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| Above: Deployment at New Plymouth Airport July 2020. |
Within 48 hours of the deployment a stoat was caught in one of the four traps that we deployed. Following that we had four mice caught. Today we returned to the airport to check the four units and check their viability. It should be pointed out that during the past three weeks the weather has generally been poor where there has been significant rainfall.
The units have been deployed in rat tunnel boxes (shown above) with our standard set up. The sound profile is targetting rats and mustlelids. The sound profile during daylight plays every five minutes a random sound (of five). When the solar panel detects darkness it plays one of the five tracks every minute. The airport has an active pest removal program which is being used in conjunction with the sound lure. There are a mixture of traps some of which have the two different kinds of traps adjacent to each other.
Each of the units when checked today were working as expected following the correct sound pattern and showing no evidence of water entering the units. This is extremely pleasing as the weather conditions could not have been worse in the last two weeks including heavy, driving rain and high winds. This would again confirm our recent testing to show that the unit is able to maintain itself in adverse conditions.
While there was no animals that were present in the traps it was noted that all the traps had been stripped of the peanut butter that is being used as a basic bait. Furthermore in the trap shown in the second photograph, which has had the wood placed on it to hold it in place there was evidence of Possum interaction with the unit. This is interesting because of the location is removed from vegetation meaning that something, potentially the lure, has drawn a possum to the area where the trap is located.