Pass the Wallaby

The increasingly ubiquitous wallaby may be the newest presence on the New Zealand dinner table, as municipalities around the country are being encouraged to consider different strategies to control their booming populations. The Australian marsupials arrived in New Zealand in 1874, and have flourished free from the predators and less hospitable habitats of their native land. Poison is currently being used to control populations, but the growing numbers are  vrequiring on an increasingly creative response. A café in the self proclaimed wallaby capital of New Zealand, Waimate, does good trade in wallaby pies, and the councilors approved of the culinary options. The region’s biosecurity manager Graham Sullivan said increasing the culinary market was a realistic option for the country. “Wallaby is quite nice to eat, just like kangaroo, so if a cottage industry was up for harvesting them for the table then fantastic,” he said. “It would just take somebody with the initiative and the dosh to set it up.”