A further comment by Andi Cockroft, chairman, CORANZ
For seventy years, New Zealand has run the largest aerial poisoning programme in the world. Helicopters sweep over the backcountry every two to three years, broadcasting 1080 pellets over mountains, valleys, waterways, and forests. The practice is so entrenched that many people no longer pause to ask whether it is working. It is simply what we do.
But when you step into the Aorangi Range days after a drop, the official narrative dissolves. The forest is silent. Not calmer—silent. Birdsong vanishes. Insects disappear. Even the air feels empty, as though the whole ecosystem has inhaled and forgotten how to exhale. The same thing happens in the Akatarawa Forest. These places once teemed with life. Now, after decades of repeated drops, they feel hollow. The data may claim improvement, but the land itself suggests otherwise.
On paper, the story is neat. DOC publishes graphs showing “no long-term decline” in birdsong. OSPRI claims 1080 is “essential” for controlling TB vectors. Parliamentary reports announce that eradication is progressing well. But these metrics are built on aggregate averages, smoothed over space and time. The immediate ecological shock—the collapse of sound and movement after each drop—is not captured by the models. The local declines are lost in statistical noise. New Zealand’s conservation narrative has been built on data that cannot hear the silence.
Meanwhile, the pests remain. Despite seven decades of poisoning, possums, rats, and stoats are still widespread. In fact, after each drop, rat numbers often rebound to two, three, even four times their pre-poisoning levels. The survivors breed into a predator-free vacuum. Stoats flourish on the rodent boom. Possums recolonise edges. The forest enters a boom-bust cycle driven not by nature but by our interventions. DOC acknowledges this—but only deep in technical reports. In public, the message remains simple: “1080 saves birds.”
The truth is more complicated.
Possums have been portrayed as the central villains of New Zealand ecology and biosecurity. The narrative is familiar: possums strip the canopy, destroy habitat, and spread bovine tuberculosis. Therefore, aerial poisoning is necessary. But this framing obscures two important realities.
First, New Zealand is already close to, or within, the international threshold for being considered TB-free. A country does not need zero TB to qualify. It needs low herd prevalence and strong surveillance. New Zealand has both. The idea that the primary obstacle to TB freedom is possums is outdated. Yet the messaging persists, in part because the system built around 1080 needs the justification to continue.
Second, while possums can carry TB, the role of stock movements in spreading the disease is severely under-discussed. Official documents acknowledge that infected cattle transported—sometimes without proper documentation—have seeded outbreaks in supposedly possum-free regions. But blaming possums is easier than confronting failures in farm management and enforcement.
Then there is the Remutaka incident—a detail so strange that many assume it is myth. In 2016, Landcare Research deliberately infected possums with TB and released them into the Remutaka Forest Park as part of a transmission study. They were later recaptured and euthanised. Whatever the scientific rationale, the optics are extraordinary: the same Crown-funded system that warns of the dangers of TB-infected possums also released TB-infected possums into the wild. Did those released possums ever infect others that were not euthanised?
Small wonder that public trust is low.
Independent hunters and trappers have conducted hundreds of necropsies in areas labelled “TB hotspots,” finding no infected possums. This does not disprove the existence of wildlife TB reservoirs—it simply underscores how patchy and limited those reservoirs now are. The possum TB crisis of the 1970s and 1980s is not the reality of today. But policy has not kept pace with change.
Possums are also framed as major predators of native birds. This too is overstated. Possums are primarily browsers. They will take an egg occasionally, but they are not specialist nest raiders. Rats and stoats do far more damage to nests, yet they rarely appear in public communications. The possum persists in the role of symbolic villain because it is large, photogenic, and easy to hate.
Meanwhile, people living closest to the land bear the heaviest consequences. For many rural families, the bush was once a reliable source of supplementary food: venison, goat, pig, hare, rabbit, possum. After 1080 operations, those same families stay away. Dogs die from eating poisoned carcasses. Hunters fear contamination. In a cost-of-living crisis, the government continues to undermine a vital source of wild protein without acknowledging the impact.
Behind all this lies a machinery that has grown too large to stop. Helicopter firms depend on regular contracts. Bait manufacturers rely on volume demand. Scientific teams depend on ongoing monitoring programmes. Whole departments within DOC and OSPRI are structured around repeat 1080 operations. No individual is corrupt; the system itself is simply unable to choose a different path.
The tragedy is that while New Zealand spends tens of millions on aerial poison, the forests continue to decline. Kea remain endangered, and some die in 1080 drops. Many insects and small mammals vanish for extended periods. Forest soundscapes collapse repeatedly. And pest populations return like clockwork.
