Date: 1st July 2024
Southern Lakes Sanctuary continues vital conservation work
Southern Lakes Sanctuary has secured enough funding to continue its critical conservation work in the Queenstown Lakes District – but they’re not out of the woods yet.
The conservation consortium driving predator control, restoring wildlife and protecting biodiversity across its 660,000ha catchment area has recently secured over $1m of support from a range of generous private funders, businesses, philanthropic groups and local government agencies.
Established in June 2021 as a result of the Jobs For Nature funding, Southern Lakes Sanctuary has operated on $1.5m annually to coordinate and deliver major conservation projects throughout the region. However, with the three-year programme coming to an end this month, the consortium was at risk of collapse if money wasn’t maintained.
Since its inception the Southern Lakes Sanctuary has been determined to contribute to the region’s biodiversity for years beyond the Jobs For Nature period and has spent the past year actively seeking generous and engaged contributors.
Thanks to commitments from Central Lakes Trust, AJ Hackett Bungy New Zealand, Lotteries Commission and many others, such as philanthropists Sir Michael Hill and Rod Drury, conservation outcomes such as these recent examples can continue:
· Trapping of 37 feral cats at Mount Creighton Station across 20 nights via 10 live capture cages.
· Dispatching more than 538 pests from 900 hectares in Bob’s Cove.
· Installing 110 AI-enhanced predator traps near Arrowtown and on Coronet Peak lower face, which have dispatched more than 3,000 possums and rats from 2,300 ha.
· A small, 20ha area with just three traps on QEII National Trust-owned Remarkables Station land has taken an impressive 235 possums and rats.
· Establishing a 100km-long alpine trapline between Wānaka and Glenorchy to help conserve vulnerable species such as kea and pīwauwau (rock wren).
· Protecting endangered mohua in Makarora from an impending rat plague through extensive trapping and monitoring. Over three months last summer, crew and volunteers walked more than 190,000km to regularly check traps and bait stations with more than 5,000 rats exterminated.
Southern Lakes Sanctuary project director Paul Kavanagh says the conservation group’s success and milestones to date are the direct results of SLS’ impressive crew and their collaboration with countless volunteers.
“The incredible achievements of the volunteers and our team members undertaking predator control are what attracts donors to support us. They recognise the importance of continuing our role to protect our local biodiversity,” he adds.
SLS will continue to rely on annual funding to ensure this important conservation work is undertaken for the future.
“Restoring the region’s natural biodiversity takes time and ongoing commitment. There’s a lot to do but with a great crew, a supportive community and rapidly advancing technology we are optimistic about what the future holds and how we can contribute to it,” Kavanagh explains. “By 2030, we aim to have removed more than 250,000 predators in total, while maintaining a network of 30,000 traps and support the return of endemic birds across Wānaka and Whakatipu areas.
“We hope that over the coming years it will become normal for anyone to see takahē wandering in the Rees Valley, hear a deafening chorus of birds at Bobs Cove and easily spot mohua and kea in the Matukituki Valley.”
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