A trapping programme began in a small area of secondary forest in 2006 aimed at controlling possum, rat, mice, stoat and weasel populations.
A team of volunteers cut 22 km of tracks spaced 100 m apart around the valley, allowing traps to be set up on a 100 m grid (50 m around the perimeter).
The traps were baited weekly.
Shooters also killed about 100 goats that had been ring-barking trees in the valley.

Three aerial drops of 26.5 tonnes of brodifacoum-laced bait to eliminate all rodents within the fence were planned for July to October 2017.
This action was challenged in June by a group calling themselves the Brook Valley Community Group (BVCG), who protested the aerial poison drop near a waterway.
Although portraying themselves as a community group, many of the organisers were anti-1080 activists from outside Nelson.
The drop was halted while the case went to the High Court on 7 August, and then, two days before the first drop, to the Court of Appeal; in both cases the court ruled against the BVCG.
Nelson MP Nick Smith was accosted on 3 September 2017 (the day of the first drop) by two protesters who abused him, rubbed rat poison in his face, and threatened his family.
That same day, a hole was drilled in a fuel tank for helicopters performing the drop, several protesters attempted to block access, and three were arrested.
The three poison drops subsequently went ahead smoothly, and no bait was dropped outside the sanctuary boundaries, nor was any trace of brodifacoum detected in the stream water.

The BVCG attempted to take their appeal to the Supreme Court, but were denied, and they were ordered to pay over $70,000 in legal costs to the Nelson City Council, the Minister for the Environment, and the Brook Waimārama Sanctuary Trust.
The group considered disbanding as an incorporated society to avoid having to pay the costs and "starting again somewhere else".

After six months of monitoring, the sanctuary was declared "pest free" in 2018, with at least 14 pest species removed from within the fence, including rats, stoats, and deer.
A four-monthly testing regime checks for presence of rodents; as of May 2019 there had been two breaches of the fence, both individual rats which were dealt with shortly afterwards.
In the year following the elimination of rodents there was 400 per cent increase in the numbers of tūī and bellbirds, and a 200 per cent increase in fantails and tomtits.
There were also notable increases in the number of ground invertebrates and tree seedlings.
A trapping programme began in a small area of secondary forest in 2006 aimed at controlling possum, rat, mice, stoat and weasel populations. A team of volunteers cut 22 km of tracks spaced 100 m apart around the valley, allowing traps to be set up on a 100 m grid (50 m around the perimeter). The traps were baited weekly. Shooters also killed about 100 goats that had been ring-barking trees in the valley.
Three aerial drops of 26.5 tonnes of brodifacoum-laced bait to eliminate all rodents within the fence were planned for July to October 2017. This action was challenged in June by a group calling themselves the Brook Valley Community Group (BVCG), who protested the aerial poison drop near a waterway. Although portraying themselves as a community group, many of the organisers were anti-1080 activists from outside Nelson. The drop was halted while the case went to the High Court on 7 August, and then, two days before the first drop, to the Court of Appeal; in both cases the court ruled against the BVCG. Nelson MP Nick Smith was accosted on 3 September 2017 (the day of the first drop) by two protesters who abused him, rubbed rat poison in his face, and threatened his family. That same day, a hole was drilled in a fuel tank for helicopters performing the drop, several protesters attempted to block access, and three were arrested. The three poison drops subsequently went ahead smoothly, and no bait was dropped outside the sanctuary boundaries, nor was any trace of brodifacoum detected in the stream water.
The BVCG attempted to take their appeal to the Supreme Court, but were denied, and they were ordered to pay over $70,000 in legal costs to the Nelson City Council, the Minister for the Environment, and the Brook Waimārama Sanctuary Trust. The group considered disbanding as an incorporated society to avoid having to pay the costs and "starting again somewhere else".
After six months of monitoring, the sanctuary was declared "pest free" in 2018, with at least 14 pest species removed from within the fence, including rats, stoats, and deer. A four-monthly testing regime checks for presence of rodents; as of May 2019 there had been two breaches of the fence, both individual rats which were dealt with shortly afterwards. In the year following the elimination of rodents there was 400 per cent increase in the numbers of tūī and bellbirds, and a 200 per cent increase in fantails and tomtits. There were also notable increases in the number of ground invertebrates and tree seedlings.
Brook Waimārama Sanctuary