Russell Sika Deer Eradication

FYI this herd is up for tender i see. so best get in there before the cullers get them all.

https://www.gets.govt.nz/NRC/Externa...tm?id=27912047

"Deer living in the wild are a declared eradication species under Northland’s Regional Pest and Marine Pathway Management Plan. There are about 12 small herds of wild deer in the region, mostly red deer but including a population of sika deer (Cervus nippon) in Russell Forest – part of Northland Conservation Park plus adjacent private tenures. This population was established in 1988 when 12 sika deer were illegally liberated. The animals have been subjected to recreational hunting since that time and to official control by the Department of Conservation (DOC) since 1998.

Since 2003, there has been a policy by DOC to keep Northland free of wild deer populations reiterated by Northland Regional Council in its regional pest plans and operational plans (Speedy et al. 2016). The red deer populations are largely caused by escapes from deer farms. So long as these farms exist the removal of escapees will require ongoing management 2003). However, providing illegal liberations of other deer species can be stopped, the single sika deer population in Russell State Forest can be eradicated. This aim is the first priority for the developing Wild Deer Elimination Program for Northland.

There have been several reviews of the management of sika deer in Russell State Forest. Some were as part of the wider issue of deer management in Northland. However, a recent report focused on the sika herd with the aim to eradicate it. Funding priorities have changed with extra resources committed that has allowed a new dedicated team to be established. Subsequent developments have been (a) more clarity on the eradication project across lands of all tenures, (b) some successful local trials of aerial culling, and (c) the development of new tools to detect and kill deer, such as thermal imaging and DNA techniques, that have worked for eradication projects in other deer species but can now be applied to sika deer (Eogene 2023).

Project Deliverables
• Undertake eradication of Sika deer in an effective and efficient manner within two years of commencement of operations.
• This is a two-year contract with the first 12 months from commencement date, to remove most or all sika deer from the project area in that 12 month period and the following 12 months to locate and eliminate any surviving animals.

A response template will be attached by under addenda Friday 25th August to assist in your tender submission.
Final copy Sika Report 22 March-Final Version placed in Addenda file."

are there really any still there this has gone on for some time what proof is there of any left n??

Yip there’s some left

NRC clearly have nothing better to do than chase down a small herd of deer. Like so many issues these days, this is dogma over outcomes and value for money.

Earlier in the year 10 we’re taken by one of the cullers. From what locals who hunt in there have said she’s hard going and pretty dense bush.

Last review I read of this issue highlighted a challenge in that some of the private landowners weren't keen on facilitating the eradication programme. I see the OP suggests they are all on side now... wonder what changed their minds?

I know of one person who has a good size herd present on her property and she is very protective of the animals. They take a few for meat each year with a bow, but leave the rest in peace. And no, I haven't been offered access!

They hate dogs up there too. Trout??
Pigs??

From my understanding there is actually a few kicking around but people are protective of their mobs. Bugger all in the doc land

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Originally Posted by Maxx

Last review I read of this issue highlighted a challenge in that some of the private landowners weren't keen on facilitating the eradication programme. I see the OP suggests they are all on side now... wonder what changed their minds?

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The wild animal control act, actually provides MPI (I think) with some pretty serious power, which is seldom if ever used.
From memory warranted officers can enter your property with firearms to shoot the animals. The property’s owners can and would also be charged, can’t remember exactly what for.
I also believe they can seek costs for the control from the property owners. So all in all a pretty ugly situation to be in.

The same act has been used or threatened to be used with private landowners in the Southhead Kaipara region with the Fallow herd.

I suspect the difference is the Southhead Fallow herd is a) already well established and recognised b) beyond control now. So it hasn’t gone anywhere.
Plus there was a ferocious fight back by many local land owners and Iwi.
Whereas the Russell Sika by all accounts is very localised and small. So it’s a battle which can be won.

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Originally Posted by Lauries Hut

The wild animal control act, actually provides MPI (I think) with some pretty serious power, which is seldom if ever used.
From memory warranted officers can enter your property with firearms to shoot the animals. The property’s owners can and would also be charged, can’t remember exactly what for.
I also believe they can seek costs for the control from the property owners. So all in all a pretty ugly situation to be in.

The same act has been used or threatened to be used with private landowners in the Southhead Kaipara region with the Fallow herd.

I suspect the difference is the Southhead Fallow herd is a) already well established and recognised b) beyond control now. So it hasn’t gone anywhere.
Plus there was a ferocious fight back by many local land owners and Iwi.
Whereas the Russell Sika by all accounts is very localised and small. So it’s a battle which can be won.

