AYESHA RASCOE, HOST:
I'm Ayesha Rascoe, and you're listening to The Sunday Story, where we go beyond the news of the day to bring you one big story. A huge experiment is underway in New Zealand. The country is trying to save its endangered wildlife - animals found nowhere else on the planet. But to do that, they're killing animals that aren't native and have been taking over. It's a nationwide extermination campaign, one of the most ambitious in the world. And it's raising questions about just how far humans should go to save the natural world. Lauren Sommer from NPR's climate desk went to New Zealand and joins us now. Hi, Lauren.
LAUREN SOMMER, BYLINE: Hey there. OK. So, yes, I went to New Zealand, and I want to introduce you to some of the people doing this work.
MILA MCKENZIE: If you come down here, we can actually show you the small stream that runs through here.
SOMMER: So that's Mila McKenzie, and I met her in a neighborhood park in Dunedin, New Zealand, and that's where her student group volunteers. And they've done a lot. You know, they clean up litter, they put in new plants.
FINN HIBBERT: I think this year we've put about one to 200 trees.
SOMMER: That's Finn Hibbert. He's another student in the group, and it's called Town Belt Kaitiaki.
HIBBERT: It's lucky almost all of the kids love weeding.
RASCOE: I find that hard to believe 'cause I can't stand weeding.
SOMMER: (Laughter).
RASCOE: But that's great that they're doing this, and they're, like, taking care of the environment. That's nice.
SOMMER: Yeah, exactly. But they're also doing something that most kids don't do.
HIBBERT: These are traps, basically, yes. We call these trapping stations.
SOMMER: So they're trapping and killing animals that aren't supposed to be in New Zealand.
HIBBERT: So we have a possum trap, so the white ones that are up on the trees. And then we have down here, like, our rat and mice traps. They're the small, like, tunnel ones.
SOMMER: So McKenzie and Hibbert are doing this as part of a nationwide goal, and it's big. It's to completely eradicate many invasive species. So these are animals that were brought to New Zealand by humans. Some were brought by accident, like rats, while others were actually introduced on purpose. And these invasive species have been devastating for native wildlife, especially birds. More than 60 bird species have gone extinct, and most of those that are left are threatened. So conservation experts say saving those species means getting rid of invasive species. And that's what these students are helping with.
MILA: Though it is a bit gross sometimes - just thinking about it is a bit gross - it's actually quite an ethical thing 'cause it's easier if you kill off something that's causing a problem than let - instead of letting them kill off everything else.
RASCOE: So are these, like, volunteers, or is this, like, something the government is running?
SOMMER: Yeah. It's really kind of a nationwide thing. I mean, the government is funding it. The government is doing a lot of the work, but everyday people are also volunteering. They're chipping in, and the whole effort is called Predator Free 2050 'cause the goal is to do it by 2050.
RASCOE: How many animals are we talking about here in terms of what would be eradicated?
SOMMER: So no one knows exactly, but it's a lot. I mean, there are estimates that it's in the tens of millions, probably more.
RASCOE: That is a very high body count.
SOMMER: Yeah. And I think the question that everyone's asking is, is it even possible? There are just huge challenges here - technical challenges, ethical challenges. And this is the most ambitious, invasive species removal in the world. So what New Zealand figures out will have a huge influence on other places that are trying to save their endangered species.
RASCOE: So today on The Sunday Story - what it could take to save some of the planet's rarest animals. Stay with us.
This is The Sunday Story. I'm Ayesha Rascoe, joined today by NPR correspondent Lauren Sommer. So, Lauren, you went to New Zealand. You seem to get the best gigs.
(LAUGHTER)
RASCOE: But I can't say I know a lot about New Zealand's wildlife. It does kind of make me think of this bird that you see in children's books sometimes. It's the kiwi, right?
SOMMER: Yeah. Yeah, the kiwi. It's the most famous bird in New Zealand. It's kind of this national symbol. New Zealanders are actually known as kiwis. That's their nickname. You've seen it, right? Let me send you a picture real quick. Hold on.
RASCOE: Oh, my goodness.
SOMMER: They're really round. They have this really long beak.
RASCOE: It is a unique-looking bird.
