More than 950 traps have been set in the West Matukituki Valley, and 250 traps in the east to catch rats, stoats and predators that kill native birds.
Southern Lakes Sanctuary’s Scott Bewley is the brains behind a new prototype predator trap that so far has been effective in trapping stoats, which have otherwise become aware and accustomed to the typical brown wooden box traps used by the department of conservation.
Mr Bewley said so far, the trap was working well.
"Unfortunately, Matukituki is just hanging on by the skin of its teeth and there wasn’t money for the 1080 operation."
"We are just holding the line until other tools come along. They [stoats] do become aware that it is in their environment and they won’t enter them."
Last January the traps caught 77 stoats, a record number since the trust began in 2013.
The uprise in predators was caused by a mast season, he said. This is when conditions favour the large beech trees, which drop seeds that rats and mice feed off. The rats and mice then attract stoats.
"It becomes an abundance of food for rodents, so you have an explosion of rodents
"They prefer the rodents over birds, but once they run out, they start predating on birds, which is a big problem.
"The problem we have with rodents is they become the food source for stoats and if that population increases, we have a problem."
A spike in rodents and predators is not unusual for a mast season, he said. However, without the trust and the huge number of traps, the birds would be in much more danger.
