep out domestic pets and little hands.
The bait for the trap is peanut butter or other pantry items. We are not using poison for this project.
The Plan
Successful trapping in one in five backyards is estimated to reduce the rat population to below 5 percent of current levels.
Our plan for the future is to connect our urban backyards with rural properties and beyond.
You can help by joining Masterton’s backyard trapping movement!
Does it cost to join?
The traps and protective timber tunnel are available to Masterton households for a donation. Your donation helps to keep the programme going. As a guide, it costs $20 for materials to make a wooden tunnel plus trap.
You can donate through our Givealittle Campaign:
https://givealittle.co.nz/org/waip2k
or a direct debit into our bank account:
Account name: The Pukaha to Kawakawa Trust
Account number: 02-0608-0063691-00
Reference: Predator Free Masterton
Report Your Catch
Whether you are using your own trap or one of ours, recording every predator you catch helps us track our progress.
