NEW ZEALAND DOGS AND HANDLERS HELP ERADICATE RATS FROM AUSTRALIAN ISLAND

New Zealand dogs and their handlers showed dogged determination to remove rats from Australia’s Lord Howe Island in the face of Covid-19 restrictions.

The dogs and their handlers had an extended stay on the island and then were separated for almost a month due to the ongoing Delta outbreak in New Zealand.

When the New South Wales government reached out to New Zealand’s Conservation Dog Programme for help quashing a rodent incursion on the island in April, two of the country’s finest dog handlers were quick to put their hands up.

Department of Conservation senior ranger Ange Newport said Lord Howe Island was an outstanding example of an ecosystem developed from submarine volcanic activity with nearly half its 241 plant species and 60 per cent of insects found nowhere else on Earth.

The island is 600 kilometres off the east coast of Australia and has about 400 residents.

A rodent eradication was undertaken on Lord Howe Island in 2019 to remove ship rats and mice from the island. After 16 months of no sign of rodents, as small breeding population was discovered in April. The origin of this population is currently being investigated.

Newport said as soon as there was a hint of a rodent on the island, the response had to be quick.

Two resident biosecurity dogs and two dogs and handlers brought over from Tasmania could not keep up. Rats can breed all year round and have five to six litters a year, each with up to 10 pups.

A call for help was made to the New Zealand Conservation Dog Programme and answered by handlers Miriam Ritchie and her rodent-detecting fox terrier border terrier crosses Will and Ahu, and Chelsea Price with her rat detecting jack russell cross Baxter.

Richie said the island had many similarities to New Zealand, with its vulnerable bird species, but there were also some differences.

“A lot of our work in New Zealand is surveillance, where typically we spend weeks and weeks searching pest-free islands without finding any sign of rodents – which is exactly the way we want it.

“On the other hand, the Lord Howe work was fun and exciting because the dogs were regularly finding scent and live animals, which is rare in pest-free island work in New Zealand.”

Price and Baxter work for Zero Invasive Predators (ZIP) in South Westland, where possums have been eradicated from the Perth River Valley.

Price said it was a challenge to search residential properties on Lord Howe.

A few residents opposed the programme for a variety of reasons, which “added another layer of complexity to our work”.

“Lots more people are on board now after seeing the positive effects the eradication has had on the environment and wildlife, and even just on their living situation as they have no rats or mice to deal with.”

By early August, with rodent numbers down to almost undetectable levels, it was time for the Kiwi teams to come home.

“This was another really cool aspect of the work over there – seeing how good our dogs actually are at their job in an international context.”