SOMMER: Like, very dorky cute. And as you might imagine, in New Zealand, there are people that are huge fans, and I met one of them.
CLAIRE TRAVERS: It's really unusual, and it's got a lot of attitude. And it's, like, once you see them, you just love them.
SOMMER: So that's Claire Travers. She works for the Whakatane Kiwi Trust, which is a group that helps to save kiwi. And she says even though they're super famous birds, a lot of people in New Zealand have never actually seen a kiwi. One, because they only come out at nighttime, but also because they're disappearing.
RASCOE: Oh, wow. So this is a national bird that's at risk of becoming just a symbol.
SOMMER: Yeah, exactly. That's what people are worried about. But, you know, Travers is one person who does know how to find these birds.
TRAVERS: What we're going to do now is go out and locate a young chick.
SOMMER: So we went looking for a five-week-old chick that they had just released into the wild. And, you know, it was daytime, so that's when kiwi are in their underground burrows. But this chick had a radio transmitter. So the team was kind of scanning for that signal, which helps them figure out where it is.
TRAVERS: And to the side that way. Oh, look, it's getting stronger there now. Seventy. Oh, 71.
SOMMER: So we were in a jungle in Whakatane, New Zealand, and it was incredibly dense. It was just giant ferns, huge trees. It was not easy to walk through and fight in this kiwi.
(SOUNDBITE OF TWIGS SNAPPING)
SOMMER: Ooh, OK. Here we go.
(SOUNDBITE OF TWIGS SNAPPING)
RASCOE: So that's the sound of the microphone, like, bumping into a bunch of stuff.
SOMMER: Yeah. I was doing my best to keep up. Along the way, we did see these kind of signs of kiwi.
KETURAH BOUCHARD: So you can see these holes here?
TRAVERS: Oh, yeah.
SOMMER: That's Keturah Bouchard, and she volunteers with the kiwi project. She was pointing to a bunch of these, like, little holes in the dirt. They were kind of, like, puncture holes.
BOUCHARD: So they'll stick their beak in, and they kind of sometimes swirl it around a little.
SOMMER: It's kind of how they find worms and bugs to eat. And so we searched all morning, and then we finally zeroed in on the chick.
BOUCHARD: I got her.
SOMMER: It was a North Island brown kiwi. It was just like this tiny little fluff ball with a long beak.
(SOUNDBITE OF KIWI SQUEAKING)
BOUCHARD: We're checking her eyes and ears.
SOMMER: So they did a health check on her, and they found that she had lost a little weight.
TRAVERS: All right. You want them a bit stroppy. You want them a bit feisty. So...
SOMMER: That's a good sign?
TRAVERS: Yeah, yeah. But you see how small she is?
SOMMER: So small.
TRAVERS: She's living in here all on her own, just doing her thing. Yeah. All right.
(SOUNDBITE OF KIWI SQUEAKING)
SOMMER: Young kiwi are really vulnerable. Only about 5% of them survive there. And that's mostly because of one predator - stoats.
RASCOE: OK. So what is a stoat?
SOMMER: They're related to ferrets and weasels, and they're only about a foot long, but they're basically the terminator. I mean, here's how people all over New Zealand describe them to me.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: They are very smart. Very, very smart. I mean, a stoat will take on a predator that's much, much bigger than it is.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: They run really fast. They can climb trees. They can swim.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: Incredible predators, apex predators.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #4: They're sort of pound-for-pound, one of the most amazing carnivores on Earth. They're extremely sneaky. They're absolutely amazing killing machines.
RASCOE: Oh, my goodness. I mean, I'm looking at a picture of them. They look so cute. They're killing machines?
(LAUGHTER)
RASCOE: The description of them is incredible. I mean, it does sound like something out of a horror movie, but they look so cute. So looks can be deceiving.
SOMMER: Oh, absolutely. Yes. If you're a bird in New Zealand, this is your nightmare. And stoats were brought by European settlers because they had actually brought in rabbits for hunting, but the rabbit population got out of control. So then they brought in stoats to control the rabbits. And then the stoats started eating New Zealand's birds.
RASCOE: OK. So they thought they were solving one problem, but they created a much bigger one.
