We can learn from New Zealand about eliminating unwanted invaders

The country’s zoologists and wardens have become world leaders in alien species eradication. Can we learn from them? asks Richard Collins

Islands off Kerry support huge numbers of breeding shearwaters and auks. A quarter of Europe’s storm petrel nest in Ireland and Little Skellig holds one of the world’s largest gannet colonies. Such remote locations offer birds protection from four-legged predators. Rats, accidentally released from boats, have colonised some islands, but starvation during winter food shortages reduces their impact on nesting birds the following summer.

BirdWatch Ireland’s Puffin Island reserve is about 300m from the mainland, too far out, you might think, for mink to visit. However, in an article in Wings magazine, Dr Stephen Newton revealed that these voracious predators of eggs and chicks were seen there in 2007.