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The WAC act is administered by DOC and no one else has powers under that act - MPI can act I believe for TB - okay first of very seldom used - I used in only twice in my 35 years - a notice is first issued that it will be used - it is certainly not march in and start shooting - the landowner has the right to object - now a warranted Officer under the act only has the right to enter before notice if they believe an offence has been committed but then they do not have the right to shoot just investigate any offence - IN this case that is not needed as DOC know there are sika on the propertys - immediate entry ( search and investigate ) would be used if deer had just been released - now objections the only one that would hold up and prevent the power to control part would be if the landowner could prove substantial disruption to farming practices or loss of income - power of entry and control has to be signed of very high in DOC food chain - once signed of then DOC can enter and control - not sure about costs possibly dont know - not in the cases we did - yes a little used act with powers but not completely one sided - the cases I dealt with were illegal releases and we had TB Free and Regional Council all screaming eradicate eradicate as the landowners simply would not state where they got the fallow from and Daisys rule Taranaki economy - the local farmers in the areas involved made a substantial part of their income grazing dairy stock - and they simply did not want deer near them - bit different now as fallow popping up all over the place - in all of DOC acts power of entry is limited by the Warranted Officer must believe an offence has taken place -

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Originally Posted by Barry the hunter

The WAC act is administered by DOC and no one else has powers under that act - MPI can act I believe for TB - okay first of very seldom used - I used in only twice in my 35 years - a notice is first issued that it will be used - it is certainly not march in and start shooting - the landowner has the right to object - now a warranted Officer under the act only has the right to enter before notice if they believe an offence has been committed but then they do not have the right to shoot just investigate any offence - IN this case that is not needed as DOC know there are sika on the propertys - immediate entry ( search and investigate ) would be used if deer had just been released - now objections the only one that would hold up and prevent the power to control part would be if the landowner could prove substantial disruption to farming practices or loss of income - power of entry and control has to be signed of very high in DOC food chain - once signed of then DOC can enter and control - not sure about costs possibly dont know - not in the cases we did - yes a little used act with powers but not completely one sided - the cases I dealt with were illegal releases and we had TB Free and Regional Council all screaming eradicate eradicate as the landowners simply would not state where they got the fallow from and Daisys rule Taranaki economy - the local farmers in the areas involved made a substantial part of their income grazing dairy stock - and they simply did not want deer near them - bit different now as fallow popping up all over the place - in all of DOC acts power of entry is limited by the Warranted Officer must believe an offence has taken place -

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In recent times many contractors have been issued notice books before for various wild animal control jobs, some of whom will be on this forum. Just have to get signed off which was a fairly simple task.
Issuing a notice can be done very easily as well, not even in person. Then the contractor can enter as they please, any hindrance can result in fairly serious penalties.

However I think that all of the landowners in regards to the job above are onboard. And like most contracts, issuing a notice is a last resort. Liaising with all of the effected parties and bringing them on board is a far better option, especially in the long term.
There has been contracts where landowners have not been forthcoming to the point where there has had to be a police officer escorting the contractor onto the property each day.

A while back there was a similar issue with a land owner who solved the problem with an extremely loud bird scarer. The contractors just walked off. There was a real slanging match but the officials could do nothing because he wised up claiming he was scaring away paradise ducks and he did not have a permit to kill them.

The bio security control act. Allows them to serve a bio security control notice and under police protection follow up with destruction and control work, weather for flora or fauna. The landowner can be detained if an attempt is made to halt the work, injure a worker, or restrict access.
I know the Russell state well, I hunted it for many years, I know the contractors personally and a lot of the surrounding landowners, everyone has been led to believe the forest is sick and it needs to be 1080’d. In the years I’ve hunted the place the old nz forest roads have all progressively become more and more overgrown, doesn’t sound like a sock forest to me. I’m fact you can compare satellite imagery from 5 years ago to present and visually see the tracks and roads disappear to undergrowth of natives.
The sika have spread to a lot of the surrounding property up there, for years the contractors were only aware of 2 population centres and believed they had the numbers contained, I guess words gotten out now.
It’s laughable really, the pig numbers in that forest are insane, I hunted it every weekend for over a year and caught minimum 2 pigs every single time.
After the 1080 drop the pig numbers will have exploded and will he spreading the kauri die back disease even more, which the nz forest service introduced back in the 80s with contaminated nursery plants.
Historically, animal control programmes have only allowed enough hours to show a decline in numbers, and once the cost of the programme out weighs the numbers being killed, funding is pulled and the 10% of animals left repopulate. Many contractors play a balancing act to create longevity in their work. It will be interesting to see how this actually goes down, the guy I used to work for up north held the contract for a few years when the previous guy left for the South Island, who had previously had it for nearly a decade. There were only ever enough hours to skim the forest as opposed to get in wipe them out up until now. I do wonder how many of the deer have been nuked by the 1080 drop? There is also a small mob of feral cattle living in the forest bordering a few farms who don’t allow access to recreational hunters, I regret not hunting them when I had the chance now, will they be targeted to I wonder?

