Threats to offshore islands
Pests such as stoats and wild cats eat nesting birds and chicks. Rats have a wide diet of lizards, birds, chicks, insects and seeds. Possums are known for their ability to eat foliage and have been known to eat bird eggs and kill birds protecting their nests.
Tuatara
New Zealand's flora and fauna evolved in the absence of mammalian predators and herbivores and are poorly equipped to survive in their presence. 44 birds have become extinct since the arrival of pests in New Zealand with human colonisation.
Analysis of the stomach contents of stoats and rats has confirmed that native species are part of their diet. Videos have captured possums eating eggs. Where pests have been removed, the increase in native plant and insect life shows the effect the pests have had.