Five fires could potentially have killed at least two rowi pairs within Okarito Kiwi Zone and may have done a great deal more damage had the local community, Franz Fire brigade, helicopter crew and DOC fire-fighters, not responded so quickly.

The first four fires were spotted from a helicopter about 3 am yesterday, with the largest spreading over an area of about 500 sqm. Another suspicious fire was discovered overnight by the side of State Highway 6.

Franz staff went out to check on the status of these birds this morning and we all had an extremely anxious wait to see what they found. Rowi are priceless and any loss of genes from the small pool of birds would seriously set back our quest to save the species.

At around 2 pm we were incredibly relieved to hear that all the birds with territories threatened by the fire, were safe!

Contact the local police to report any suspicious behaviour in the Okarito area.

Thanks to everyone who helped us save these vulnerable birds.

CN pair, otherwise known as Whetu and Marama, have produced an egg that has kept us returning to their burrow we’ve tried to rescue—first as an egg and then as a chick—five times.

The first attempt was made by Hayley, Mike and Duncan whose radio receiver passed out within metres of the burrow!  How frustrating, they knew they were close but were surround by a hundreds of possible rowi homes.

A few days later, Hayely, Mike and myself had a second go at trying to rescue the egg.  Their home is about a 1 km walk in a reasonably flat (albeit muddy) area just off Mapourika Lake.  When we got to the burrow there was an entire possum skeleton out front. It looked like Whetu and Marama had dealt to this sorry possum and had carefully left its remains as a reminder to any other rodent who should think about trying to take them on—that’s what we like to see! Unfortunately we couldn’t reach the egg on this occasion without disturbing the adult birds, so we decided to leave the egg to hatch.

At the entrance of the kiwi burrow

In this situation we wait until the adult transmitters tell us that the egg has hatched and that the chick is at least four days old before we go to catch it. This involves arriving at dusk and sitting sooooo quietly that you can hear every stick and leaf move at the entrance of the burrow.  Hayley, Mike and Duncan went in on a Sunday night to catch the chick. Armed with catch nets, mosquito nets and insect repellent they waited, until suddenly the chick zoomed out of the burrow without any inhibition so fast that all three rangers missed it!

Lucy with the fashionable mosquito netting head gear

Next Anna and I went in to collect this confident chick—although this time it was not so confident.  We had not long positioned ourselves in front of the burrow entrance listening to the irritating high-pitched hum of the 50 or so mosquitoes, who were hovering off the surface of my face, when we started to hear intermittent morepork calls, then a few scuffles from the burrow, a couple of stomps and squeaks.  An adult carefully moved into the entrance and sniffed the air. It took a couple of steps right and sniffed, then another couple of steps left towards Anna and sniffed around her hands.  This was enough, obviously Anna was too smelly! The adult turned and, baring its fluffy behind, disappeared down the burrow.  We heard a bit of a conversation between the adult and the chick—which I can only imagine went a little bit like, “you’re not going out tonight son, there’s something very stinky out there”—and that was the most kiwi we saw all night. We waited and waited and could hear the adult and chick come to the bottom of the entrance, sniff the air and disappear again, all night they did this and all night we waited. At 4.30 am we retired, chick bucket empty.

Third time lucky, Anna and Ieuan went out on a rainy night and nabbed it. Fantastic!

We were all amazed that a chick that old was still alive and were anxious that any night could be its last. The lucky chick is now at Willowbank Wildlife Reserve for a few weeks to make sure it’s healthy before being transferred to predator-free Motuara Island where it will stay until it’s big enough to return to Okarito to beat up more possums—just like its parents!!

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.

Anna holds one of last year's juveniles ready to return to Okarito Kiwi Zone.

While on the island, we also screened the remaining juveniles from last year’s breeding season, for diseases in preparation for their return home to Okarito Kiwi Zone. This involves taking a blood sample and a faecal sample and sending these off to the lab to be analysed. When the results come back we look for any abnormalities that could indicate disease, parasites, or infections. Anything that shows up must be treated before returning to Okarito as it would be devastating to introduce something into the ‘whanau’ population that could threaten the species.

A couple of highlights from the trip:

During the trip we were treated to some beautiful Marlborough weather and our nights were spent sleeping outside under the stars after winding down with some music from Ieuan and his guitar.

After a bit of foraging, Mike provided an entrée of paua, kina and mussels which didn’t last long when put in front of four hungry DOC workers.

Anna and Ieuan carry out disease screening.

Early in the new year, Sky Ranger flew over the sanctuary and detected 10 pairs that had recently started incubating new eggs. Just as we were beginning to think that the season was winding down, this came as a nice surprise. The next few days will be spent catching up with these birds and trying to rescue their eggs. With any luck, we will be sending a few over to Christchurch at the end of the week.

We would like to wish everyone a happy new year and hope that this year continues to be a good one for rowi!

Some rowi highlights from 2009:

Hira (meaning 'of importance'), the 100th BNZ Operation Nest Egg rowi chick, is born at Willowbank Wildlife Reserve.

Rowi chicks discovered nesting together on Motuara Island.

Makaawhio kaumatua, Archdeacon Richard Wallace, blessing the chicks on their return to Okarito.

Associate Minister of Conservation, Hon. Kate Wilkinson, helps the team release rowi back into Okarito Kiwi Zone after a bumper breeding season.

Students join the rowi team as part of the Untouched World Programme.

To get to Norman and his partner, we had to access the sanctuary from beautiful Mapourika Lake by boat (not a bad start to the day). The lake was so swollen from all the rain that the wharf was completely under water.