New Zealand needs pest control. No reasonable person denies that. But we also need honesty. We need to admit when a tool has reached the limits of its usefulness. Seventy years is long enough to judge the results.
We need investment in targeted trapping, genetic technologies, biological controls, fenced sanctuaries, community-led operations, and new approaches that stabilise ecosystems instead of shocking them. We need independent ecological auditing, not self-confirming internal reports. And we need to listen to the people who walk the forests, not only those who model them from afar.
If we continue as we are, the next seventy years will look exactly like the last: poison, rebound, decline, repeat.
The forests have already told us the truth. They are falling silent. The question is whether we are willing to hear them.
Same can be said of just about any place after a 1080 drop. Forests that 30 years ago were teeming with life now desolate wastelands. It may be true that some species thrive because all other competition is removed, but that can’t explain the demise of the Kea for instance. Once a pest yet now endangered after decades of “protection” from the likes of DOC. “Protecting” it into extinction the way they are going.
As for these “scientists” reporting no change or more abundant birdlife, I wonder what planet they are on – or is their “science” just a statistical game on a computer? Places like Pureora, Tongoriro, Kaimanawa all show the effects of total silence following a 1080 drop – those who say otherwise are not rooted in reality.
I agree about the Aorangi block the last time it was 1080’d – I went through a week later – but they missed a small section near Sutherland’s Hut – the insect life was incredible just in that small area about 100m square – no bird life just insects and with no predators lots of them. Everywhere else silence!
This analysis aligns with four decades of field observations showing profound post-drop ecological disruption.
The boom-bust cycle described—where rat populations rebound to 2-4 times pre-poisoning levels, creating predator vacuums that benefit stoats—contradicts sustained pest suppression claims.
The distinction between aggregate statistical modeling and localized ecological collapse is crucial: smoothed averages mask immediate impacts.
The TB narrative requires updating given NZ’s current low herd prevalence and the documented role of inadequately tracked stock movements in disease spread.
Most concerning is the institutional dependency created—helicopter contracts, bait manufacturing, monitoring programmes—forming self-perpetuating systems resistant to alternative approaches despite questionable long-term efficacy.
Independent ecological auditing and targeted alternatives deserve serious investment.
Don’t get me started on 1080! Having lost a beautiful dog in the most agonising way to this indiscriminate poison, watching the slow convulsive attacks that overcame her and being powerless to do anything about it other than arrange for her quick euthanasia – no animal should have to die that way. I hear of deer taking days to die in such circumstances as to leave one cold. If you must rid the planet of such creatures, surely a swift accurate bullet is preferable to subjecting the fauna to such vile execution methods. And when I say accurate bullet I specifically exclude heli-hunting from a moving aircraft.
How come the suckers using this super toxin can’t understand the damage they are causing?
A great factual piece from Andy Cockroft, but I can’t agree with his
“No individual is corrupt; the system itself is simply unable to choose a different path”.
I worked as a Scientist on Possums, TB and 1080 in a collaborative study between Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI) I and Forest Research Institute’s Animal Research Centre at Rangiora. Here I witnessed bullying and corrupt science. I tried to blow the whistle and was sacked for my efforts. Corruption is rife in Government at all levels and it’s time we had serious conversations about it instead of pretending that it doesn’t exist.
Government is quite capable of choosing different paths and will when the going gets tough. Police minister Mark Mitchell is making the right noises about the recent allegations of misbehaviour of some Police. But Ministers with other Portfolios need to look closely at what’s going on in their Departments. “Yes Minister” and “Yes Prime Minister” politics is rife but few Politicians will admit it. We need more people to blow the whistle and insist on proper investigation of their complaints.
We need to erase the words “Pests” and “Weeds” which are the Mantra for everybody receiving payment in the present money go round circus of Animal and Plant poisoning. If people have problems with animals and plants, let them deal with them.
It’s simply a cost of owning property, others shouldn’t have to pay.
We no longer need to waste taxpayer/government money on Pests and Weeds. Historically Rabbits Deer Possum etc have been problems but not today. Poisoning was started by farmers and MPI to kill rabbits pigs and possums. When people complained about dead birds MPI paid DOC money for research to show 1080 did not kill birds. DOC took the money and told MPI what they wanted to hear. That’s how Corrupt Science is in New Zealand. Wildlife poisoning is a now a Total Scam, just a “make work scheme” for everybody from University professionals to Newspaper Editors who publish the Poison Notices.
Readers of Andi Cockroft’s article may wish to read a letter appearing in the Veterinary Record – a leading veterinary science journal in the United Kingdom.
It was published last week (attached).
Thank you Andi!
