New Zealand has designated its first Herd of Special Interest, giving hunters a formal, legally recognised role in managing the wapiti of Fiordland National Park and settling, for now, a long argument over how introduced deer should be handled inside one of the country’s most protected landscapes.
Hunting and Fishing Minister James Meager made the announcement in Te Anau on Monday, confirming that the Fiordland wapiti herd would become the first animal population in the country to hold the status under the Game Animal Council Act. He called it a milestone for hunter-led conservation.
“This is an exciting and logical step for valued introduced species, which have significant heritage and cultural values to many Kiwis,” Meager said. He said the arrangement would “help manage deer numbers to sustainable herd levels, ensure hunters pull healthy animals off the public back country to put on the family dinner table, and better protect our biodiversity”.
A Herd of Special Interest, or HOSI, is a status created under the Game Animal Council Act 2013 that allows a valued introduced herd to be managed for hunting as well as for conservation, rather than simply treated as a pest to be wiped out. It comes with a management plan, agreed numbers and clear responsibilities. Until now no herd had ever held it, so the wapiti decision sets the template for everything that follows.
Under the new framework, the Fiordland Wapiti Foundation will lead the work on the ground, operating under annual plans agreed with the Department of Conservation, iwi and hapū. The existing ballot, which has run since 2011, will continue. Each autumn about 600 hunters draw spots across 25 blocks, and in a typical season fewer than 100 animals are taken. The foundation says more than 18,000 deer have been removed from the area over the past two decades through its culling and ballot work.
Wapiti, a North American elk, were released in Fiordland in 1905, a gift arranged with the help of United States President Theodore Roosevelt. They have been hunted in the fiords ever since, and the annual trip is described by many as the hunt of a lifetime. Over the decades the animals have also interbred with red deer, and the resulting herds browse heavily on native plants, including rare alpine species found nowhere else.
The designation follows a change to the law. Parliament passed the Game Animal Council (Herds of Special Interest) Amendment Bill, removing any requirement to exterminate a valued introduced herd once it has been designated inside a national park. The Government argued the change gave certainty to hunters and to the volunteers who have carried much of the control work, while keeping conservation obligations in place.
Not everyone is satisfied. Forest and Bird has long argued that deer of any kind do not belong in a national park and that browsing pressure is steadily degrading native forest and fragile alpine vegetation. The group took the wapiti management arrangement to the High Court in a judicial review, saying sensitive plants were not being adequately protected under the existing deal.
That case has been paused. The parties asked the court to adjourn proceedings to give the Department of Conservation time to review the current arrangements and for everyone to meet and work out a way forward. Monday’s announcement effectively locks in the hunter-led model that Forest and Bird had challenged, and the conservation group is likely to keep pressing on the question of whether native plants are being monitored closely enough.
The wider political argument is about precedent. National parks are meant to be managed for their natural values, and the National Parks Act has traditionally treated introduced animals as pests to be removed. The Herd of Special Interest status carves out a different path for animals that hunters and some communities value, and both sides know Fiordland’s wapiti will not be the last herd to seek it. The Game Animal Council has said other bids are already moving through the system.
Meager framed the decision as practical rather than ideological, pointing to the food that hunters bring home and the volunteer hours that go into keeping numbers down. Supporters, including outdoor recreation groups, say the foundation’s record shows hunters can deliver conservation outcomes at little cost to the taxpayer while native vegetation recovers in blocks where numbers are held low.
The decision lands in an election year, with the vote set for 7 November, and it fits a broader coalition theme of recognising hunting, fishing and the outdoors as part of everyday New Zealand life. How much weight voters put on that, against concerns about protecting national parks, is one of many questions people will weigh before polling day. If you want to see where the parties stand on this and other issues, you can use our voting tool.
For now, the Fiordland Wapiti Foundation will keep running the ballot and the annual control programme, and the Department of Conservation will keep monitoring the health of the forest. The first Herd of Special Interest is in place. Whether it becomes a model that eases the long tension between hunting and conservation, or simply moves the argument on to the next park, will play out over the coming seasons.
What do you think about giving hunters a formal role inside a national park? Have your say in the comments below.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job 🙂
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