Possum trap good enough to eat

Duncan McMorren holds one of the biodegradable bait stations. Picture / Fotopress

A new potato snack could put paid to the possum in an environmentally friendly way, says pest control company Connovation's chief executive, Duncan McMorren, holding up the latest in bait stations for those pesky Australian overstayers in his East Tamaki factory in Auckland.

Connovation has been trying out the bait stations for four months. And McMorren says the results have been so good, they will progressively replace the company's existing product.

Marlborough-based Potatopak, which pioneered the use of potatoes to make edible plates and bowls, has developed the fully-biodegradable bait stations. Its products are made of food-grade cellulose and 100 per cent-edible potato starch reclaimed from the waste starch of potatoes turned into chips and other foods.

"The product is unique and it works. When our people have gone back to check sites where we used potato-starch bait stations there is no evidence of them within a few weeks," McMorren says.

Camera monitoring shows that possums or rodents eat the bait station or else it rots away in a relatively short time.