SOMMER: Oh, yeah, yeah. And it's kind of a standard story with so many invasive species around the planet because New Zealand birds did not evolve with predators like this. The country had no native mammals aside from bats. So the only thing the birds had to worry about were predators like eagles and raptors, things that kind of hunt from the sky. So New Zealand's birds - they use camouflage to hide, or they would kind of just freeze when they were threatened so that they weren't seen from above. But obviously, that doesn't really work when the predator is a mammal on the ground right next to you.
RASCOE: 'Cause when you freeze, it's like when you fall in a horror movie, then they can really get you. Now you are the perfect prey.
SOMMER: And add to that, birds like kiwi can't fly, so they really can't get away. Claire Travers told me that stoats sniff out the kiwi burrows, and then they just pick off the chicks right when they leave the nest.
TRAVERS: So you find a leg with a little transmitter attached, where a stoat has dragged it and eaten the rest of it. And you just think all that work put into that bird, just to be like that. That's the heartbreak for me.
RASCOE: Well, that is tough. Clearly, the kiwi - they need some help.
SOMMER: Yeah. And that's where the trapping comes in.
(SOUNDBITE OF TRAP CLINKING)
GAYE PAYZE: So Tom's (ph) got a DOC 200 here. That's the trap mechanism.
SOMMER: That's Gaye Payze. She's the predator control coordinator for the Whakatane Kiwi Trust. She showed me one of their traps, which is designed to catch stoats. It's kind of this wire mesh box on the ground, and then the trap part is at the back.
PAYZE: It's a metal plate, which, when it's depressed, goes off, and the heavy bar comes down and crushes and kills the animal instantly.
SOMMER: So Payze told me that the traps have gone through animal welfare testing to make sure they're as humane as possible. And they've set hundreds of these traps to try to catch stoats.
PAYZE: Each stoat is a little victory. It's a huge victory, really, as they are such hard animals to capture. I mean, it's easy to - when you start, but when you get to the stage in our project - we've been going for, like, over 20 years - you're really down to the hardcore.
RASCOE: I mean, what's a hardcore stoat? Because I thought that stoats were, you know, pretty hardcore at this point.
SOMMER: (Laughter) Yeah. So the hardcore stats are the ones that have learned to avoid traps. They don't go in them. And they teach their young to avoid the traps, too. So obviously, that makes it really hard for them to catch, and it kind of makes this a battle. But Travers told me it's one she can't walk away from.
TRAVERS: If we weren't doing what we were doing as a nation for kiwi, you know, within the next two generations they'd have - they'll be gone.
SOMMER: And, you know, it's not just kiwi in trouble. Around 4,000 native species, overall, are threatened in New Zealand. So that's where this national goal is coming from. It's to get rid of stoats - right? - but it's other species, too. So weasels, ferrets and three species of rats.
BRENT BEVAN: Yeah. It's bold and ambitious, but I believe that that's what we need to do in the world.
SOMMER: So that's Brent Bevan. He manages the Predator Free 2050 program at New Zealand's Department of Conservation.
BEVAN: If we don't take action, we are killing our native wildlife by omission. Choosing not to take an action is an action. So either way, something's going to die based on the decisions we make.
RASCOE: Well, I mean, it seems like this is a big ethical question, right? Like, there's the animal rights aspect of it because there are people who would argue that killing any living creature is wrong. And is it ethical to kill one species of animal to save another species of animal that could go extinct?
SOMMER: Right. That's a really big question here. And I talked to someone who looked into this debate in New Zealand. Emily Parke studies the ethics of conservation at the University of Auckland. And she said the idea of killing invasive species hasn't been a big sticking point in New Zealand.
EMILY PARKE: The ethical questions that arise are really less about is it OK to do this and more about what values should we be upholding as we do it. Even if we all agree with the aim of a predator-free New Zealand, we might disagree about ways of achieving that aim.
SOMMER: So, for instance, animal rights groups, like New Zealand's SPCA, say they want to see the development of nonlethal methods of control. But they do recognize there's a need to control invasive species. And overall, the New Zealand public is largely supportive, according to polling. Native wildlife is also really important culturally to the Indigenous communities there, many of the Maori tribes. A lot of people I spoke to just said, you know, humans caused this problem, so it's our job to fix it. And as Emily Parke told me, that public support is crucial for a goal like this.
