How can these eyes do any harm to anyone?
You think this might be impossible? Unfortunately, this is not the case. As a nature lover you should be prepared for getting involved with possums, or at least with the sign of their existence, while visiting New Zealand. My first encounter with a possum reaches back to a foggy morning when we had just stepped out of one of Waitomo’s Glowworm Caves. Due to our surprised faces after seeing the dead possum caught in a trap, our guide started explaining the threat these animals are for the whole environment.
Once having been introduced to the country in 1837 for fur trade, possums do huge damage to New Zealand’s native forests and therefore are regarded as the country’s “most damaging animal pest”1. So whenever you decide to go for a hike, you may find several possum traps hidden inside the forest. This happens for good reason as possums can have a bad influence not only on the environment, but also on farming and native animals.
For a traveller it may be shocking that the country’s beautiful nature is constantly endangered by such a species. Being attracted by tourism campaigns and good experiences of others, tourists are not aware of the environmental issues a dream destination regarded as perfect may face.
Nevertheless, the government founded “National Possum Control Agencies”2 to manage this problem. They use control methods such as hunting, trapping and poisoning. Furthermore an Easter Bunny Hunt is organised in Central Otago every year that serves to “kill as many rabbits as possible in 24 hours”3 as well as other dangerous species like possums. With an event sounding as cruel as this, animal activists appeared as well in the past but are said to have not shown up this year being caught in a discussion, whether animals or the environment should be given higher priority.
Being a vegetarian myself, I had to overthink this post several times as it just seems wrong to kill these animals. In my opinion, they have only suffered from us. Humans transported possums to New Zealand to use their fur and now they are shot as if we do not want them any more. On the other side the government already invests a lot of money in possum control and it might be an impossible demand to collect them all and ship them to Australia where they are protected as a native species.
1 http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/possums/page-1
2 http://www.doc.govt.nz/nature/pests-and-threats/animal-pests/animal-pests-a-z/possums/
3 http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11612540
