Concern for rare beetle

Press, 30 December 1988, Page 28

Concern for rare beetle

By

OLIVER RIDDELL

in Wellington

The Conservation Department has lodged an objection to the proposed site for a new rubbish tip in Central Otago on the ground that it would endanger a rare species of beetle. The Cromwell chafer beetle is endemic to a very limited area. Land development and the establishment and rapid expansion of Cromwell mean that this flightless beetle is now restricted largely to an 81 ha nature reserve, with possibly one or two other very small and isolated remnant populations. The Minister of Conservation, Ms Clark, said saving endangered insects from extinction was just as important as saving endangered birds. Plans by the Cromwell Borough Council to site its new tip only 500 metres from the nature reserve meant that the chafer beetle could become an indirect victim of the Clyde dam power scheme.

There was some irony in that; the nature reserve had been created for the chafer beetle in 1983 as a result of the invertebrate surveys done as part of the studies on the hydroelectric development of the Clutha River. Ms Clark said the council had been forced to shift its present tip site by Aoril. 1989. because that site would be inundated once Lake Dunstan formed behind the Clyde dam. The new site chosen was expected to have a life of 100 years, by which time it would have moved to within 200 metres of the chafer beetle reserve — well within the estimated 500-metre home range of a rat.

Her department was concerned that predators such as rats and cats would be attracted to the tip and be a threat to the nature reserve and the chafer beetle.

The department was keen to help the Borough Council investigate alternative sites for the new tip, Ms Clark said.