PARKE: Predator-free New Zealand is as much a social challenge as it is a biological challenge. This isn't just about coming up with the right technologies and methods. It's about a lot of social change.
SOMMER: She says it's kind of about reframing our cultural ideas of these kind of cute, fuzzy mammals, and it means getting rid of stuff that's living in people's backyards. So there really has to be public buy-in.
RASCOE: So that's the debate around, like, should this be done. But what about the question of, like, can they do this? Like, is there any other way to save New Zealand's wildlife without trying to do this countrywide eradication?
SOMMER: There are a few other strategies, yeah. And I actually went to see one of them. You know the movie "Jurassic Park," where there's just those, like, huge fences and gates?
RASCOE: The ones that, like, keep the dinosaurs inside, and a lot of them are, like, electrified, so they can't get out?
SOMMER: Yeah. Exactly. That is basically what I went to see.
RASCOE: After the break, we find out what's behind the fence. Stay with us.
We're back with NPR's Lauren Sommer, who's taking us to visit some very rare animals in New Zealand.
SOMMER: Yes, and it is a high-security situation.
MADISON KELLY: So this is the fence. We're at the pedestrian gate, the ped gate. This is the only way in and out for pedestrians visiting.
SOMMER: So Madison Kelly took me to see a 6-foot-tall, fortified metal fence. She works at the Orokonui Ecosanctuary outside of Dunedin, and she says everyone thinks of "Jurassic Park."
KELLY: Yes. Yes. That's the very first thing my dad did when I took him here (laughter).
SOMMER: So this fence isn't actually designed to keep things in. It keeps things out, like stoats and rats.
RASCOE: 'Cause we know the fences in Jurassic Park don't work so well like keeping things in.
SOMMER: Yeah, exactly. So, like, the top of it is kind of flared outward. It curves outward so nothing can climb over it. There is an electric wire on top, which triggers an alarm. There's 24/7 monitoring, and there's even a code to get in.
(SOUNDBITE OF PRESSING CODE KEYS)
KELLY: And that changes every day.
SOMMER: But, you know, inside, native birds are able to thrive.
KELLY: It's hard to talk, you know? If you're here first thing in the morning, the dawn chorus - immense.
(SOUNDBITE OF TUI CHIRPING)
SOMMER: You know, all around us, there are these black and blue birds called tui.
(SOUNDBITE OF TUI CHIRPING)
RASCOE: Oh, I mean, it sounds like you could get some sort of, like, dance song out of that. I mean, it has, like, kind of a techno vibe.
SOMMER: Yeah, exactly. There was also a pigeon the size of a chicken.
(SOUNDBITE OF KERERU FLAPPING WINGS)
KELLY: It's the kereru. That one that just flew past. Yeah.
SOMMER: That was enormous.
KELLY: Yep. So they are huge.
RASCOE: OK. So I just looked up this bird, and it is a giant pigeon...
SOMMER: (Laughter).
RASCOE: ...Which I don't know that I would like to see that on a park bench. But for bird watchers, they would probably like that, right?
SOMMER: Yeah. Yeah. That was the thing about it. So many of these birds are so unique. And for Kelly, she said this eco sanctuary is really special to her because of her Indigenous Maori heritage.
KELLY: You know, Orokonui is obviously a biodiversity project, but it's also a community project. It's also a place where some of our stories, our forests, our species, our taonga (ph) - so our treasures - can be active here in a way where that storytelling and that knowledge keeping is still stored in the forest and might be lost elsewhere.
SOMMER: But, you know, protecting these birds - it takes constant vigilance. I mean, we kind of talked about how those fences in "Jurassic Park" don't always work, right? And after a big snowstorm one year, stoats were somehow able to get over the fence. It was when this very rare bird, the South Island saddleback, was also living in the sanctuary.
KELLY: They basically were picked off one by one by those stoats. It took months and months and months to actually track down those stoats.
RASCOE: I - well, I could see why stoats would want to get in. I mean, this is basically like a feast for them.
