When it comes to pests, traps, and ecosystems, Craig Bond knows his stuff. As Goodnature’s co-founder, he’s been up close and personal with pests for more than 20 years, doing everything from testing stoat traps in the New Zealand bush, to supporting global conservation organisations, to rewilding his own backyard, to developing our new indoor mouse trap.

What has he learned in two decades of pest control? As Craig puts it, it’s all about consistency and long-term change - there’s no quick fix here.

“In order to kill lots of animals humanely and effectively, in a way that’s going to make an impact, there’s no point in killing just a few of them. You’ve got to kill lots of them and you’ve got to keep doing it to get to a low level of predators in the ecosystem, so the good stuff can flourish.”

Over the years, we’ve contributed to that long-term goal by shipping over half a million traps around the world. And with every Goodnature trap killing an average of 44 pests in its lifetime, we’ve killed at least 22 million pests. That’s 22 million invasive animals removed from farms, forests, beaches, and backyards – and countless natural spaces that are just a little bit wilder.

It all ties back to our rewilding mission. We believe that a world with fewer pests is a world where nature can thrive, and that every tiny pest makes a difference. Everything we do, from building better traps to working with community groups, comes back to that goal.

Helping nature take care of itself

How does trapping pests help nature thrive? Beyond the obvious – fewer invasive predators in the environment means more birds and other native species – removing pests also means more plants, seeds, insects, and biodiversity in general. Eliminating pests without using poisons is even better, as it prevents harmful toxins from entering the ecosystem and causing more damage.

While we’ve always known that pests cause serious harm, our work also lets us see the other side of the equation. The great news: when we eliminate or minimise those damaging pests, nature really does bounce back.

Craig tells a story about working with a community group in Patagonia. The local albatross colony was struggling because mink – introduced for the fur trade – preyed on their nests. Goodnature adapted our traps to target mink, helped fund the project, and showed the community how to set up a trapping network. The results surprised even us:

“Maybe a year or two after the traps went in, the community saw fledged albatross chicks for the first time in twenty years,” explains Craig. “It’s those moments where you go, actually this works, and it works at scale.”

Although the pest species vary, we’ve seen the effect of large-scale trapping in projects all over the world - protecting kōkato in New Zealand’s far North, targeting grey squirrels in the UK, setting up networks to shield Hawaii’s vulnerable bird species, and supporting conservation groups from Scotland, to Scandinavia, to the Solomon Islands.

FACT: Rats, mice, stoats, and other pests eat plants and seeds, prey on native birds and lizards, and make it harder for ecosystems to get back into balance - get the full story in our Rewilding blog.

Observe, learn, test, repeat

Of course, before we could see the real-world impact of our traps, we had to actually make them. In the early days, Craig and Goodnature co-founder Robbie Van Dam spent a lot of time in the bush around Wellington as they developed their first stoat trap.

Craig remembers it like this: “Observing, learning, testing, repeat.”

The focus was always making the traps as effective and humane as possible. While controlling pests is essential to protect native species, the target animals still deserve respect.

“Our goal is that the animal is going about its day and has no awareness of what happens,” explains Craig. “We don’t want it to suffer, we don’t want it to be scared or fearful.”

Making a trap that’s highly effective, user-friendly, humane and optimised to suit the target species isn’t easy. And that’s before you consider the non-animal side of things, like manufacturing, price, distribution, and quality control. It’s a balancing act – or, as Craig puts it “Constantly trading everything off and trying to find that sweet spot.”

After perfecting the stoat trap, we funnelled that learning into making traps for weasels, squirrels, rats, mink, mongoose, and more recently, mice. Whatever the animal, the approach is the same: “Test test test, learn learn learn, and use that to inform everything we’re doing,” says Craig.

Wilder spaces on a smaller scale

While those big, global projects are satisfying for the team, pest control and rewilding also happens on a much smaller scale. Craig should know. His small garden, on Wellington’s South Coast, has been a testing ground for traps right from the start.

