The Department of Conservation (Doc) has confirmed it is going to remove predator traps from kea habitats, following photographic and video evidence they are not kea-proof.
Doc Eastern South Island operations director Andy Roberts said the self-setting automatic A24 Goodnature rat and stoat traps were being removed from high-density kea habitats above 900m.
Doc and the Wellington-based company Goodnature, which designed the trap, were ''working on more engineering and design solutions,'' and experimenting with some kea exclusion devices.
The self-setting trap had been hailed as the most efficient and humane way to kill rats and stoats, the main threat to endangered native birds.
The rat or stoat is lured to the trap, then struck on the head, killing it instantly.
The trap is powered by a compressed CO2 canister and automatically resets after striking. It can strike up to 24 times before the canister needs replacing.
Traps deployed in weta habitat areas had been fitted with weka excluders, but it had been assumed kea excluders were not necessary.
Kea Conservation Trust co-founder, trustee and chairwoman Tamsin Orr-Walker said she was given the photos and video footage of a kea filmed on the West Coast in the past two weeks, poking its head up into the unset trap.
She said the material was sent anonymously, but it ''validated concerns'' the traps were not kea-proof and she immediately sent it to Doc.
''Obviously, there has been a huge amount of work getting these traps into conservation areas to protect all our native birds from stoats and rats but there is an issue here now with kea and we have to address it,'' she said.
Mr Roberts said it was difficult to design a trap that was kea-proof as they were such ''an inquisitive species''.
Goodnature co-founder and director Robbie van Dam said while every method of predator control has to date killed at least some kea, Goodnature was in ''the fortunate position whereby no kea have been reported harmed or killed by one of our traps''.
Ms Orr-Walker is on a South Island tour delivering public talks about community involvement in saving the kea.
She said there was a community-led kea sighting project under way in Arthurs Pass which she hoped to replicate at Treble Cone skifield and around hiking tracks on Mt Aspiring.
Ms Orr-Walker is due to speak in Wanaka tonight and Dunedin tomorrow night.
- By Kerrie Waterworth