SOMMER: Yeah. Right. And so it just takes a ton of work to make sure that doesn't happen. All that work - the constant checking, you know, building these fences in the first place - all of that means ecosanctuaries aren't cheap. They cost millions of dollars. But some people think they are a better value. I talked to John Innes, who studies conservation at the New Zealand Institute for Bioeconomy Science, which is a national research lab. He says he'd rather see the focus on these ecosanctuaries instead of the nationwide eradication.
JOHN INNES: I think the idea has been unhelpful - predator-free by 2050. Just to be clear, I think, of course, the vision is wonderful. Who could disagree with that? Of course, it's good. But we have ended up spending tens of millions of dollars now for several years, and people are not building things that we know work.
RASCOE: What would be the total cost for fully eradicating the invasive species across New Zealand? Has anyone put a price tag on that?
SOMMER: There's really just estimates. I mean, right now, New Zealand already spends millions of dollars on this, but fully getting rid of invasive species - it's estimated to be more than a hundred million dollars per year. And that's conservative. It's probably a lot more.
RASCOE: That's a lot of money.
SOMMER: Yeah. You know, so far, they have succeeded at eradicating invasive species on some small islands right off the coast. But as you can imagine, it just takes a huge amount of work and labor and people time to trap and get rid of animals across a country that's, you know, 100,000 square miles.
RASCOE: What do - the people you talk to, do they think New Zealand will be able to reach this goal?
SOMMER: Well, one thing to point out, it's not all or nothing. So even just reducing the numbers of these invasive predators can be a big help for many of the birds there. But most experts told me right now it's just really unlikely that New Zealand can do this full eradication. To make that goal even remotely feasible, there needs to be new technology that makes controlling invasive species just much more efficient. And there are people working on it.
RASCOE: Well, what are some of those new technologies that they're working on?
SOMMER: So one example is traps that use artificial intelligence. So they have cameras that can see what kind of animal is going inside, and then the trap only goes off if it's the right animal. Those traps also reset themselves to go off again, so it doesn't require a person to do that. And there are more cutting-edge ideas that New Zealand is also researching, and one is to use genetic research to target animals. So that could mean creating poisons that only work on one animal, or there are these ideas to genetically modify invasive species in a way that interferes with how they reproduce. So it's like you change their genes in a way that means they only have male offspring, and then if there's only males, over time that population slowly dies out.
RASCOE: Well, I mean, genetic modification definitely would come with a lot of concerns. And, you know, going back to "Jurassic Park," they say nature finds a way.
SOMMER: (Laughter).
RASCOE: Are there risks to doing that strategy?
SOMMER: Yes. And, you know, this is very early. It's still in development. Everyone I spoke to there said there needs to be a really big scientific debate, a public debate about these risks. But it's definitely a sign of how New Zealand is kind of on the forefront of all this and thinking about how conservation could change as the technology gets better.
RASCOE: You know, I'm curious after talking to all these people, going to all these different places. Did you come away with a sense of hope for these endangered species? Or is there a sense that this is too far gone and that, you know, it won't be able to be undone?
SOMMER: The biodiversity crisis, you know, it's not getting better. Things like climate change are making this even worse. And it's just taking a lot more for humans to stop that slide. And that's kind of the big questions in New Zealand that everyone in the world is facing - right? - like, how far should we go? How much should we do? And the hard part for all of this is just there's this shrinking amount of time to figure it out. So, you know, I think that was the main sense I got away from the whole thing, which is, even if they don't think they can get there, the important thing is to try.
RASCOE: Well, that certainly is something to be thinking about and grappling with. Lauren, thank you for this reporting.
SOMMER: Yeah, thanks for having me.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
RASCOE: This episode was produced by Justine Yan and edited by Jenny Schmidt. The reporting for this episode was brought to us by NPR's climate desk. Neela Banerjee was the editor. Mastering by Kwesi Lee. Special thanks to producer Ryan Kellman. The Sunday Story team includes Andrew Mambo and our senior supervising producer, Liana Simstrom. Thomas Coltrane (ph) is our intern. Irene Noguchi is our executive producer.
I'm Ayesha Rascoe. UP FIRST is back tomorrow with all the news you need to start your week. Until then, have a great rest of your weekend.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
Copyright © 2025 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.
Accuracy and availability of NPR transcripts may vary. Transcript text may be revised to correct errors or match updates to audio. Audio on npr.org may be edited after its original broadcast or publication. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.