Touring New Zealand (1 Viewer)

I went to Tiritiri Matangi Island. The ferry goes at 9 a.m. and arrives at the island about 10:30. I met up with a couple of other birders and we took a guided tour of the island. Unfortunately it was a dark, overcast day. Most days start out that way but then it clears up and is nice and sunny by 9 a.m. After the tour and lunch, we had less than two hours to tour around on our own before having to return to the ferry for the ride back to Auckland. The sky finally cleared up and the sun came out at about 2 p.m. I saw lots of birds and it was a good day but not enough time and too dark in the forest due to the gloomy overcast sky. It was a good introduction to the island but I think a serious birder or bird photographer will want to make a second trip or better yet stay overnight for more time and to see the nocturnal kiwis. It is possible to rent a bed in a bunkhouse style building.
I saw the following new birds: NZ Fantail, NZ Robin, North Island Saddleback, NZ Pigeon, Stitchback (female only which is grey with white shoulders. Did not see the male which is black, yellow and white), NZ Bellbird, Brown Quail, and Whitehead.
I did not see the rare birds including the Takahe and the Kokako. The Takahe are in hiding at this time because they have chicks. They are more likely to be seen anytime other than December.
I hope to get back to the island again when I return to Auckland after my tour of the North and South Islands.

Meet up?

Hey Jay,
I am in New Zealand birding also. I've already come down to the South Island, in order to see the breeding birds down here (penguins!). I spent a week on Tiri myself, it was like nothing else. If you're headed down this way, I'd like to meet up and maybe travel together? I'm doing a lot a solo birding and it would be nice to have somebody to share the experiences with....

Hi, I will be heading south but not for a while yet. I am currently heading north of Auckland until Christmas. How long will you be here?

I am now at Muriwai on the west coast, north-west of Auckland. We went to visit an Australasian Gannet colony. These large birds live in colonies on cliffs overlooking the sea. There are 28 colonies around New Zealand but 25 of them are on small islands. Only three are located on the main islands, one of them here at Muriwai with about 2,000 birds, so it is a rare chance to see them. They are very interesting birds. December is nesting season for the gannets so we are here at a good time to observe their behaviour. They lay a single egg which they take turns incubating for six weeks until it hatches. When one bird returns from feeding, it finds its mate in the crowd. They are obviously very happy to see each other. They flap their wings and squawk and rub their beaks together. After their greetings, they trade places, and the other bird flies out to sea to feed. Once the egg hatches, the parents keep it warm and feed it for another six weeks.
When the chicks fledge and are able to fly well enough, they all take off without their parents and make a 2,400 km trip to Australia. They remain there for five years. The parents do not go. During this time the gannets are a speckled brown colour. After five years, they become adults and turn mostly white with black along the edges of their wings and a golden-brown on top of their heads and nape. They are black around the eyes. It looks like they are wearing too much eyeshadow and green polish on their toes. When they become breeding adults they return to New Zealand and never go to Australia again.
Perhaps the Australasian Gannet should be New Zealand’s national bird instead of the kiwi. Many young New Zealanders take off when they are old enough and go to live and work in Australia for several years. They eventually return, find a spouse, buy a house, and spend the remainder of their lives in New Zealand. Just like the Gannets.
Also living in the gannet colony are White-fronted Terns which are also busy raising their chicks. Another new bird for me.
Another new bird that I saw in the campground here is the California Quail. This is an introduced bird. Its native range is the west coast of North America from California north to southern British Columbia. A North American bird that I see for the first time in New Zealand.
I also saw the African Collared-dove, Chaffinch, Yellowhammer, and European Goldfinch. All introduced birds.

