Thread: DOC hut book use

Important note to all you DOC hut and track users.

DOC urges backcountry hut users to record their visits

It doesn't matter what your opinion of DOC is ... if they don't know we are using these huts in the conservation estate they might not keep maintaining them.
Particularly the more remote ones we hunters prefer.
I've had a bit too do with DOC in the last few years and its all about the numbers for them.
If we don't enter information into the hut books then as far as they are concerned we do not exist !!!
So if like me you have a favorite hut you go to regularly and you don't put entries in the hut book because you don't want everyone to know where you got that big stag, bull or buck ? Then start putting entries in those hut books ... even if you use a pseudonym and enter that you are a "bird watcher".

This is not just the huts but also the maintenance of tracks, structures, road end parking and toilets etc
Comments on repairs and maintenance, track cutting required, signs, markers, noxious weeds .... whatever just put them in the hut book.
Contact the relevant DOC area office ( its pretty easy and I have always had some kind of response )
Its all about the numbers guys and the people who make these decisions are fixated on information in spreadsheets. If those spreadsheets are skewed towards international visitors then that's where the limited resources will directed.

Good luck to you all for the roar ( Im missing my second one in a row ) and don't forget to fill in the hut book with bird sightings !