Just a brief stop o/n at the (in)famous Country Club where we met the usual locals.
I met with a friend and we talked about the on-going poisoning problems around the Nelson area. He also hunts on the Kaikoura hills - the Clarence River Valley which was recently 1080'd. I did the Official Information Act request for the rationale from the Government agency TBFree (an anomoly, NZ is TBFree by International standards), which revealed (as usual) there was no logic to the poisoning of 11,000 hectares of land and water: 12 pigs over 2 years had apparently been found to be bTB positive. Hardly a convincing argument - especially when the cattle there have been seemingly located there for decades.Current issues nearer home (to Nelson) include the City Council's proposal to poison a nature 'Sanctuary' (that word seems to have a different definition here in NZ) with 26 tonnes of a lethal, inhumane anticoagulant toxin, Brodifacoum. This is a rat poison that - in every other part of the developed world - is used exclusively in indoor bait stations, where there has been a full risk assessment for the secondary poisonings that are likely to occur. Here in NZ? Yup, you guessed it, let's spread it from helicopters over land and into water courses. And can you believe this nature sanctuary is less than 5 kms from a highly residential area? There are various protest groups trying to prevent it, there have been numerous letters in the local newspapers - including a petition you can sign here and a forthcoming public meeting to raise awareness of the potential risks to human health and companion animals. We'll wait to see the outcome, but undoubtedly this is one of the most horrific local poisoning operations I've heard about so far. Brodifacoum is horrific. In some ways even worse that Compound 1080 - if that's possible.
Back at the club, walked nonsense for an evening and then the following morning left for the West side of Nelson and pastures new.
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