• /
    • Archives /
  • 30/11/1999

Archives For 30/11/1999

Ulva Island Eradication Update: 21 April 2011

Brent Beaven —  21/04/2011

 
The DOC website has the latest updates on the Ulva Island rat eradication.
___________________________________

The work on Ulva Island continues to progress, with the work focussed on planning for an eradication option and obtaining the resource consent for this work.

Operational planning

Planning work is progressing well, key decisions have been made about bait storage, loading site, re-fuelling site etc and organisation of these and other aspects of the operation is well on track.

Documentation such as contracts (bait supply, aerial bait spread), operational plan etc are either completed or in final draft phase.

The operational plan has been sent to the Islands Eradication Advisory Group for feedback, (including questions raised by the community such as merits of pre-feeding and best practice for sowing the coast).

IEAG is a team of DOC experts who provide worldwide technical support for island eradication operations. New Zealand leads the world in this field and the meeting was attended by people from far flung places such as French Polynesia, California and the UK, all seeking advice on how to go about eradicating rats from islands.
Calibration of the helicopter buckets has been organised for the last week of April (April 27th). Bucket Calibration is an important step in the eradication process and is carried out in a flat mowed paddock where all bait can be seen and counted. Non-toxic bait is sown through the bucket that is to be used in the operation and the machinery is tweaked to ensure that bait is sown to the correct swath width (i.e. width of strip sown with bait on each pass) and that the correct number of pellets per hectare are sown. Once the correct bait application spread and rate has been achieved the bucket settings are noted so that the toxic bait can be spread correctly on the day.

Biosecurity meeting

As mentioned in the last update, a public meeting will be held at 7.30pm on 28th of April in the Stewart Island Community Centre. This meeting will discuss any and all ideas about possible ways to improve the biosecurity on Ulva Island to further reduce the chances of rats establishing in the future. If you have any ideas, or are simply interested to hear what might be proposed, please come along.

Monitoring

The University of Otago’s bird research group (who monitor robins on Ulva Island every summer) have offered to monitor the effects of the baiting operation and the effects that the rats have had on the birds on Ulva Island. It will be great to have this independent monitoring of the operation.

Trapping stopped

Some confusion seems to have arisen around the reasons as to why we have stopped trapping on Ulva Island.

The long term exisiting biosecurity measures on the island are aimed at preventing a rat population becoming established. In this case, they have failed and a rat population has established. Continuing to run these traps and bait stations will not even now slow the rat population expansion and is therefore considered to be a waste of time. Servicing them has stopped so we can focus efforts on a proper eradication attempt. This has been misinterpreted by some as DOC giving up. The fact is that we are well down the planning track for an aerial eradication attempt.

Regards

Brent

In Animal pests, Southland, Ulva Island , ,
permalink

Raoul Island Diaries: A black-winged petrel named Laughing Jack becomes a favourite on Raoul Island

DOC on Raoul Island —  14/04/2011

Raoul Island is one of the Kermadec Islands, about 1,000km north-east of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean. DOC has a small team of rangers and volunteers who live on the island in relative solitude. Their main focus is controlling weeds on the island, maintaining infrastructure such as buildings, roads and tracks, and carrying out work for Met Service and GNS.

Since the island is so remote, we get these diary entries from the team and post them up on their behalf. Today’s diary is by volunteer, Maree Roberts.

Is Laughing Jack our favourite bird…?

Baby Jack, a Black-winged petrel chick, on the nest

It is not surprising that in being surrounded by birds, one or two would become favourites, or at least well-known to us. This is so of Laughing Jack, a Black-winged petrel that has built its nest on a nearby track.

This track, the Orange Grove Track, is an access route to the main track across the island and to many of our weeding plots. We therefore walk past Laughing Jack’s nest on a nearly daily basis.

Now Laughing Jack is not one for spending a lot of time on a fancy nest; this nest is more like a hollowed out groove in the edge of the track. So once the egg was laid and Laughing Jack was sitting on it, he was perched on the edge of his nest fully visible to us.

One of the coolest things that I have learnt on Raoul is that you can literally call black-winged petrels to you through a very strange and funny way. Basically you make a “wo wo wo” sound by patting your mouth with your hand. This has them swooping down all around you and often landing beside you, or if you are lucky, even on you.

So each time we would walk past Laughing Jack’s nest we would make this sound and Laughing Jack being a friendly kind of bird would answer back loud and clear. Laughing Jack became so used to us that just walking by and making the noise set him off. And it seemed to us that Laughing Jack sounded just like he was laughing his head off at how silly we sounded – hence the name ‘Laughing Jack’.

Red-tailed tropicbird on a nest

We have had many a laugh with Laughing Jack over the last month as he sat on the nest. And then, as these things go, baby Jack appeared. Black-winged petrel chicks are the cutest balls of fluff you ever saw and we were lucky to be able to see this one clearly due to the meagre nature of Laughing Jack’s nest.

Of course the first thing we did was try out the call and in response, in the squeakiest pitch, was the familiar laughing call. So now we get to not only watch baby Jack grow and grow, but also to say hello every time we pass and hear him laughing his fluffy head off about how silly we all sound!

… or is it the Red-tailed tropicbird?

It is quite a competition around here for which birds are our favourite and for me it has always been the beautiful Red-tailed tropicbird. When the sun is shining and you look up and see one, you can almost see right through their white wings and as for the long red tail feathers well, they are just fantastic.

Red-tailed tropicbird chick on nest

We recently got to go over to the Meyer Islands, another bonus of being on Raoul Island. These islands are literally coated in beautiful, and sometimes quite rare, seabirds.

On this trip I was privileged to get to see up close not only several tropicbirds, but their fluffy white chicks as well. This was a real highlight of my trip to Raoul and made me realise just how lucky I am to have come to stay in this bird paradise.