I went out on a guided night walk in the Kauri forest to look for kiwis. The New Zealand forest is very different from a forest in Canada. I was amazed that we could walk through a damp forest at night an not see a single mosquito. In Canada you would get eaten alive and there is always the chance of bumping into a bear. Here there is nothing that will bite you. Also the forest if deadly quiet. In Canada you would hear insects buzzing and little critters scurrying around in the underbrush.
We were looking for kiwis which are nocturnal. There are five different species of kiwi in New Zealand. The Brown Kiwi is the only one that lives on the mainland of the North Island. Some others live on little offshore islands. There were once millions of them all over the North Island before the arrive of humans in NZ. Now they number just in the thousands and still decreasing. They will probably become extinct if not moved offshore to predator free islands. The native Maori used to hunt them for food and clothing until about 1920. Their feathers were used to make robes for their chiefs. They still do, but now they use feathers from animals that are found dead from other causes. Now the main threat is from introduced animals. Dogs, rats, cats, possum and weasels kill many kiwis. We saw one possum in the park.
After walking for two hours in the park, we had not seen a kiwi. We did hear them though. I was surprised at their call which sounds like a loud scream piercing the still night air. I will never forget that sound. Although we didn’t see any kiwi we saw other wildlife. We saw what are called glowworms. This is a type of worm that glows in the dark to attract insect prey. In a couple of small streams we saw huge eels. The water was barely deep enough to cover them. They were about one metre in length.
Sadly we heading back to the vehicle without seeing a kiwi. Just as we were getting into the van, we heard a kiwi calling from very close by. The guide decided to go back and try once more. Ten minutes later we saw two kiwis, one large adult and a smaller one. We were not allowed to shine flashlights on them or use flash cameras. The guide had a large lantern that was covered with a red lens that provided enough light to see. I didn’t get a really good look at them. It looked like a hairy basketball running through the underbrush. The second and smaller one was much further away.
I didn’t get a great look at them but am happy with what I saw. It was nice of the guide to go back and try again as this involved extra time on her part. Perhaps I can see another later in my tour of NZ. If not, I have seen at least one. Most native New Zealanders have never seen one except in the zoo.

If you would like to see the NZ Dotterel nesting and are heading north of Kaitaia, let me know as they are nesting just up the road from where I live.

Also north of Kaitaia is Parengarenga Harbour with abundance of birdlife http://nzbirds.com/birding/parengarengabirds.html is where you can find the list of what is commonly seen there

Interesting thread. How much did the Tiritiri Matangi boat and guided birdwatching trips and the guided night walk in the Kauri forest cost? Thanks.

Allen

Hi Tom,
Was it the Trounson forest where you had your kiwi walk? I'm booked on one of these in February so it's nice to hear that you were successful.

Allen,
The Trounson walk costs $25 per adult. Details here:
http://www.kauricoasttop10.co.nz/guided-kiwi-night-walks-dargaville.html

David

We did the Trounson walk a few years back and it is hard work to see a kiwi with a group that are mostly there just for something to do....far too noisy for kiwi usually, but the other bits are good. We stayed at the nearby caraven park and asked the guide (who also ran the park) if we could nip back on our own. He was more than happy to lend us a couple of torches and we had a pair near the 'auditorium' area and was much easier with only the two of us
If you can, book early and stay on Tiri for the night...that way you can see Little Spotted Kiwi and Tuatara too.

birdboybowley said:

We did the trounsoun walk a few years back and it is hard work to see a kiwi with a group that are mostly there just for something to do....far too noisy. We stayed at the nearby caraven park and asked the guide (who also ran the park) if we could nip back on our own. He was more than happy to lend us a couple of torches and we had a pair near the 'auditorium' area and was much easier with only the two of us

Click to expand...

We had a couple of tourists and their six week old baby on our walk. Didn't see kiwi - surprise surprise.

