Issue 96 - August/September 2023 |
On Sale Monday 14th August 2023

It’s been another challenging couple of months with weather patterns as unsettled as ever, but hopefully you’ve all managed to get a few trips in between the rain, wind and snow!

The huge news this issue is the release of National’s Hunting and Fishing Policy. This is a really big deal, and encompasses so much of what we’ve been fighting to achieve for many years. Kudos where Kudos is due - Chris Luxon, Todd McLay and their team have taken on board what we’ve been saying and come up with a really comprehensive policy that sounds pragmatic and sensible and will have big wins for hunters and fishers, game animals, game birds and sports fish, indigenous biodiversity and conservation as well. This is an opportunity for the win/win we’ve all been looking for. Now we’ll have to wait and see the results on election night to see if National can deliver on this policy

Make no mistake, this is very early on in the process of recognising valued introduced species in legislation following on from good work in the Te Mana o Te Taiao national biodiversity strategy and Te Ara ki Mua wild animal adaptive management framework. We do need to sort out the current mishmash of conservation legislation that makes it impossible to map out a pragmatic and achievable path forward for valued introduced species and conservation. There are issues with sections like s4 (2)(b) of the National Parks Act for example, that says all introduced species shall be eradicated as far as possible. This is a virtue signaling provision that has ostensibly achieved nothing other than to deny the opportunity to formulate pragmatic solutions for the conservation of our national parks.

This new emphatic direction announced by National should be a game changer. With the right resolve from the politicians and sensible advice from the various sectors, it is possible now more than ever before!

Some of you may have seen the latest WARO national land schedule review. There are huge issues with some of the changes that have been made here, including absurdities such as opening up the Kaimanawas to uncontrolled WARO. The Department is working with the Sika Foundation to seriously reduce hind numbers in there while leaving the stags for recreational hunters. Now a WARO operator can simply buzz through there cleaning up all the stags, destroying all the biodiversity gains and goodwill this project has produced so far. There are areas in the South Island high country recently made public due to tenure review, that have now been opened up to WARO while still remaining closed to recreational hunting. There are other heavily recreationally hunted and readily accessible areas that have also now been opened up to WARO. All this conflict is so unnecessary, and was done by the DOC concessions division working in a silo, not by Ben Reddiex and the wild animal management team who should have been heavily involved in this process. Absolutely absurd, and does not help trying to get hunters and Department working together constructively.

We MUST highlight that WARO is an important part of the ‘concerted action’ mix needed for game animal management, but only when co-ordinated with rec hunting under the ‘complimentary’ (FWF) management model; not the ‘competitive’ conflict driving management model (that results almost everywhere else under this new WARO schedule).

The Departments tahr control for the year started in July, so please be aware you may well encounter culling operations in tahr country for the next couple of months. Go to the DOC website to get the most up to date information.