Veterinary Record – 2025 – Obendorf – Has the role of scavenging been overlooked
When asked why a poison which is known to spread through the food chain should be randomly spread through our environment the answer was: “We are aiming to poison only mammals. Other countries round the world have valuable mammals. NZ is different
we don’t have any ‘valuable’ mammals so it’s fine to poison all mammals in NZ. Yeah sure we have a few bats but no one ever sees them and what do they really matter in the big picture”. The science teams took their cue from this proposal.
We can point to apathy and laziness. In our back yard the pig hunters were threatened with exclusion from the DOC estate, no pig hunting if there is a murmur against the use of 1080. I don’t think we can blame the hunters.
We have seen that jobs are more important than ethics, human values or common sense.
This has been reinforced by the experience with govt’s anti-covid measures and now we are part of a nation ‘going along’ with the anti-global warming measures. Why?
Explanations for government’s inability to listen to logic and common sense seems to point at the globalists’ desire to control all food sources, shut down food production of all kinds not under their control. Wild food has to be exterminated and successive NZ governments have gone along with this global wish to the point where every living wild creature in NZ is now infected with a certain amount of poison. All the different wild animal poisons spread through the food chain, 1080 is the only one which infects plants as well insects, birds, fish and animals.
Without some kind of revolution NZ is firmly stuck on a path of self-destruction.
The 1080 debate has become “plagued by experts” who are often remote from the disease outbreaks.
My own observations stem from 50 years as a practice vet, hunter, and meat vet.
Disclaimer, I abhor 1080 for its inhumane deaths and its non selective nature and would prefer for its use to be greatly restricted.
In my time as a Supervising Meat Vet at a Deer Slaughter Premises it was obvious that each district or region has its own set of issues. The value of our inspection was finding Tb lesions in animals from “Tb Free” herds complicated by numerous cases of Johne’s lesions that present the same as gross Tb lesions.
The sources of the breakdown in the farmed deer included;
1. Latent infections in aged hinds whose compromised immune system caused these animals to test negative to the standard skin tests
2. Ferrets especially in North Canterbury and drier parts of the South Island East Coast
3. Un-documented stock movement from Tb infected areas to clear areas
4. Seeding of infected pigs by pig hunters. (Confirmed by typing the Tb strain(s) found).
5. Otago properties with the presence of Tb infected wild pigs. (Considered end hosts).
In the Ashburton County in the 1980s. the few Tb infected herds were on the same farms that my father found Tb in the early 1950s. Patches of bush or riverbeds suggested Tb was re-cycling through localized possum dens.
On the West Coast we had similar areas of heavy bush where Tb persisted also suggesting the importance of possums.
As Tb came under control stock movement was confirmed as transferring Tb from infected parts of the coast to parts of previously free Westland.
There was also a troubling case where mis-identification of ownership of slaughtered cattle at a meat plant caused a local farmer to be placed under movement control and suffer unnecessary costs and inconvenience.
There was a case where a retiring deer farmer simply released his farmed deer to the wild with a history of having reactors.
Other cases would see a re-emergence of Tb when some aged pine trees or other were felled implying dispersal of an infected den.
Overlying all the above was the observation that many West Coat yearling and 2yo cattle would test positive to the initial test requiring the local OSPRI manager to make a judgement as to the significance of these results. Ancillary tests may or may not have been used.
Having seen the re-emergence of Tb when testing was wound back in the 1990s, I am concerned that the “bean counters” have determined that NZ’s technical “Tb free status” is grounds for repeating this strategy. Political / ideologically based decisions typically do not end well.
If we do get a flare up, 1080 will be the first response.
DOC and Tb
Because 90% of the West Coast land is vested with DOC, a huge amount of land suffers aerial Tb applications that has never had a case of Tb identified in domestic or wild animals. This applies particularly to South Westland.
Triennial applications have been the norm until the super-poisoned 100,000 ha of ZIP between the Waihou and Whataroa catchments began.
To be fair there are no longer any mice in Okarito while deer have become virtually extinct.
There needs to be more robust opposition to ten eighty. The ragged hippies waving signs we all laughed at twenty years ago. Now that the forests are so damaged a few more might join the ranks of protest. The time for a few words on an article has passed. There has been zero traction gained from our combined experiences. I do not know how but we need a tougher stand and opposition before the damage is forever irreversible
I couldn’t agree more Pete. But there’s no “robust opposition to 1080”.
The problem is apathy, indifference or just plain selfish laziness by most.
Forest and Bird have effectively infiltrated places of influence even to the late Kevin Smith becoming secretary to a Minister of Conservation Chris Cartewr back in the period 2002-5.
Apathy by hunters is the biggest obstacle. Hand in hand with apathy goes inertia.