Wildside - Introduced Species

Wildside - Exotic can be profit

©Zane Mirfin, Wildside Column, Exotic can be profit, Nelson Mail, 12 September 2009

Desirable Immigrant: Fishing for an alien species - trout inthe DOC-controlled wilderness.  Not all introduced species are unwanted and are generally valued by New Zealanders.


❞ Without introduced species, the New Zealand economy could not function as we know it.

In New Zealand we are fortunate to have so many introduced animals, fish and plants. These introduced life forms, including us humans, have had a profound influence on the modern lifestyle and have created great social, economic and recreational opportunities.

As an outdoor recreationalist, I highly value introduced species for sustaining the outdoor pursuits I enjoy.

Sure, there are a few important native species if you a hunter and fisherman in New Zealand, most notably saltwater fish and gamebirds such as paradise ducks and pukeko, but without introduced animals and the introduced plants, trees and creatures they feed on, the outdoor sporting scene would be pretty barren.

Just this week, my father Stuart and I were up at our forestry block pruning Mexican cypress trees while listening to Kathryn Ryan on Radio New Zealand National interviewing various people, in preparation for Conservation Week, about the negative effects of introduced trees on the New Zealand environment. Dad and I just kept rolling our eyes as we listened to waves of propaganda and bureaucratic justification.

The view from our ladders was impressive, over the Waimea plains and out into Tasman Bay. Below us the sinuous curves of the Waimea River led through the intensively modified landscape and we discussed the value of introduced species in our economy. Before us we saw grass, sheep, cattle, vineyards, willow and eucalyptus trees, pine plantations, citrus and olive orchards, and many other signs of a well-balanced modern agricultural economy.

Without introduced species, the New Zealand economy could not function as we know it. We rely on those introduced grasses, tree crops and vegetables that also feed our dairy cows, sheep, pigs, deer and many other valued introduced animals.

If we were totally reliant on all things native, we would head back to the Stone Age at a rapid rate. Early Maori found coastal areas or tidal lagoons and estuaries to be the best real estate to occupy because there was plenty of fish, shellfish and eels on hand. The interior of New Zealand, by contrast, was a harsher place, with limited food resources. Thomas Brunner, an early explorer of the Buller Gorge, found this out the hard way when he had to eat his faithful pet dog, Rover, when he ran out of food along the way.

Lately in The Nelson Mail, there has been robust debate in the letters column about introduced animals, native birds and toxins such as 1080 poison. This debate is healthy and is largely polarised as divergent groups go head to head, as is their democratic right.

The Conservation Department (DOC) and other government organisations such as the Animal Health Board have copped significant flak, but I believe it is every taxpayer’s right to question organisational orientation, budget and spending priorities that affect taxpayer values, interests and recreational activities.

It seems to me that the land stewardship models of conservation and preservation regularly get confused. At university, we were taught that conservation was the wise use of resources, while preservation is where you lock something up and throw away the key.

I’m a great believer in the intrinsic value of native species and love nothing more than visiting coastal areas with my
son, Jake, a mad-keen bird enthusiast, to enjoy the marvels of nature.

Our company, Strike Adventure, is also a concession holder, able to operate commercial tours on crown land, but I find that paranoia in the bureaucracy and media about introduced species gets a little tiring.

There has to be a better way of managing New Zealand’s valued resources, native and introduced, and I believe it needs to start with deviating from the ‘‘native is good, introduced is bad’’ mentality.

Sure, some species haven’t worked out well, such as stoats, rats, old man’s beard and didymo, but many species, such as deer, chamois, pigs, mallard ducks, canada geese, trout and salmon – to name just a few – have become highly valued recreational species and have added significantly to the social, sporting, tourism and cultural amenities of New Zealand.

When you look on the positive side, many introduced species have at least some value to outdoor recreationalists. The biodiversity and ecology of the New Zealand landscape has been irrevocably changed but in life you can’t go back.

The world wasn’t meant to have so much human movement and modification and the ongoing introduction of new species and organisms is pretty much inevitable, because you can’t cut yourself off from the outside world.

Many of the arguably worst introduced invaders were brought into New Zealand waters and on to the land unintentionally, and organisms such as didymo, sea squirt, undaria and varroa mites arrived despite the best efforts of biosecurity, and will continue to arrive in the years ahead.

Interestingly, one of the worst invaders in North American rivers is the New Zealand mud snail, which went there attached to an angler’s boots, proving that our own native species aren’t totally benign in new locations, either.

There will always need to be sanctuaries for New Zealand native species, and public and private initiatives, in association with volunteers, will play a valuable part in preserving at least some of our native heritage. But you can’t turn back the clock and in the years ahead it would be nice to see introduced species treated with more respect and better management by politicians and bureaucrats.

Treating most introduced species as pests has proven to be unworkable and is definitely not sustainable long term.

The current mantra of reducing valuable introduced resources to pest liability status at the expense of the taxpayer just doesn’t make sense in an era crying out for the wise use of resources. It costs a lot of money, disenfranchises interest groups, and alienates a large percentage of the population who just happen to hunt and fish.

Resources such as introduced fish, birds and game animals can only be managed well if they are perceived to have value.

In the future, I’d like to advocate for protein management reserves, where wild animal populations close to civilisation could be managed sustainably on public land. Such areas could be toxin-free, organic food-gathering areas, where the public could harvest free, safe and healthy meat to feed their families and subsidise their Third World pay cheques.

We could even have innovative resource management systems where DOC was self-funding and incorporated the value of introduced species.

Maybe we could even access our latent mineral resources on Crown land for public good – now there’s a really contentious idea.

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