Rowi Project Blog

Over the last few days I’ve been training Rein – a very special and enthusiastic new member of the rowi team who is going to prove invaluable in finding rowi without the use of transmitters. Starting young - Rein is only eight weeks old – she will focus on familiarising herself with new people and environments as well as mastering basic obedience training.

Yes that’s right we’re talking about a dog, a Hungarian Vizsla in fact.

Vizslas are actually bred as an all-round hunting dog so are genetically predisposed to hunt for birds. Ironically these animals (as with all dogs) can be both a prolific killer of kiwi and, with the right training and in the correct hands, they can also become very valuable conservation tools.

The path to becoming a detection dog for the Department of Conservation requires considerable training, so I will be kept very busy over the next couple of years. However, with any luck we will be exploring the Okarito Kiwi Zone together and begin species training before the end of the year.

Rein - on her way to becoming an invaluable member of the rowi team

Rowi, along with all other species of kiwi, have a very limited genetic diversity. Because the population of rowi is so small and the monitored breeding population is only half that again, the chicks being protected using BNZ Operation Nest Egg are coming from the same sets of genes, year after year.

A trained kiwi dog will be a huge asset to the team in allowing us to find previously unmonitored kiwi in Okarito. This will assist in increasing the current rowi gene pool and also help us to protect the offspring of new birds using BNZ Operation Nest Egg.

Having spent so much time in kiwi conservation I would still like to urge people to take extreme care with their pets. One uncontrolled dog can destroy whole populations of kiwi in a frighteningly short time-span. See dog and cat owners to find out how you can prevent your pet from killing our icon.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 22nd, 2010 at 1:08 pm by Iain – BNZ Operation Nest Egg Ranger (Rowi) and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.