Gavin McLean and Tim Shoebridge are historians at the History Group of the Ministry for Culture & Heritage. Gavin has just finished a history of the Lyall Bay Surf & Life Saving Club and a photographic history of Otago and is writing a history of the prime ministership. Tim, who published The Good Citizen: A Life of C.E. Daniell of Masterton and a guide to the National War Memorial in 2009, is writing a history of the impact of the automobile on New Zealand.

Prologue: NZ's increasingly permeable borders -- 1: 'Another plague ship lying in our harbour': Human quarantine before 1939 -- 2: 'Open for the introduction of every abomination': Animal and plant quarantine before 1939 -- 3 'More afraid of what we do not know than we do know': Quarantine enters the aviation age 1940-64 -- 4 'Hold for agriculture': The modern quarantine system emerges, 1965-84 -- 5 'Way ahead in the world': Bio-invasion and biosecurity, 1985-2010 -- Bibliography -- Notes -- Index.