Letters:Time to cut back on 1080

I was sad to read Laurel Stowell's article on the anti-1080 protest (Chronicle, August 15).

I find it hard to believe that Orillion — or is it "Orwellian" — staff were subjected to death threats.

If true, I would be fairly certain it would have been some unwanted "tag-along" — unwanted and unknown to the good people who organised the hikoi.

When TB eradication is the goal, I have to admit 1080 is probably a great tool. We seem to have driven TB back to near-extinction.

I do not see 1080 as a threat to humans, but it is time to cut back its use.

Nature wastes nothing, so the poison must keep killing all the way down through the food chain. Eventually the small birds and creatures that eat the insects — they will die, too. Only the vegetation and birds of the forest canopy survive.

We humans found New Zealand; we introduced a vast array of new animals; we have altered much of the habitat.

Let us celebrate the introduced animals. Only the possum has done real damage to our flora.

As for the rare birds that need protection, it would be cheaper and more effective to farm them and sell to collectors who would ensure their survival in captivity.

You don't like that idea? Well, I do not like blanket poisoning of our conservation estate.

WILLIAM PARTRIDGE
Hunterville

Science will save

John Archer defends his one-child policy (Chronicle, August 11). Is he for zero migration to New Zealand?

"The mathematics (may be right) but he forgot to look at the science." Global warming is still under discussion, therefore is not science yet — a bit like the theory of evolution.

I see National Geographic is suggesting the scientific Adam left Africa 130,000 years ago because of drought and therefore starvation. Present-day starvation has been for decades blamed on the wealthy countries eating too much — this includes you and me.

Science is making spectacular gains, yet you are pessimistic of dealing with disease.

We are up to 1200 planets in the habitable zone (possibly colonisable) just in our galaxy. Your ancestors travelled from the other side of the world; we shall travel to the other side of the galaxy.

I would like to explain why I dismiss your view. In the first major population scare of the 1970s, spearheaded by Paul Ehrlich, an entomologist, the world's pharmaceuticals began to make a fortune from contraceptives and still are doing so. Who funded the story to depopulate?

F R HALPIN
Gonville

We know the score

I agree with Fred and Lorna Rose's letter about football in Wanganui.
I live in New Plymouth, and the paper up here doesn't even mention football. I read your paper to get the results. Keep up the good work.

BRIAN DEARDEN
New Plymouth

Keenan's claims

I am surprised at some of the things Dr Danny Keenan has written in his article (Chronicle, August 15).

All he has put forward are his opinions of what the Treaty of Waitangi says or does not say.

What we do know is that the Queen, in 1840, was asked to send troops to New Zealand to stop Maori killing each other, which she did.

These troops were involved in dispensing justice and restoring order as they saw fit. Mistakes were probably made on both sides.

The Treaty clearly states the tribal chiefs ceded their sovereignty to the Queen but, by reinventing the Treaty, one can change the interpretation and, unfortunately, this is happening more. The debate will continue about race-based rules for council seats and all the other things Dr Keenan mentions.

It would be nice if, some time soon, Hobson's words "We are one"— apparently said after each chief signed the Treaty — were to be seen to be actually in place.

PJ BURRELL
Katikati

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