Goats and forest

Press, 12 February 1979, Page 16

Goats and forest

The remaining wild goats on Arapawa Island have become the cause of an unpleasant situation, pitting protesters against Forest Service cullers and presenting the police with a difficult task. The police should not, however, have any difficulty deciding what their task is. It is to prevent the protesters from impeding the efforts of the cullers to reduce further (after last years major cull) the numbers of goats on the island.

The Conservator of Forests at Nelson, Mr P. W. Maplesden, has declared that the choice on the island is simple — the goats or the forest. The forest is the only significant remnant of native bush on the shores of Cook Strait It contains diverse plants growing in a complex pattern of forest types. The Marlborough Sounds Maritime Park Board has properly decided that the preservation of this forest is of considerable importance. The choice is not, however, quite as simple as Mr Maplesden’s remark suggests. The country can have both goats and forest, but not both on Arapawa Island. The forest will survive, and slowly recover, only if wild browsing animals, notably the goats, are eliminated from the island or at least greatly reduced in numbers. The goats may have an interesting biological status and history and be as deserving of protection as the forests they have so badly damaged. Definite evidence has still not been produced to establish that the Arapawa Island goats are a reasonably pure Old English breed and therefore, to some

extent, an endangered species. They apparently do differ somewhat from other New Zealand wild goats, but the importance of these differences has not. been established. But even if the goats are worth preserving as a breed, they can be saved without their having the run of the reserve land on Arapawa Island. There are already a considerable number of goats gathered off the island for purposes of breeding and study.

Some goats, too, will survive this month’s “mopping up.” If later research establishes that a small wild herd on the island is not preventing the forest from recuperating, these survivors can remain. If such research establishes, however, that even a small, remnant herd still threatens the forest, then the policy of extermination must be pursued vigorously. Extermination may be impossible in practice, but if it remains the goal, then the numbers may be kept low enough to ensure that the forest has a reasonable chance to recover. Whether the policy has to be extermination or can be control, the Maritime Park Board and the Forest Service must not relinquish the management of the goats to any other body. The framing of the policy and its execution must remain in the proper hands, and the police, in the present awkward situation on the island, must uphold the authority of the proper bodies. The evidence is incontrovertible that the goats are damaging the forest. What the protesters have ignored is that while the goats can be moved, the forest cannot.