Yes, the kiwi walk was at the Trouson forest. The tour with a guide cost $25 each. There is a campground within walking distance of the park and a nicer one about 10 km away called Kauri Coast. That is where we stayed and where the guided tours start. You get a ride from there to the park included or you could drive on your own if you don't mind windy roads in the dark. We had only six people on our tour but sometimes there could be much more. The max is 11 people. If there is more than six people and you are in the second half you may not see anything. You can go on your own but shinning a light scares the kiwi away. The guide had a light with a red lens. If I were to do it again I would camp at the campground within walking distance of the park and get a red cover for my flashlight and go on my own without the group. On the group tours they have about a 50% success rate of finding kiwis but people at the back end of the group may not get a good look. I think on your own you would have a better chance of seeing one and it is free. Anyone can go into the park. The guided tours do not have priority. You can can a used military flashlight at an army surplus store that has a removable red lens.
On the trip to Tirititri Matangi, the boat cost $66. The tour was only $5. But time is limited. The boat arrives at 10:30 and you have to be back by 3:15. I would like to do it again and stay overnight. Sleeping quarters have to be arranged in advance. No short-notice bookings. I hope to have time near the end of my tour to go there again and stay overnight. It is excellent except for the time restaints if not staying overnight.

Kotitihaere. Thanks for the tip but I didn't get that far north. I am now at Miranda south of Auckland. I hope to have time after my tour of South Island to go up north again and do the sandboarding at 90 mile beach and if I havent see the Dotterel by then to try again. I went to see the Maori Culture Experience show at Waitangi. It was excellent.

I went to Miranda Shorebird Centre, south of Auckland, in search of the NZ Dotterel. I didn’t see the Dotterel but my visit netted two more new birds, the Sharp-tailed Sandpiper and the South Island Oystercatcher. I didn’t know that the South Island Oystercatcher could also be seen in the North Island.
The Sharp-tailed Sandpiper breeds in Siberia and migrates to New Zealand during the northern winter, like the Bar-tailed Godwits. The majority of birds were the Godwits, some 2000 of them but searching the crowd revealed a few other birds in their midst. I also saw several Wrybills.
The birds come and go with the tide so you need to go the bird blind just before high tide. The best times are from about 5 pm to 7 pm. I guess this will change with time but just ask at the Shorebird Centre for directions to the blind and the best time to go.
It is worthwhile stopping here but the birds were still quite a ways out, even at high tide. This also changes with time. Sometimes the tide comes right up to the shore near the bird hide but not this week. Does anyone know other good places to see shorebirds and especially the NZ Dotterel?

Maroon Jay said:

Does anyone know other good places to see shorebirds and especially the NZ Dotterel?

Click to expand...

http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/wading-birds/1/5

For NZ dotterel, if you can try at Mangere again, or at the Wenderholm Regional Park just north of Auckland - both places where I've found them readily.

27 Dec
I went to the Wharekawa Wildlife Reserve at Opoutere in the Coromandel Peninsula to look for the New Zealand Dotterel (called the New Zealand Plover on the IOU birdlist and the Red-breasted Dotterel in North America). The New Zealand Plover lives and nests on the beach. This makes them very susceptible to human disturbance. Their numbers have been decimated by introduced animals such as dogs, cats, rats, possums and weasels. There are less than 2000 of these little birds left and decreasing. They are endemic to New Zealand.
After getting settled in the campground we went down the beach to look for them. After a while we found a few of them and got a few photos but were soon driven away by a sudden rain storm. I planned to come back the next day in hopes of setting up my tripod and long lens and getting some better photos.

28 Dec
Rained all day. We spent most of the day reading in the camper van. By 4 p.m. I had given up hope of getting photos of the NZ Plover. Then about 6 p.m. there was a brief break in the cloud cover. I grabbed my equipment and headed for the beach. As it was late in the day and had been raining all day, there were not many people on the beach and therefore more plovers. I saw 24 adults and two chicks and got some good photos before it clouded over again.
The NZ Plover can fly but the chicks cannot and are easy prey. We saw only two chicks in the colony which is not a good sign for the next generation.

