Kangaroo Island Natural Resources Management Board lodges plans for 3km cat-proof fence
A barrier cutting off the Dudley Peninsula from the rest of Kangaroo Island will form a key line of defence in the region’s fight to eradicate wild cats — if it gets the green light.
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Threatened native species and livestock would be protected under plans to install a 3km cat-proof fence isolating Dudley Peninsula from the rest of Kangaroo Island.
The local Natural Resources Management (NRM) Board has lodged plans with Kangaroo Island Council for the floppy-top fence, which would be built along the narrow isthmus near Pelican Lagoon.
The island aims to eradicate wild cats completely by 2030, and has already deployed measures including trialling poison-squirting “Felixer” machines and encouraging islanders to use an app to record cat sightings.
Kangaroo Island NRM Board presiding member Andrew Heinrich said the fence, to prevent cats entering from the west, was an important step in the island-wide eradication project.
“It is well known that feral cats are the main predator of our threatened species, many of which have their last refuge on the Island,” Mr Heinrich said.
“But farmers also know that cats are the main carriers for several diseases such as toxoplasmosis and sarcocystosis that hit farmers’ pockets hard.”
The Board last year estimated there were about 5000 wild cats remaining on the island, which celebrates being free of other “pest” animals such as foxes and rabbits.
KI NRM regional manager Damian Miley said the fence would have four gaps, which would be monitored and controlled to stop feral cats from entering.
Ecologist Katherine Moseby said the project would help protect native animals such as brown bandicoots, KI dunnarts, echidnas and hooded plovers.
“I think putting a fence up is really the only way to eradicate cats from Kangaroo Island,” said Dr Moseby, an adjunct lecturer at Adelaide University and director of consultancy company Ecological Horizons.
“It’s a clever way to take advantage of these long, skinny peninsulas, where you only have to put in a short fence.”
Dr Moseby said a similar measure was used on Dirk Hartog Island in Western Australia, where threatened species were now being reintroduced.
Another project on the Yorke Peninsula involves a fence on the southern part of the peninsula to reduce cat and fox populations.
Dr Moseby, whose husband John Read created the Felixer machine, said cats were having a “massive impact” on wildlife and sheep production.
On Kangaroo Island, the NRM Board said the fence would travel down the middle of an old road reserve from the cliffs of the south coast to Pelican Lagoon.
michelle.etheridge@news.com.au