A Helping Hand

Tui had a much easier life before humans came to New Zealand. Their only predators were birds. Their only competitors were birds and native bees. Today tui face a number of threats that make it difficult for them to survive, find food and reproduce.

Tui have lost much of the forest habitat where they once lived. Polynesians and Europeans destroyed large areas of forest when they arrived. Tui have had to move into other habitats, such as suburban gardens, The reason there are so few tui on the Canterbury Plains is because it is a very long way from the foothills across the plains to Banks Peninsula and there is virtually no native forest left on the Plains.

Today the greatest threats to tui are introduced predators such as rats, cats, stoats and possums. These animals eat tui and compete with them for food. Other competitors include wasps and introduced birds like starlings which eat lots of small fruits.

Because humans are responsible for making life so difficult for tui and other native birds, we also have a responsibility to try to protect our birds from these new threats. If humans did nothing, many of our native birds would eventually become extinct. These birds simply cannot survive now without our help.

The main way that we can help tui and other native birds is by controlling the introduced predators that we brought to New Zealand. Scientists have developed many clever ways to kill these predators. Mostly they use traps or poisons.  The poisoned baits are placed inside bait stations to keep ground birds like weka and kiwi from being killed. The baits are also dyed green and flavoured with cinnamon to attract mammals and keep birds away. Traps to kill stoats and rats are usually placed inside a tunnel to keep other animals away from them but also because stoats and rats like going into dark holes and burrows.

Someday scientists may develop more permanent ways to eliminate all of these introduced predators from New Zealand forever. It may be possible to develop a virus that only attacks a certain species, or it might be possible to stop females from having babies. At the moment, though, we are a long way from discovering a method like this that is safe and effective. In the meantime, if we want tui and other native birds to survive, our only choice is to keep controlling predators where ever we can.