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Meet Neil Bolton

Job: 

Senior Ranger – Department of Conservation, Twizel

Job description: 

Supervise a team of staff and contractors who control introduced pest animals (tahr, rabbit, possum, wallaby, deer, pig & chamois).

Work background: 

A number of different Ranger roles in the Department of Conservation spread over many years with a key focus on pest weed & animal control activities.

Favourite part of job: 

Visiting parts of New Zealand that most other people would never get to visit and enjoy.

Least favourite part of job: 

The paperwork!

What I am working on now: 

Multiple tasks:

  • planning major rabbit control operation within Tasman River Valley
  • tahr control programme for this coming winter/spring
  • wallaby poison operation at two sites
  • recreational hunter information updates for tahr/wallaby on DOC website
A quick story about a job well done: 

When at Aoraki Mt Cook National Park trialling a newly designed helicopter bucket for spreading rabbit poison, all of us involved were very nervous as this new bucket had never been used on such a large poison job before (approx 1700 hectares). This nervousness included the helicopter pilot! After flying out all the poison baits we realized that this new bucket which we had designed and got built worked better than we ever thought it was going to. The pilot found the job very easy, it took very little time to fly out the poison bait, was way quicker than spreading the bait using an ATV, and ended up costing a quarter of the price per hectare to spread the bait than the old method of using an ATV.  

We have now used this bucket at many locations and intend to use it again in the Tasman River Valley poison operation (approx 6000 hectares) which is being planned at the moment.   

Qualifications: 

Way too long ago to remember!

Interests outside work: 
  • Landscaping/gardening
  • House renovations
  • Wine making
  • Travel

Watch the video where Neil talks about his work (26 Mb mp4 file).


Meet Neil Bolton, a Senior Ranger with the Department of Conservation. Image: DOC.

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