I have not been to every possible NZ Dotterel site of course, but I don’t think you can find a better place than this. The Dotterels are easy to find on the beach and fairly tame. You can get within three metres of them. There is a restricted area but the Dotterels come out of it and run around on the beach. Finding them and seeing them close-up is a sure thing here during breeding season.
If you come here you will probably want to stay overnight as it is a long way from any city. Campgrounds in NZ are called Holiday Parks and have cabins for rent as well as camping sites if you don't have camping equipment but you will probably have to book ahead to get one between Christmas and end of January.
From the campground, do not follow the signs to the Wharekawa Wildlife Refuge. You will be walking through a bunch of muck at low tide if you go this way and impassible at high tide. Instead, follow the signs for the beach, turn right, and walk along the beach for about 15 minutes until you see the roped-off restricted area. You might see Dotterels even before you reach the area. Look both in the restricted area and on the beach.

At Rotorua, on the shore of Lake Rotorua, there is a small island where you can see Red-billed Gulls, Little Pied Cormorant (aka Little Shag) and Little Black Cormorant (aka Little Black Shag). I know these are common birds but here you can see them close up and get good photos and observe them on their nest. The island is a breeding colony for these birds but it is just metres from shore and they are used to people. You can also observe interesting interaction among the birds. While I was there a Kelp Gull attacked the colony and tried to make off with a Red-billed Gull chick but the chick was half grown and too large for the Kelp Gull to fly away with. He made several attempts at it. The Little Pied Cormorant and the Little Black Cormorant were new ones for me. That brings my total to 599. Now I am looking for a nice bird for my 600th.
To get to this island, take the road behind the Bath House Museum.

At Wairoa on the east coast between Gisborne and Napier are two lagoons. They are described in the Lonely Planet Guide as a good place to see birds. The first is Whakaki Lagoon, about 10km north of Wairoa. Don't go there. The road is a sand trap. I got stuck in the sand and spend three hours in the hot sun digging out with sticks. If you have 4WD and manage to get past the sand, you will eventually come to a locked gate with a sign saying that this is private property. There is no access to the Lagoon.
The second lagoon, Whakamahi, is very close to the town and is accessable but I didn't see anything except common birds there.

What I have seen so far in the north half of the North Island. Where the bird has a different name in New Zealand than the international name I have put the NZ name in brackets. Endemics: Paradise Shelduck, Red-billed Gull, NZ Scaup, Variable Oystercatcher, Wrybill, Tui, NZ Fantail, NZ Robin, North Island Saddleback, NZ Bellbird, Whitehead, NZ Pigeon, Stitchbird, North Island Brown Kiwi, South Island Oystercatcher, NZ Plover (aka NZ Dotterel) Total 16. Natural birds that came here under their own power but are not endemic: Kelp Gull (aka Southern Black-backed Gull), Royal Spoonbill, White-faced Heron, Great Cormorant (aka Black Shag), Eurasian Coot (aka Australian Coot), Purple Swamphen (aka Pukeko), White-headed Stilt (aka Pied Stilt), Masked Lapwing (aka Spur-winged Plover), Bar-tailed Godwit, Austrailan Pied Cormorant, Australasian Gannet, Sacred Kingfisher (aka NZ Kingfisher) Welcome Swallow, Sharp-tailed Sandpiper, Little Pied Cormorant (aka Little Shag), White-fronted Tern, Little Black Cormorant (aka Little Black Shag), Swamp Harrier. Total 18. Introduced birds: Eastern Rosella (from Australia), Australasian Magpie (from Australia), Common Myna (from India), Song Thrush (from Europe), Black Swan (from Australia), Eurasian Skylark (Europe and Asia), California Quail (west coast North America, California to British Columbia), African Collared Dove (Africa), Common Chaffinch (Europe), Yellowhammer (Europe). Total 11. Introduced birds that I have seen before and not counted in my totals: Mallard, Rock Dove, Common Starling, Common Blackbird, House Sparrow, European Goldfinch, Canada Goose. A total of 45 new lifers. Not too good birding now in the centre of the North Island. I expect to pick up a lot more when I get to the Wellington area.

