4WD threat to rare moth

Four-wheel-drive vehicle users at Marlborough's Cloudy Bay are being asked not to stray from existing tracks, to avoid damaging the habitat of a rare moth that lives nowhere else.

The mat daisy jumper, first discovered in 1999, is flightless and only known to live in a 2km strip of the Cloudy Bay foreshore. About 3mm to 5mm long, the moth looks like grass seed and use a distinctive jumping action to get about.

A Department of Conservation officer said signs of off-track 4WD activity had been found in Cloudy Bay foreshore areas inhabited by the moth.