Giant wētā
Image: Sabine Bernert | ©

Introduction

By collaborating and co-designing projects with our partners, we bring together our unique strengths to maximise the wins for nature.

Partnering for the biggest wins for nature

We work together with partners on large landscape-scale projects that eradicate and control predators. DOC couldn’t do this work alone.

We’re strategic about the projects we choose. DOC goes where we can get the biggest wins for nature and where communities are ready to act.

From control to eradication

As we move towards our goal, we will need to achieve more eradication projects (the complete removal of predators and defence against their reinvasion).

Permanent eradication is much more difficult than control. It requires more planning, resourcing, eradication tools, and the ability to defend from and respond to reinvasions.

Our partnerships currently do both. We ‘hold the line’ through control and scale up eradication on islands and land we can defend.   

Eradication allows our species to thrive

For our endangered species, eradication means the difference between living on the edge of extinction and thriving.

Chatham Island tāiko (the stunning magenta petrel) is one of the rarest seabirds in the world with fewer than 250 remaining and only 40 breeding pairs. Predator control and forest restoration has saved this species from extinction. With the Chatham Island community striving to be predator free, we can secure a future for tāiko.

Our partners

North Island

Predator Free Te Tai Tokerau

A collective of community groups, tangata whenua, industry, conservation organisations and government that worked together to develop a five year pathway to move towards a predator free Northland/Te Tai Tokerau.

Predator Free Te Tai Tokerau Collective

Reconnecting Northland

Combines energy, resources and knowledge across Northland to create large-scale change for the region’s natural environment and its people.

Reconnecting Northland website

Predator Free Hauraki Coromandel

DOC, Predator Free Hauraki Coromandel Trust and iwi are working towards the eradication of pests on the Coromandel Peninsula. We will achieve this by linking up the conservation efforts of groups across the region. 

Predator Free Hauraki Coromandel website

Taranaki Mounga

Restores the ecological vitality of Taranaki’s mountain, ranges and islands in partnership with iwi, agencies and community.

Taranaki Mounga website

Predator Free Hawke’s Bay

Brings public and private efforts together to make a difference for biodiversity in Hawke’s Bay.

Predator Free Hawke's Bay website

South Island

Project Janszoon

Restores the whole of Abel Tasman National Park, from iconic dunes and plants to forests and wildlife. 

Project Janszoon website

Kotahitanga mō te Taiao Alliance

Brings together an alliance of iwi, councils and DOC across the Buller, Tasman, Nelson, Marlborough and Kaikōura regions to get the best possible results for conservation and people’s connection to it.

Kotahitanga mō te Taiao Alliance website

Te Manahuna Aoraki

Creates a 310,000 hectare predator free mainland island in the Upper Mackenzie Basin and Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park to preserve its iconic landscape and wildlife. 

Te Manahuna Aoraki website

Offshore islands

Predator Free Chatham Islands/Wharekauri/Rēkohu

A community-driven project to help restore our islands’ natural gifts, for now and for future generations. Getting rid of our target predators – possums, feral cats and rats – could make a huge difference for the health of our islands. 

Predator Free Rakiura

Aims to remove rats, possums, feral cats and hedgehogs from Rakiura/Stewart Island and its islands. 

Predator Free Rakiura website

Maukahuka Pest Free Auckland Island

DOC and Ngāi Tahu have completed an investigation into the feasibility of eradicating pigs, cats and mice from Auckland Island in the New Zealand subantarctic region.

Maukahuka: Pest Free Auckland Island

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