Forest and Bird has been given a boost of more than $20,000 to help with pest eradication in the Makarora Valley.
The Royal Forest and Bird Society’s Central Otago branch has been given $23,395 from the The Otago Regional Council’s environmental enhancement fund to help with a predator control programme in the valley.
Volunteers from Forest and Bird had been running the predator control programme for more than 20 years.
ORC chief executive Peter Bodeker said the funding would cover items such as predator traps, rodent detector cards, tree mounts and cages.
Forest and Bird said the programme could expand relatively quickly and a trapping programme run by the volunteers would coincide with the Department of Conservation’s Battle for Our Birds programme in Mount Aspiring National Park.
Forest and Bird would focus on the braided river systems in the valley as those were priority ecosystems and habitats for a range of plants and animals, including endangered bird species.
The Wakatipu Islands Reforestation Trust also received $3816 from the fund to help maintain the Pig and Pigeon Islands reserves.
