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Archives For 30/11/1999

The Chatham Islands celebrate tāiko

Department of Conservation —  09/04/2013

In February celebrations were held on the Chatham Islands to commemorate 35 years since the rediscovery of the tāiko—a rare seabird breeding only on the remote islands.

An unbanded taiko being held after being discovered on the Chatham Islands.

An unbanded tāiko discovered on the Chatham Islands.

The Chatham Island Tāiko Trust organised a week of activities, with logistical and planning support provided by DOC.

The events commemorated the rediscovery of the tāiko (on 1 January 1978) by David Crockett and his team. Events included an open day in the Tuku Nature Reserve where the majority of known tāiko burrows are found, a Golden Oldies Tāiko Camp visit, and an operation of lights to demonstrate how tāiko are captured, which is the same method used 35 years ago to capture the first known tāiko.

Some of the original team who rediscovered the taiko stant by the Taiko Totem.

Five of the original seven team members who rediscovered the tāiko

The final event was the official celebration which saw more than 150 people make their way over to ‘Tāiko Camp’ on the south west coast of the main Chatham Island for presentations and the unveiling of the Tāiko Totem, an acknowledgement of all the people who have contributed to the tāiko project.

The weather throughout the week was fine and settled, and all the events came together in a fitting tribute. Among the guests of honour recognised with presentations at the celebration was David Crockett and several members of the original team that rediscovered the tāiko.

Attendees of the taiko celebration go through a predator proof fence.

A guided walk through the predator proof fenced area see a Chatham petrel chick

The contributions and support of many local identities and landowners that supported the original team and subsequent protection work was also acknowledged, in particular the contribution of the Tuanui family. Chatham Island Tāiko Trust Chairperson, Liz Tuanui was thrilled with the turnout for the celebrations. She said, “It was a great example of the community working with DOC to achieve a common goal.”

All that attended the celebration were treated with a very rare opportunity to see a tāiko after the unveiling. An unbanded adult was found on the ground the day before the event near Sweetwater, a predator fenced area built by the Chatham Island Tāiko Trust for the protection of tāiko and other seabirds.

David and Ruth Crockett receiving boquets and certificates from the Tāiko Trust.

David and Ruth Crockett receiving boquets and certificates from the Tāiko Trust

Tāiko Trust

For further information see the Chatham Island Tāiko Trust webpage at www.tāiko.org.nz.

In Native animals , , , , , ,
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Jobs at DOC: Fern—Species dog

Department of Conservation —  28/03/2013

Come behind the scenes and into the jobs, the challenges, the highlights, and the personalities of the people who work at the Department of Conservation (DOC).

March is Whio Awareness Month. To celebrate this, we thought we would profile a slightly unique staff member, Fern the whio dog based in Ohakune.

Fern the whio dog in the snow.

I love going to work in rain, hail or snow

Name: Fern Dog.
Position: Species dog – kiwi and whio.
Office: Ohakune.

At work

Some things I do in my job include… finding kiwi and whio that humans seem incapable of locating. It’s so easy to sniff them out and I’m not really sure why they have noses if they aren’t prepared to use them. I’m also involved in advocacy work at schools and end up with a heap of kids sitting on and around me. I don’t really mind that because the kids make quite a fuss over me, and my ranger (Malcolm) talks about cool stuff like stoats and rats and possums.

The best bit about my job is… finding whio that the rangers can’t locate and listening to them discussing when they had last seen the birds and how they thought the birds had either been preyed upon or left the area. I have just started to help my ranger move the whio into nets for banding and that is very cool. I don’t like herding sheep but ducks are neat to herd and I get to swim in the deeper water because Malcolm is a bit of a sook once the water gets up to his waist.

Fern the whio dog crossing a swing bridge.