They have given the goats a hard time as the under story had taken a hammering when I was working there, still a few pigs getting round

Just to clear a few things up. The surrounding areas that traditionally blocked access have now given access.
The money this time is pretty extensive compared to previous budgets. They have a few new tricks up their sleeve(which I personally don't think will work).
They are working with a few assumptions. Deer picked up on the cams and dna samples. The 12 dna samples are the obvious starting point to provide a goal.
There is the problem that Sika exist far beyond the range that is being hunted however no one is talking about where these are and neither will I.
They've given the goats a good hammering. There's still some there however.
Barry, there's still quite few. I've seen the proof myself and had interactions a few years back. I hunted them too. That's where it gets hard as low numbers and goats and pigs were the issue.

Sounds like the Sika population in the North is here to stay.

Yes probably but not large enough to be of any interest to rec hunters. I did see a nice stag taken a wee while back by a pig hunter. Also have a few photos but not able to show them out of trust to the suppliers.

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Originally Posted by Cowboy

Just to clear a few things up. The surrounding areas that traditionally blocked access have now given access.
The money this time is pretty extensive compared to previous budgets. They have a few new tricks up their sleeve(which I personally don't think will work).
They are working with a few assumptions. Deer picked up on the cams and dna samples. The 12 dna samples are the obvious starting point to provide a goal.
There is the problem that Sika exist far beyond the range that is being hunted however no one is talking about where these are and neither will I.
They've given the goats a good hammering. There's still some there however.
Barry, there's still quite few. I've seen the proof myself and had interactions a few years back. I hunted them too. That's where it gets hard as low numbers and goats and pigs were the issue.

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good on ya - I was good mates with the old Contractor hell of a good bloke - if DOC are managing this I have no doubt it will be a clusterfuck -I personally think that they simply dont seem to have the experience to run this sort of operation - ones is always knee capped by lack of budget and Managers high up who want to add their two cents worth but dont have genuine WAC experience - me I was always a hunter first so yes likely there will be sika there for some time - they should have got in hard early when first released -this has been going on for years now -

Was that Alan? NRC are in control of it.

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Originally Posted by Cowboy

Was that Alan? NRC are in control of it.

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Yeah, Interesting to note the Regional Council involvement.

Have had some experience attempting to push back against that sort of creep in a couple of other Regions ... DoC always keen to shovel their work onto others, and also have observed the self-interested (IMO) actions of Regional Council staff looking to extend their remit into work on PCL .... Another example is where the OSPRI operations start to wind down as bovine TB occurrences reduce, and we get the 'we need to maintain the gains' mantra.

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Originally Posted by Cowboy

Was that Alan? NRC are in control of it.

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yeah good bugger genuine hunter

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Originally Posted by Maxx

Yeah, Interesting to note the Regional Council involvement.

Have had some experience attempting to push back against that sort of creep in a couple of other Regions ... DoC always keen to shovel their work onto others, and also have observed the self-interested (IMO) actions of Regional Council staff looking to extend their remit into work on PCL .... Another example is where the OSPRI operations start to wind down as bovine TB occurrences reduce, and we get the 'we need to maintain the gains' mantra.

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exactly I am pleased I am out of that sort of cluster fuck as soon as deer control is mentioned every dick and dog in Regional Council and DOC wants a say despite the fact they could not mange a WAM deer project if they tried - sadly been the case for years - Regional Council in most cases need someone to tell them to fuck off and concentrate on their core business and deer control is not part of it -but no their wannabe hunters want a piece of the action dont they - has not changed and sadly wont -

Wannabe hunters eh? You do realise they use contractors? When I was working in Russell I had almost a decade as a professional hunter, am I still a wannabe @Barrythehunter?

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Originally Posted by Fat ninja

Wannabe hunters eh? You do realise they use contractors? When I was working in Russell I had almost a decade as a professional hunter, am I still a wannabe @Barrythehunter?

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I was not referring to the actual hunters they have used on the ground - rather the Managers who think they are hunters and want to have a say - I worked in Northland for 5 years when it all started - I do not have confidence in DOC to run it and I will stand by that

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Originally Posted by TLB

In recent times many contractors have been issued notice books before for various wild animal control jobs, some of whom will be on this forum. Just have to get signed off which was a fairly simple task.
Issuing a notice can be done very easily as well, not even in person. Then the contractor can enter as they please, any hindrance can result in fairly serious penalties.