Today I went to Kapiti Island to look for birds. It has been sunny for the past four or five days but whenever I go search for birds it is dark and gloomy. It is getting depressing. When it is a dark overcast day it is much darker still in the forest.
The island has been a bird sanctuary since 1897 but it took about 100 years to get rid of all the introduced mammals on the island. It was first used as a base for whaling, then for cattle. The island is 8 km long by 2 km wide and 521 metres high. I hiked the very steep trail to the top.
The government first removed all the cows and other domestic animals. Then it worked on getting rid of the many wild goats. Some goats could not be captured and the last one was shot in 1928. Next they worked on getting rid of ferrel cats and the last of them were eliminated by 1935. Then the government attacked the multitude of rats and opossums. They began by an aerial bombardment of poison bait. This killed only 1,080 opossum so they tried setting traps. The traps netting 19,612 opossums on this little island, so you can imagine how many are in all of New Zealand. Hunting dogs were brought in to catch the remaining 32 opossums that had evaded the traps. Rats were eliminated by 1996.
Opossums were introduced into New Zealand in 1837 for food and pelts. There are now more than 40 million of them in the country and they are a major pest. They often carry a form of TB that can be easily spread to cattle. Millions of opossums eat 21,000 tons of vegetation every night. They also eat eggs and baby birds and are a major threat to the kiwi and other native birds. Wherever there are opossum, there is a noticeable decline in native birds. Since opossums and rats were eliminated on Kapiti Island, the birds had thrived.
The island is the major stronghold for the Little Spotted Kiwi. There are less than 2000 of these birds and about 1500 are on Kapiti Island. The Takahe is a very rare bird. It was thought to be extinct for many years but was later rediscovered. There are only about 250 Takahe and 16 of them on are Kapiti. I didn’t see either of these rare birds. The kiwi is nocturnal.
However I did see the Kaka and the Weka, two birds that I very much wanted to see. The Kaka is my first species of New Zealand parrot. It is a large, dark-green bird, with a huge beak that looks like it could take off a finger or open a can of beans. They are both very tame on Kapiti. In fact, they are more than tame; they are aggressive. The Kaka will land on your back and with its huge beak it can rip open your backpack and steal any food it finds within. When several people, including me, stopped for lunch, one man took his lunch bag out of his pack and set in on the ground for a moment while he did up the zipper. It was a moment too long. A Weka grabbed the bag and ran off into the bushes with it. I also saw the New Zealand Pipit.
The trail to the top of the island is steep and a lot of hard work and time-consuming. I found that there are many more birds on the bottom half of the island, than near the top. If I were to do the trip again, I would not bother going all the way to the top unless you are very keen on the view. I would take the Wilkinson trail as far as the feeding station, spend some time there and then come back down. Going to the top, besides being hard work, used up a lot of time. By the time I got back down I did not have much time to search for the Takahe as the boat goes back at 3 p.m.
There are also boat trips to the lagoon at the north end of the island. You cannot do both on the same day.