At first my ranger Malcolm was a bit scared of crossing swingbridges, but I showed him how it is done

The funniest DOC moment I’ve had so far is… when we were herding ducks into a net and I had done a great job when ranger Bubs said he would move the last ducks with a volunteer (as he had a real rapport with this pair). I lay in the sun with Malcolm and then we got a radio call to say the ducks had gone to ground and they couldn’t find them. I took Malcolm downstream and located the first one in a cave but was informed Bubs had already checked that cave out. Well he must have been using ‘boys eyes’ because ranger Ali looked in the cave and came out with a whio. How surprising!

Then I took Malcolm further downstream and pointed the second bird out to Bubs who actually managed to catch it. ‘At least he got that right,’ I thought to myself. When Malcolm told ranger Ali that we had caught the second bird she was very indignant as she had a huge net across the river and a heap of volunteers ready. I couldn’t help laughing to myself and I am pretty sure Malcolm had a grin on his face.

The DOC (or previous DOC) employee that inspires or enthuses me most is… Neo, a male German short hair pointer who owns Andy Glaser. He’s not quite as big as me but he is very handsome. We have discussed having puppies together at some stage. He bought ranger Andy down to Mangatepopo a few weeks back and showed me how good he was at locating and herding whio. He is seven years old and works whio very well. Once I saw him working I thought ‘I’m going to be as good as him,’ and I have stepped up to be like Neo. He said he has taught Andy all he knows about species dog work and I am teaching Malcolm so that he can work at a higher level too.

Fern the whio dog sniffing out whio.

The nose knows

On a personal note…

The song that always cheers me up is… ‘Who let the dogs out’.

My stomping ground is… Mt Ruapehu and the rivers of the central plateau.

If I could trade places with any other person for a week—famous or not famous, living or dead, real or fictional—it would be… Neo.

The best piece of news I’ve heard lately is… that I passed as a fully certified whio dog for the Department of Conservation.

Fern the whio dog pointing out whio on the river.

Here is me doing what I do best: pointing out whio to humans

In my spare time I… rush round on Malcolm’s farm and show up the farm dogs that are slow and have noses and ears painted on their faces.

If I could be any New Zealand native species I’d be… a falcon/karearea because then I could fly to the whio and give them one hell of a fright.

My secret indulgence is… food and I would make a good biosecurity sniffer dog at an airport.

If I wasn’t working at DOC, I’d like to be… a deer dog as deer are so easy to locate compared to kiwi and whio.

Fern and Ranger Malcolm monitorwhio in the Tongariro forest.

Me and ranger Malcolm monitoring whio in the Tongariro forest whio security site

Deep and meaningful…

My favourite quote is… ‘They are still making them!’ when humans whinge about something broken or missing.

The best piece of advice I’ve ever been given is… don’t be grumpy because life is too short.

In work and life I am motivated by… DOC rangers who are so passionate about New Zealand’s environment and biodiversity.

My conservation advice to New Zealanders is… look after it or lose it.

In Jobs at DOC , , , , ,
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Not your typical thieves in gold-mining era campsites

Department of Conservation —  21/01/2013

New Zealand has an extensive history of gold mining. The principal New Zealand gold fields were Coromandel, Nelson/Marlborough, Central Otago and West Coast. DOC has as many as 1000 gold-mining sites on lands it manages, and some of these are currently used as campsites.

Grant Jacobs the author of the blog, “Code for life”, shares a recent experience he had while on a camping trip at a gold-mining era campsite. He writes*:

“[When] camping in New Zealand, small items left lying around are at risk from thieves. I was reminded of this whilst sitting on the foundation stones of what was once an old gold miner’s hut, the iron remains of the roof and perhaps chimney at my feet, reading a novel with my tent pitched on the other side of the clearing where the thief stalked.”

Tent across the clearing at an old gold mining campsite. Photo taken by Grant Jacobs.


Tent across the clearing at an old gold mining campsite

“Some of these camping grounds are now, and probably were then, home to indigenous thieves. As I sat on the foundation of the miners hut, my back against a tree, I became aware that one such cheeky thief was prowling my tent on the other side of the little clearing.”

A weka under the outer fly of the tent looking for items to steal. Photo taken by Grant Jacobs.


