Why bother monitoring predators? Isn’t trapping enough?
Monitoring possum distribution is an important part of City Sanctuary’s work. Monitoring helps us understand where possums are still present so we can focus our efforts and assess how well we’re doing with our predator control work.
Monitoring devices such as motion-activated cameras, chew cards and wax-tags, don’t require much effort from animals to interact with them (cameras require none!). Because they’re simple to interact with, monitoring often reveals a clearer picture of what pests are still around in an area, rather than just relying on catch data to tell us.
Community Ranger Zac recently did a round of predator monitoring in the Botanic Garden. 48 chew cards were deployed in key areas of the garden and left out for a 7-10 day period. Chew cards are baited with non-toxic lure to entice predators to gnaw on them.
After the cards were retracted, each one was analysed to assess bite marks. All this data was then saved onto Trap.NZ to contribute to our big pool of data.
February 20, 2025
Keeping our finger on the (possum) pulse — City Sanctuary
maximios city
Why bother monitoring predators? Isn’t trapping enough?
Monitoring possum distribution is an important part of City Sanctuary’s work. Monitoring helps us understand where possums are still present so we can focus our efforts and assess how well we’re doing with our predator control work.
Monitoring devices such as motion-activated cameras, chew cards and wax-tags, don’t require much effort from animals to interact with them (cameras require none!). Because they’re simple to interact with, monitoring often reveals a clearer picture of what pests are still around in an area, rather than just relying on catch data to tell us.
Community Ranger Zac recently did a round of predator monitoring in the Botanic Garden. 48 chew cards were deployed in key areas of the garden and left out for a 7-10 day period. Chew cards are baited with non-toxic lure to entice predators to gnaw on them.
After the cards were retracted, each one was analysed to assess bite marks. All this data was then saved onto Trap.NZ to contribute to our big pool of data.