When humans came to New Zealand, they introduced several mammals that have been a disaster for New Zealand’s birds. These include rats, cats, dogs, opossum, weasels and others. Many NZ birds are extinct and many are very rare and live only on small off-shore islands. The birds had been alone and in peace in these islands for 80 million years. There were no mammals except for bats. With little to fear, some of the birds became flightless and others had no instinct to fight off attacks or flee. Even birds that can fly became extinct or rare because rats and other mammals eat their eggs and chicks. It is a sad story but now New Zealand is trying very had to preserve and increase its native birds.
When you think of an island, you no doubt think of land with water around it. There are other definitions of islands. In Alberta, Canada there is a provincial park called Cypress Hills. It is an island of forest surround by a sea of prairie and wheat fields. There are birds and mammals in Cypress Hills that can also be found in the Rocky Mountains but not in the prairie between. New Zealand has invented a new kind of island. They call it a mainland island.
A mainland island is a fenced, predator-proof area for the safety of the birds and other native NZ wildlife and plants. Zealandia is one such mainland island. A whole valley is surrounded by a fence. The fence is 2.2 metres high so that animals cannot jump over it. It has a large, inverted cap on the top like a upside-down rain gutter to that climbing animals cannot get over the top. It extends below ground and then curves outward for a further 400 mm to prevent any animals from burrowing under it. It is covered with a fine mesh to prevent small animals like mice from getting through it. It made me think of something from a horror movie where isolated remnants of civilisation are enclosed in a fenced area and hostile aliens abound on the other side of the fence such as the fence in the movies Avator and Jurrasic Park. Well, this area is for birds and not people but that is exactly what it is. An island of safety surround by hostile, killer animals. It is 8.6 km long. The fence took three years to develop and test and cost 2.3 million dollars.
The goal of Zealandia is to restore this valley to the condition that it was in before the arrival of humans The fence was completed in 1999. Starting from this date, they estimate that it will take 500 years to return the valley to its pre-human condition. To grow giant trees and increase bird populations takes much longer than to destroy them.
The first year after the fence was built was spent getting rid of the introduced pests. Opossum, in addition to being a danger to the birds, consume a huge amount of vegetation. In this valley alone they were eating 400 tonnes of vegetation per year. Poison bait was put out to kill the Opossum. To give you some idea of the number of Opossum in New Zealand, they removed three tonnes of Opossum from this single valley. Every single mammal was removed including hedgehogs, rabbits, mice and many others for a total of 13 species. There are no mammals in the valley now but poison bait stations are maintained in the event that some gain entrance. In 2000, they began to release native birds in the sanctuary.
The Takahe is one of the world’s rarest birds. It was thought to be extinct from 1898 to 1948, when a small group of them were discovered in the mountains of the South Island. To save them, they were moved to predator-free islands. Their population was down to 118 birds. There are now about 250 of them. Some are at Tiritiri Matangi Island near Auckland. I went there but didn’t see any. There are 16 of them on Kapiti Island but I didn’t see any there either. At Zealandia I saw two. These two birds represent almost one percent of the total population. They look like a fat, bluish-purple chicken with a huge red beak. Something like the Pukeko that I had seen previously but much larger and flightless. It was really great to see them. All Takahe are mounted with an antenna to monitor them so that they will never disappear without knowing the cause.
I also saw the Brown Teal whose population numbers less than 2,000 and the Red-crowned Parakeet that has a population of less than 25,000. Three rare birds in one day.
The Little Spotted Kiwi is also here but as kiwis are nocturnal I didn’t see any.
The valley is home not only to birds but rare NZ geckos and frogs and other animals. The Tuatara is a lizard-like animal native to NZ. Tuatara eggs were found at the sanctuary. The first time they have been found in the wild in more than 200 years. To prevent them from becoming extinct they have been breeding them in captivity. Zealandia is even caring for native NZ insects such as the Weka which is a large cricket.
They still have a lot of work to do. Future tasks include getting rid of the introduced fish that are killing everything in the lake and causing algae blooms and restoring native NZ fish.
Admittance to Zealandia is $18.50 during the day, but a whopping $76.50 at night plus $15.50 for a ride to and from the city to see the nocturnal birds. Rides are free during the day or you can take a bus.
The birds are thriving here but it will take hundreds of years to increase their population back to what it was before the arrival of humans. It will be like stepping back in time to a forest full of birds. By contrast, the Botanical Gardens is just a 30 minute walk from Zealandia. We spent one afternoon there and saw only a single native NZ bird along with lots of English House Sparrows, Starlings, Mallard Ducks, feral pigeons and other introduced birds. If you come to New Zealand, Zealandia is not to be missed.