Beautiful Mapourika Lake. Photo: Lizzy Sutcliffe

We caught a ride with Iain and Kirsty across the lake (Kirsty is working for DOC’s Research and Development Team studying the kea living in Okarito forest) they where heading in the kiwi zone as well to put new transmitters on some juvenile kea.  As well as rowi, kea are just one of the many incredible species, including kotuku/white herons and royal spoonbills, that make Okarito such a special place.

The kea nest is in the base of a huge tree and Hayley and I stuck around to help – we had never seen juvenile kea.

Haley checking one of the juvenile kea

It was really cool to see the how the tricky bits of working with kea are overcome compared to kiwi, (kea are much more difficult birds to track because they fly!). They needed to use a huge staff, nearly three metres long, to reach the juveniles in the deep burrow. We were expecting to find two kea chicks but to our surprise there were three.

So much is different about working with kea compared to kiwi, for starters kea wear their transmitters on their backs like wee backpacks, unlike the kiwi who have their transmitters on their legs. And having wings which flap and flutter in your face while you’re trying to attach their transmitters makes it extremely difficult. You can also get a more definite indication of the sex of a kea by measuring the crown, not like the kiwi as we have difficulty determining sex even after measuring the bill.

By the time we were halfway through putting on the first juvenile’s transmitter the curtains were just about closed on our weather window and then it started raining….so unfortunately we couldn’t get Norman’s transmitter changed. It is too much of a health risk to work with kiwi in the rain; if Norman’s feathers got wet they would stay wet and expose the bird to the cold.

Instead we set off to get some kea signals. We both felt privileged to see the juvenile keas and their beautiful feathers and happy to help another team in Okarito Kiwi Zone.

Me with one of the fantastic kea chicks.

Godzilla is a suitable name for this bird as she is notoriously stroppy and in the past we have not risked removing her eggs in case she ended up damaging the shell from stomping in protest. However, it was decided that we should attempt an egg lift on the pair’s second egg of the season to ensure stoats didn’t get to it first!

It was a great day out in the bush for me, the first sunny day in Franz Josef for around two weeks and my first time out into the field since the Untouched World Programme. It was good to get back into it (although the hills were a bit steeper than last time I walked that line!).

It is lovely in the Okarito Kiwi Zone at the moment as the manuka is flowering and the rata, which is a nice addition to the leafy brown and green colours of the canopy.

Hayley tracking the rowi

Hayley located the ‘N pair’ with a TR4 tracking device. She found a close signal off to the left of the track – low and behold we were practically at Godzilla and Houdini’s front door!

The burrow was at the base of a huge tree and veered to the left so we couldn’t see the birds or an egg. We reached in and couldn’t feel anything except mighty, Godzilla-style stomping…

In order to protect the precious egg and avoid stressing the birds, we decided to leave this pair to do their thing and not hang about.

Fearsome Godzilla may have won this battle but we will be visiting her and Houdini once again for a chick catch in a month or so.

Another great day in the bush!

I think it has been invaluable for the students to step outside the classroom environment and experience conservation management first-hand. The beauty of this area had a real impact on the students and helped them to see how we are all connected to our environment – something that is not always easy to remember in more urban areas. Okarito was definitely a great place for the students to be based, as it is such a good example of a community that cares about their environment and are very conscious of the impact their lifestyles have on their surroundings. Everyone was touched by the welcoming nature of the locals who kindly put on a BBQ for us all on the final day.

One such local was Ian Cooper who runs a business from Okarito doing kiwi tours. Ian spoke to the students about his business, showing them how a living can be made locally and in a sustainable way. Executive Director of BNZ Save the Kiwi Trust, Michelle Impey, also spoke to the students about the positive impact you can make in any work situation – how you can work for large companies and still promote conservation and sustainability.  This message was really important, as it showed the students that sustainability is about everything we do and should be integral to every job we do.

Photo by: Michelle Impey

Photo by: Petr Hlavacek

Another highlight of the week for me was taking a group of students to do an egg rescue on a bird called CeeCee, We were stoked to be able to show the students a kiwi egg!  The students had heaps of questions about what we had just done and that was great, I loved to see them so excited about something that I get so excited about.

Then we showed the students how we process the egg, weighing it, washing it, and candling it to determine its age. It is quite amazing to candle an egg and see the embryo and the beautiful vein network.

It’s been an amazing week for all who were involved and I hope to be involved in the future.  I would love to see how this has impacted the students in the long-term and how they manage to take their impressions and experiences back to their communities in a constructive way. Watch this space…

Candling a rowi egg. Photo Petr Hlavacek

On Thursday the kids  presented (in groups) to members of the community about the significance of their week.   I was heartened to hear the messages that came through.   This is our next generation that will take up the reins on kiwi work and part of our role as a Trust is ensuring that we educate every New Zealander how they can help.

Presentation on the last day.

After a cup of tea and some biscuits we got to have a bit of a chat with some really cool kids and I am excited about the opportunity to show them what the Rowi Project and BNZ Operation Nest Egg is all about, and to have some good discussions about sustainability and conservation.

The kids are lucky enough to be camping on the Okartio camping ground which is beachfront.  Nice!

From what I could see, the kids were having a lot of fun already. Hopefully the weather holds out as we have a jam-packed week of rowi health-checks, rodent lines, little blue penguins, white herons and rowi egg lifts.  Not to mention, some interesting guest speakers and presentations from the students on the last day.

The progamme is a partnership between Untouched World Charitable Trust, Ngai Tahu, BNZ Save the Kiwi Trust and the Department of Conservation. 

We’ll keep you posted!