A weka under the outer fly of the tent looking for items to steal

“Those not familiar with weka might think that they would only steal food, but stories say that weka will steal seemingly anything portable that attracts their attention. Of the non-edible objects, lore has it that a bit like the gold miners, they prefer shiny things.”

Weka have a bit of a reputation for pilfering small objects. They will take the objects to the nearest cover to investigate them. For this reason it is best not to chase weka but to simply watch where they go and retrieve the objects a little later.

Because of its scavenging habit, the weka can be problematic for conservationists. Some subspecies are threatened, but moving them to offshore islands can disrupt other threatened wildlife species. For example, weka released onto Codfish Island, where they haven’t lived in recent times, threatened the viability of the Cook’s petrels there and had to be removed.

Make sure you check out Grant’s full blog post.

*All text and photos from the blog “Code for Life” are copyrighted content of Grant Jacobs.

In Camping, Coromandel, Historic, Native animals, Nelson/Marlborough, Otago, West Coast , , , , , , ,
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Murupara School students give $1000 for kiwi work

Department of Conservation —  09/01/2013

By Steve Brightwell, Community Outreach Coordinator

When a bunch of seven and eight year olds come up with $1000 for kiwi work, it’s a spectacular and humbling example of what happens when people switch on to conservation. When it’s money from kids at a low decile school that they could have spent on themselves it’s all the more impressive.

Te Urewera Whirinaki ranger Aniwaniwa Tawa and others from her office have been visiting the class this year to talk about ecosystems and conservation with a focus on kiwi protection work.

They recently ended the study with a trip to Whirinaki Forest where they experienced the forest first-hand. Following the trip, the class presented the Area Office with a cheque for $1000 to be used to raise a kiwi chick at Kiwi Encounter in Rotorua.

A North Island brown kiwi egg.

Funds from Murupara School will help care for a kiwi egg.

A stunned Aniwaniwa explained: “The class (7 & 8 year olds) have been working with me and [former DOC ranger] Graeme Weavers for most of this year learning about kiwi and the natural environment and were so affected by what they had learnt they asked their teacher what they could they do to help. Between them and their teacher (I knew nothing about this until they presented me with the cheque), they thought they would do some fundraising however as Murupara School is officially “closing” the Board of Trustees allocated each class funding to go on a class trip to wherever they wanted. These kids chose to give up their allocation and put toward sponsorship of a kiwi and wrote a letter to the school Board to ask for approval to do this. Cool huh!”

It’s totally cool – and an awesome example of how giving people a personal experience with conservation can make a real difference to the way they think and move them to action for a cause.

A North Island brown kiwi hatching.

A North Island brown kiwi hatching

The money donated by Room 12 will now go on stand-by ready to pay for a kiwi egg to be whisked away from Whirinaki and hatched if there’s any sign of it needing help. Once the egg is hatched and the chick is raised to a safe weight to return to the forest, the students will be asked to give it a name. After that it will be set free in Whirinaki -Te Pua o Tane – one little kiwi enjoying a bright future thanks to a bunch of other little kiwis who can see conservation as a path to a bright future of their own.

Well done to everyone involved.

In Kiwi, Native animals , , , , ,
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Penguin flotilla seeks yellow-eyed penguins to count

Department of Conservation —  12/11/2012

By guest blogger, zoologist, award-winning wildlife film-maker, natural history writer and passionate story-teller, Alison Ballance…

It’ll be action stations at the Department of Conservation’s quarantine store in Invercargill today as two expeditions check their belongings before heading down to the subantarctic on Tuesday, to ensure their gear is free of any possible introduced nasties.

A 12-person team aboard the 25-metre yacht Evohe are off to the Auckland islands, and a 6-person team aboard the 15-metre yacht Tiama have Campbell Island in their sights. The aim of the ‘penguin flotilla’ is to count hoiho, or yellow-eyed penguins, to establish a good population estimate for the subantarctic, which is considered the stronghold for yellow-eyed penguin populations, although we don’t know how many penguins live there!

