National bird left whistling as cash dries up

A new approach to pest control could spell bad news for New Zealand's national bird, says a leading scientist.

Dr Elaine Murphy, who has led a $6 million project on finding new ways to kill stoats over the past six years, says the money has been used up and no new finance has been made available in the latest funding decisions on pest control.

Instead, the Government's funding decider, the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology, has opted to "move radically away" from single pest control research to what it calls a "broader understanding" of interactions between different pest species.

Dr Murphy said most scientists would agree a broader approach was good, but new tools for stoat control must be funded at the same time.

"What's the point if, in 20 years' time, we know how stoats and possums interreact if we've nothing left to protect?" she said.

Stoats are the number one killer of kiwi chicks in the wild, responsible for a miserable survival rate of young kiwi of as low as 5 per cent.

Dr Murphy said a stoat breeding laboratory at state-owned Landcare Research might also have to close now the money had dried up.

She will now spend at least some of her time on another research project in Australia.

"In some ways it's exciting for me but it's also a bit sad. Stoats are still a real problem ... "

She said the $6 million was tiny compared with money spent on possum research.

Her project studied stoat reproduction, parasites and a new stoat toxin, including a "rat sausage" that showed promising results.

But plenty of scientists are happy with the latest funding decisions.

Landcare scientist Dr Phil Cowan said possum control research had been rolled into a single, eight-year project, allowing scientists from different research institutes to work together.

City-dwellers have not been forgotten in the latest funding round, with $1.6 million being allocated to find the best way of restoring selected city parks to what they were a century ago.

The 60ha Waiwhakareke Natural Heritage Park in Hamilton is being used as the first case study, led by the University of Waikato.

The park will be revegetated and plants and animals reintroduced.