Predator Free Morningside – Western Springs has been active since May 2017. It’s mission is to create favourable conditions for native birds and other wildlife to thrive in and around local reserves like Fowlds Park and Gribblehirst Reserve and across the wider area.
The project has grown from 20 traps in the area to nearly 200 and logged nearly 1600 predator catches to date, making this one of the most formidable groups in the Urban Ark trapping network.
The group are actively building up trap density in back yards around Fowlds Park to help increase native biodiversity. They are also working with neighbours of Gribblehirst reserve, to create a protective buffer zone or ‘halo’ around the critically endangered lava rock forest there. Backyard trapping reinforces the work local volunteers undertake running traplines in the parks themselves (with council permission). Please get in touch if you live in one these areas and would like a free rat trap or a loaned possum trap for your backyard…or if you’d like to help run a reserve trapline.
Members of Predator Free Morningside – Western Springs receive regular newsletter updates on progress. It is easy for people to register their catches by clicking on an email link, after which one of the group’s leaders inputs the data to a TrapNZ catch database.