However I think that all of the landowners in regards to the job above are onboard. And like most contracts, issuing a notice is a last resort. Liaising with all of the effected parties and bringing them on board is a far better option, especially in the long term.
There has been contracts where landowners have not been forthcoming to the point where there has had to be a police officer escorting the contractor onto the property each day.

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contractors have been issued notice books before for various wild animal control jobs-- just to clarify this will be a very different beast indeed to a formal notice from the Minister of Conservation to use the powers under the WAC act to enter and control deer - what the Contractors will have had will be more of a simple permission form ( will be a legal document )-A formal notice from the Minister probably only used every 10 years if then and will have come after Solisitors involved and all other avenues to enter land have been exhausted -it definitely would not be given to a Contractor to deliver and not used in possum control since the WAC act only refers to deer goats etc ungulates - we used a landowner permission form basically for every possum operation -just ties everything up legally

so heres a thought.... the deer were not released on Joe Bloggs property and werent released by Joe so HE PERSONALLY has broken no laws...now the deer/rabbits gorse are there on his land,how is he procecutable for not allowing people on to control what is in his opinion an already controlled thing/resource/pest ??????
DOC best be VERY VERY careful here .or a blanket lawsuit will be taken out against them and they will be forced to eliminate ALL GORSE off land under their control..... I know of a few folks who will be happy to get a bit of that action
sauce for the goose n all that.

30 years ago when I first came to south island,there were fallow in greenstone/caples some in blue mountains and a SMALL well protected herd in albury..... not so small and not so well protected now LOL.


thats a good point about how a 1080 drop actually backfires for pig control..never considered it in that light before today...its popped up twice in conversation.
saw it with wallabies 20 years ago..I for one stopped hunting them as couldnt use them for dog tucker,got rid of my wallaby dog too.
went from shooting maybe a hundred a year to shooting none for 3 years.... back then a big weekend with dogging during day and spotlighting at night might see 60 shot.......compared to the tallies being shot now.

Good luck eradicating that population of deer. From what I understand the numbers are reasonable and the bush thick.

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Originally Posted by Micky Duck

so heres a thought.... the deer were not released on Joe Bloggs property and werent released by Joe so HE PERSONALLY has broken no laws...now the deer/rabbits gorse are there on his land,how is he procecutable for not allowing people on to control what is in his opinion an already controlled thing/resource/pest ??????
DOC best be VERY VERY careful here .or a blanket lawsuit will be taken out against them and they will be forced to eliminate ALL GORSE off land under their control..... I know of a few folks who will be happy to get a bit of that action
sauce for the goose n all that.

30 years ago when I first came to south island,there were fallow in greenstone/caples some in blue mountains and a SMALL well protected herd in albury..... not so small and not so well protected now LOL.


thats a good point about how a 1080 drop actually backfires for pig control..never considered it in that light before today...its popped up twice in conversation.
saw it with wallabies 20 years ago..I for one stopped hunting them as couldnt use them for dog tucker,got rid of my wallaby dog too.
went from shooting maybe a hundred a year to shooting none for 3 years.... back then a big weekend with dogging during day and spotlighting at night might see 60 shot.......compared to the tallies being shot now.

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yes pig numbers can do very well after a 1080 operation evidence they can smell it in bait/ carcasses and don't touch it-they can regurgitate poisoned carcass if they do sample it so sows do well from next berry drops thru lack of possums and of course lack of hunting pressure and up goes population - deer on other hand there can be quite a bi-kill depending on just how hard a winter they have had and how hungry they are

In the meantime the rats, possums and pot holes continue to ravage the people of Northland..... what a waste of money . Many other species doing far more damage in the bush up there.....

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Originally Posted by viper

In the meantime the rats, possums and pot holes continue to ravage the people of Northland..... what a waste of money . Many other species doing far more damage in the bush up there.....

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I tend to agree just need maintenance control eradication hmmm pipe dream

Just a note. It's been known for a long time who released the sika. Kind of a running joke where everyone smirks to each other and chuckles whilst not saying too much.
Also it wasn't forced on the land owners to get access for the current op. They decided to let it go ahead. They also aren't helping to make it a success just letting the powers that be, do their thing.
I know what you're saying tho in relation to pests on private property.

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Originally Posted by Cowboy

Just a note. It's been known for a long time who released the sika. Kind of a running joke where everyone smirks to each other and chuckles whilst not saying too much.
Also it wasn't forced on the land owners to get access for the current op. They decided to let it go ahead. They also aren't helping to make it a success just letting the powers that be, do their thing.
I know what you're saying tho in relation to pests on private property.

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I knew of one release ( not this one ) every time the Contract hunter turned up they would put a huntaway out and chase any deer out well back into scrub - thought it a hell of a joke - well it was - Contractor most annoyed