Blitz set to fix stoat problem on island

D’urville Island will become stoat free, following the signing of a $3.1 million funding commitment.

The remote Marlborough Sounds island is free of ship rats, Norway rats, possums and weasels, but stoats have caused the local extinction of little spotted kiwi, yellow-crowned ka¯ka¯riki and South Island ka¯ ka¯ .

The removal of stoats would also increase protection for significant nearby nature reserves, such as Stephens Island, which was home to 50,000 tuatara.

D’urville Island Stoat Eradication Charitable Trust (Disect) co-chairman Oliver Sutherland said the funding commitment took 16 years of preparation and planning by the group.

‘‘Thanks to Predator Free 2050 Limited, Ra¯ta¯ Foundation, Marlborough District Council, the NZ Lotteries Grant Board and landowners we have the opportunity to reverse the history of wildlife loss on d’urville Island,’’ Sutherland said.

The project would use a variety of methods, which included boxed snap-traps, self-setting and live-capture traps, as well as lures and smart detection techniques such as cameras and DNA analysis.

Special attention would also given to trapping on the mainland within five kilometres of d’urville, and a surveillance network would be established to ‘‘quickly detect any incursions across the narrow channel from French Pass’’.

The island has about 45 permanent residents, 80 private land owners and public conservation land, which includes d’urville Island Scenic Reserve.

Disect co-chairman and island resident Pip Aplin said he remembered hearing kiwi above his home in Manuwhakapakapa Bay in the early 1980s.

Kiwi on d’urville Island were removed by the wildlife service years ago because of the threat of stoats, but only four old males were found, Aplin said.

Marlborough mayor John Leggett said the council was delighted to work with the island community, Nga¯ ti Koata and the Department of Conservation ‘‘to enable the restoration of wildlife and open up new nature-based jobs and opportunities for the island’’.

Field-work was expected to start on the island towards the end of 2020.

Health workers with colds aren’t banned from leaving the house, says the region’s health boss, after a complaint was made that a health worker, supposedly off sick with cold and flu symptoms, was walking about Blenheim at the weekend.

A Blenheim woman, who did not want to be named, said she was shocked to learn a woman she understood to be a health worker was outside ‘‘coughing and sneezing’’ while off work with a ‘‘heavy cold’’.

She claimed the woman said she had not been tested for Covid19.

Nelson Marlborough Health played down the complaint this week, saying no employees had tested positive for coronavirus.

Chief executive Peter Bramley stressed NMH policy for unwell staff during the Covid-19 pandemic was to seek medical advice. If they were tested, they were required to stay in isolation until confirmed negative.

‘‘Members of the public, including our employees outside of work hours, who have a cold but who do not have Covid-19 are entitled to go outside for fresh air and exercise within their local