In Auckland, Islands, Native animals, Raoul Island, Volunteers , , ,
permalink

The world’s first takapo eggs

Department of Conservation —  01/04/2011

Here on Maud Island in the Marlborough Sounds we’re very excited and a little bemused at finding what could be the world’s first takapo eggs this morning. 

Sirocco the incorrigible and amorous kakapo has already earned himself a reputation for attempting to mate outside his species but it seems this time he has outdone himself. 

Haggis and Sirocco, the expectant parents

Just over a week ago, on his 14th birthday, Sirocco’s feelings for his friend Haggis the takahē became public when he ruminated on his Facebook page “She’s cute… but she likes figs and I like apples…could anything ever happen between us? Does she even like me?” 

Now, at the start of April, we have the answer! 

The two eggs, found in a nest hidden under long grass, are being closely monitored. 

So far Haggis is proving to be a great mum although, unlike male takahē, who normally share responsibility for the raising of their young, she has discovered that all is not so smooth in cross-species relationships, with Sirocco proving to be a very wings-off kind of dad. 

In hindsight, they make a pretty good pairing though – both are big, heavy, flightless birds at the mercy of introduced mammalian predators. 

Pest free islands are their refuge. And it seems, like humans, these birds come together in times of trial. 

Haggis and Sirocco with their newly found eggs

Both kakapo and takahē eggs have around a 30 day incubation period so, if all goes well, we can expect to see some takapo chicks in the next three weeks. 

Or not.

In Native animals, Nelson/Marlborough, Sirocco the kakapo
permalink

A new baby in the (DOC) family – Orange-fronted parakeets/kākāriki breed on Tuhua

Sarah Mankelow —  31/03/2011

 

It’s times like these that I am reminded that the organisation I work for can be like a big family.

Sarah, the orange fronted Cantabrian, with two Tauranga chicks, Barb and Janice

Following the Christchurch earthquake and our office being closed, I decided to go back to my hometown and work from the Tauranga Area Office for a few weeks.

They welcomed me with open arms – great bunch of people – and on my first day I was reminded by ranger John H that other Cantabrians also were seeking refuge here. Canterbury’s own orange-fronted parakeets or kākāriki – are currently residing here on Tuhua – an offshore island paradise.

And within a week of being back inside the buzz of a busy area office I was privileged to be among the first to hear – juvenile parakeets had been spotted on the island!

The arrival of new babies are always a happy occasion and these wee parakeets – photographed by John H during a nest-monitoring trip – are no exception.

Orange-fronted parakeets are extremely rare – there are less than 200 left in the wild and only in Canterbury.

Orange-fronted parakeet/kākāriki

To help save this species from extinction, some birds have been reared in captivity by Anne and her team at Isaacs Wildlife Trust in Christchurch. The birds are then released on predator-free offshore islands – including Tuhua here in the Bay of Plenty. They arrived here this summer, and John H has been keeping a close eye on them ever since.

This little kākāriki signals hope for the future – the first confirmed breeding of orange-fronted parakeet in the North Island for over 130 years!

Everyone here – and in Canterbury – is absolutely over the moon with the discovery.

Tuhua, because of its size, could be just so important to the future of this fantastic wee parakeet. Tūhua is a really special place – the ancestral home of Te Whānau a Tauwhao ki Tūhuaand looked after by the Tūhua Trust Board.

I feel so proud to have just been a bystander in this wonderful event. And it reminds me that no matter where we are in the country, we are all working towards the same goals – a future for our own children. Just call me Aunty Sarah!


In Bay of Plenty, Canterbury, Native animals , ,
permalink

I’m still standing – yeah yeah yeah!

Sarah Mankelow —  24/03/2011

All is not lost – we are keeping some of Christchurch’s historic stone buildings! One of my favourite places to visit is the Sign of the Packhorse Hut and I was really happy to hear that it had survived the latest Christchurch earthquake. 

Sign of the Packhorse Hut

It’s a beautiful old stone hut in a great location; perched on a saddle offering a grand view of Lyttelton Harbour below and the curve of the Port Hills sweeping around its edges.

Happy memories are attached to that place – my daughter’s first overnight stay in a hut aged only two! The friends we took with us who had also never been tramping before. The bottle of wine we hauled up the hill to drink with our pasta meal, celebrating a new year’s arrival as the sun set. Staying up all night as the kids played up and took turns to keep their parents awake, finally dropping off at dawn for an hour or two of sleep.

Happy memories – my daughter’s first overnight stay in a hut

Sign of the Packhorse Hut lost its chimney and suffered some cracks in the September 4 quake, but it seems to have held it all together OK this time. Its open again to walkers coming from Kaituna valley or Gebbies Pass, but the track to Mount Herbert is closed pending a geotechnical survey.

This historic nine-bunk stone hut was built as part of a planned series of rest houses by Harry Ell for a proposed summit route from Christchurch to Akaroa. Only four houses were ever built, all from locally quarried volcanic stone.

Making memories

Fort Jervois on Ripapa Island has also survived but has suffered some damage and remains closed for now. 

Ōtamahua / Quail Island is safe and open again, another great place for families to go and have an adventure, forgetting about troubles for a while. Most of the reserves on Banks Peninsula are also now open, but reserves on the Port Hills stay closed due to the risks of rock fall.  Godley Head too, is closed – all tracks and even the road is a risky place to be until rock hazards can be managed so stay clear. 

While we keep getting large aftershocks, rock fall danger is very real, so please, keep safe and keep out of closed areas. Updates on track and facilities can be found on the DOC website.

But there’s nothing like getting back to nature to shake off the stresses of every day living – especially in a town that keeps trembling – so get out and about and make some memories of your own.

In Canterbury, Historic, Huts , , , ,
permalink