1080 protesters — they are wilfully ignorant

These past two weeks, at the start of the nesting season for many native birds, thousands of defenceless bellbird, fantail and ka¯ ka¯ and their newly hatched chicks will have been eaten alive in the Hunua Ranges by hordes of rats, stoats and possums. They could have been saved from that horrific fate but for the action of a group of ill-informed, self-appointed guardians of the environment.

A 1080 poison drop in the ranges was postponed after the Environment Court extended a temporary injunction against the operation last week. Friends of Sherwood Trust applied to the court to halt the 1080 drop by helicopter on the grounds that the operation would put human health at risk. Previous court applications to halt 1080 operations, on the grounds that wildlife was at risk, were equally ill-informed and they failed. However, alleging threats to human health introduced a new element which the courts could not ignore. The Hunua operation was publicly notified in August, giving plenty of time to mount a legal challenge, but this late action was clearly designed to disrupt the programme, win or lose in court.

The Auckland City Council had already begun covering the bush with nontoxic pre-drop pellets, to be followed up with 1080 within a week when a temporary injunction was granted two weeks ago.

The Hunua Ranges supplies about 65 per cent of Auckland’s water and is also the habitat of endangered native birds which are under threat from a growing predator population.

The target for the 1080 drop are countless thousands of rats, mice and possums, which undergo a population explosion every few years when seed production reaches a peak. These rodents result in a similar population explosion among their stoat predators. At the onset of spring, these predators turn their attention to defenceless nesting birds and their eggs and chicks, which are easier targets. The timing of these 1080 operations is therefore crucial.

The rat and mouse populations have to be taken out to starve the stoats before the onset of nesting. While the Environment Court has rightfully thrown out the application to halt the Hunua 1080 drop, the success of this year’s operation has already been unforgivably compromised.

There is a significant body of peerreviewed science to show that 1080, as applied in pellet bait from from a helicopter by properly trained operators, poses no risk to water or human health.

It is without doubt a nonselective and lethal toxin, but much safer to use than many other toxins which can leave residues in the soil for considerable periods of time.

The other reason 1080 is used as a pesticide in New Zealand is that we have no native mammals to protect. These irrefutable facts have been known and explained over many years, but no amount of rational discussion or reliable science will change the minds of a few who refuse to accept anything but a total ban on 1080 regardless of the risk that would pose to native flora and fauna. Nontarget species which have been accidentally killed by 1080 have invariably been in notified operational areas when they should not have been.

A recent protest at Parliament saw dead native birds presented apparently as evidence of 1080 poisoning, but there are suggestions they died by other means. During my time in frontline journalism, I saw, and reported on, other questionable tactics such as gathering 1080 pellets from an operation area and placing them on picnic tables more than a kilometre outside the drop zone near Otorohanga in the 1980s. I have also been given photographs of dead deer supposedly killed by 1080 in Southland, but which had poorly disguised bullet wounds. There was even a threat by anti-1080 protesters to ‘‘take down helicopters’’ as they dropped the pesticide in Egmont National Park. Some of these people in recent times have reverted to clever public relations tactics to divert almost any news event into an argument about 1080 and send threatening messages to those who legally use it.

Last year, when a Waikato family fell ill after eating wild pork, social media was quickly buzzing with unfounded claims that the cause of the illness was 1080. It wasn’t and that possibility was ruled out by medical professionals.

There is little doubt that, if 1080 did not kill feral deer and other introduced game animals, we would not have had anything like the irrational and illegal protests we have seen in recent decades.

People are allowed to oppose 1080 and they are allowed to advocate for a law change, but they are not allowed to threaten the lives of others or endanger native wildlife. It is time the anti-1080 movement was revealed for what it really is: an ill-informed, fraudulent group of ignorant idealists.

It is time the anti1080 movement was revealed for what it really is: an illinformed, fraudulent group of ignorant idealists.