Did you know?
- Pests like rats, stoats and mice chew seedlings, nibble seeds and destroy insects. They eat lizards and birds and their eggs and they'll do all this in your backyard.
- In the bush, DOC rangers use tracking tunnels to record where these small animals pass through.
- They use an ink pad and place white paper at both ends inside a tunnel. Bait is placed on a leaf in the middle of a sponge soaked in ink.
- Pests like tunnels so they scamper in to get the bait and then leave their footprints on the paper as they pass through.
- The footprints show what animals are there and where the animals will feed.
- The tracking tunnels help DOC rangers work out the best places to put traps.
Make your own tracking tunnels
Tracking tunnel
You can make a tracking tunnel out of plastic milk bottles. You'll have to experiment but that's what technology is all about!
1. Collect the items you'll need
- 2 large plastic milk bottles
- A craft knife or scissors
- A piece of wood
- Polythene wrap
- Red food colouring
- A sponge
- A small plastic tray
- Peanut butter or raw meat
- Sheets of white paper
- A piece of wire
2. Make your tracking tunnel
- Cut off both ends of the large milk bottles.
- Slide one bottle into the other.
- Slide in a piece of wood for a base.
- Darken the tunnel by wrapping it in polythene.
- Soak a sponge in red food colouring and place it on the plastic tray.
- Put some bait on a leaf and place it in the middle of the sponge. Use peanut butter for rats and mice and raw meat for mustelids like stoats.
- Place the tray in the middle of the tunnel and put sheets of paper at both ends.
- Find a good place in your backyard to put your tunnel. To hold your tunnel in place make the piece of wire into a U shape and place it over your tunnel and into the ground.
- Experiment by putting a few tunnels around your backyard. You can disguise your tunnel in the roots of a tree or even cover it with sticks. Be as sneaky as a stoat!
- Check your papers each morning. You may have to add new bait and food colouring. After 4 - 5 days you should have a good idea of what small animals are around.
Visit the NZ Kiwi Foundation website to see what the different footprints look like so you can tell what's in your backyard.
3. Trap your backyard pests
You can catch mice or rats by placing a trap in your tunnel. Placing your trap in the tunnel makes the trap less dangerous for birds and it means the pest animal can't move sideways to sneak past the trap's bar.
Find out more about how you can stop rats.
Mustelids like stoats need a heavy-duty trap at the end of the tunnel. Check out some of the traps that DOC uses.
back to top