He’s set up ‘probably too many’ rat and rodent traps in the garden, and more recently, extended his trap network inside with the new Goodnature Mouse Trap. Through a lot of hard graft, he’s turned the garden into a mini rewilding case study.

“There is no toxin use. There’s trapping, obviously,” he says. “I’ve planted hundreds of native trees, and all the trees I plant are propagated from seeds I collect. There’s lots of composting, worms, all sorts of great stuff going on.”

In more than a decade on the property, that work has paid off bit by bit, with nature taking over and getting closer to its original state.

“Every year that I live in that garden, I see more bugs, worms, weta, birds, flowers and seeds,” he says.

The key takeaway?

“I’ve learnt there are always pests around, even if you think there are not,” says Craig. “They’re always cruising round, they’re moving because of food availability, seasons, probably disruption to their habitat. The best way to control them is making sure your traps are always there waiting for them. Being patient and just letting the trap do its thing.”

People power

If there’s one thing Craig has learnt from large and small scale trapping, it’s that people are an essential part of the process. No matter how smart and sophisticated our traps are, individuals and community groups are the ones running the show.

“You’ve got to mobilise a massive group of people, you can’t limit the pool to just serious hunters and trappers,” explains Craig. “You’ve got to make your labour pool, who’s going to do all this work, as big as you can. That’s why from day one we’ve aimed to make traps that anyone between the ages of 8 and 88 can pick up and use.”

That’s why a simple, stress-free user experience has always been a key piece of the puzzle at Goodnature. We want people to actually use our products, so they need to be easy and effective, minimising the mess and ick involved with pest control.

Beyond the traps, we’re always keen to share our general pest control knowledge with anyone who wants to hear it. We know from experience simple changes inside and outside your home can make a real difference to your immediate environment. As Craig has found, toxin-free trapping and planting can boost biodiversity, while things like securing compost and rubbish bins, blocking indoor entry points, removing food sources, and clearing piles of rubbish can make your home less appealing to pests. As always, the small, consistent actions of many people add up to real change over time.

Our newest, tiniest target

Our newest trap distils all that learning into one clever little product. It’s designed to help people tackle a tiny pest with a surprisingly big impact.

Mice are often forgotten or underestimated in pest control efforts, but they’re a serious problem. According to Predator Free NZ, mice are among the most common invasive mammals worldwide thanks to rapid breeding, a flexible diet and close contact with humans. Pest control work focusing on rats and larger pests can inadvertently increase mouse populations by removing mouse predators and competition for food.

That means predator-free zones can end up with an explosion of mice – one study found 50–160 mice per hectare in some parts of New Zealand, especially when other rodents had been eliminated. That’s why mice make sense as a target – they represent a gap in our trapping range, and a chance to remove another pesky species. Even though indoor mice might seem completely removed from nature, they do make their way outside into gardens and surrounding wild spaces, and can have an impact on bird, insect, and plant biodiversity.

Optimised for mice and humans

While our mouse trap looks very different from our rugged outdoor versions, it’s built on the same principles. Through three years of testing, refining, and retesting, we’ve built a trap optimised to indoor mince, with the same effective, humane targeting of our rat and rodent traps. The ultra-precise striker is designed to cleanly kill a mouse in a fraction of a second, minimising mess and stress for user and target.

It also fits into our belief in people powered change, with a seamless – Craig would go so far as to say ‘beautiful’ – user experience. The trap has a rechargeable battery and long-lasting lure, so it can be used long-term with little input from you. It’s connected to an app through Bluetooth, and updates you whenever it needs to be emptied, refilled, or recharged. In short, it’s everything we’ve learnt over the years in one neat, effective little package.

“To make that connection between the animal and the human, that’s what we’re really good at,” explains Craig. “All our experience has led us to this point.”

Want to do your part for nature? Get your clever little mousetrap here.