A yellow-eyed penguin/hoiho on Enderby Island.
Photo copyright Alison Ballance

The last time a good survey of hoiho on Campbell Island was carried out was in the early 1990s, while there has only ever been an educated estimate of hoiho numbers on the Auckland islands, made in the late 1980s. Three years ago a joint DOC and Yellow-eyed Penguin Trust expedition braved a month of terrible winds and high seas around the Auckland islands to map every possible place that hoiho seemed to use as a breeding site, and this latest trip will build on that work.

We’ll be locating ourselves at these sites, and spending a few hours from dawn each morning watching the coast, and counting hoiho as they travel between their nests and the sea.

At this time year the subantarctic birds are incubating eggs (they’re a bit later than their mainland cousins, which is probably to due with colder temperatures and a differing food supply down there), and each pair takes turns sitting on the eggs and feeding at sea. It’s a bit like surveying commuters at a bus station, noting the numbers of arrivals and departures, although I suspect the Furious Fifties usual gale force winds, constant drizzle and low temperatures will make the job quite a lot colder and more unpleasant than any inner city bus survey!

As well as counting yellow-eyed penguins the Campbell island team, led by Sandy King, will be using a specially trained rodent dog to make sure that the island is still rat-free, while another dog, this one trained to find birds, will be checking out the Campbell Island teal, to see how their numbers are doing since they were reintroduced a few years ago.

The keen penguin watchers on the Auckland islands include Jo Hiscock, Dave Houston, Dave Agnew and Megan Willans, all DOC staff with lots of experience in both penguins and the subantarctic.

Leith Thompson is a ranger with the Yellow-eyed Penguin Trust in Dunedin, and he spends much of his working days keeping an eye on the more than 500 breeding pairs of hoiho which call the Otago and Catlins coasts home.

Carnley Harbour side of Adams Island (part of the Auckland Islands group). Photo copyright Alison Ballance

The other willing workers are six keen volunteers, who have each paid to be part of the trip, as it is a rare opportunity to spend time in the subantarctic.

Sharon Karst and her husband sailed their yacht around the world, before settling at Matakana, north of Auckland, where Sharon has become dotty about New Zealand dotterels, helping out at the Tawharanui open sanctuary.

Alan Magee is a retired engineer from Invercargill, and he’s particularly keen on geology and history, so will be taking every spare moment to immerse himself in the Auckland islands’ shipwreck stories.

Marcy Taylor grew up on a farm and still works in the farming industry. She says she’s always been fascinated by the subantarctic and that this trip sounded like an amazing opportunity, too good to pass up.

Katie Underwood works by day as Wellington real estate agent, but every moment of her spare time is filled with conservation volunteering, The Zealandia sanctuary is her usual stamping ground, but she’s also spent time weeding on Raoul Island.

Alister Robinson is a funds manager who lives and works in Sydney but was Dunedin-born and bred. He volunteers on conservation projects in Australia, and has been building up his fitness for the trip with a few weeks of volunteer work at the Orokonui Sanctuary near Dunedin.

Rachel Downey is from the UK, but now lives in Australia having got their via several years work in Antarctica. Sponges have been more her thing, but an introduction to penguins on the Antarctic peninsula got her yearning to learn more.

That leaves me, Alison Ballance, the 12th member of the team. I co-produce and co-present Radio New Zealand’s weekly science and environment programme Our Changing World, I write books about natural history, and I spent four months on Campbell Island (in the middle of winter!) researching feral sheep for my master’s degree. This will be my 5th trip to the subantarctic and I can’t wait to be back. Of course there will be the usual problem – that small matter of 460 kilometres of sea between Bluff and the Auckland islands. My plan is to get on the boat and go straight to bed! When I emerge at the other end, and once we have started work, I’ll send another blog letting you know what our weather is like and how the penguin counting is going. I’ll also be posting blogs on the Yellow-eyed Penguin Trust web site – head to http://yellow-eyedpenguin.org.nz if you’d like to find out more.

In Islands, Native animals, Volunteers , , , , , , , ,
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