To celebrate Christmas, every day for 12 days the Advocate is sharing with readers a Northland charity or organisation that supports those in the community. In turn, you can learn how best to help them this festive season. Today we speak to Kiwi Coast.
Kiwi Coast is celebrating after its trailblazing initiative to establish a corridor for kiwi to safely move along Whangārei’s east coast hit a major milestone.
Three kiwi in Whangārei Heads have each moved more than 10km over a short period, proving that the organisation’s Kiwi Link project is making a difference.
Kiwi Coast co-ordinator Ngaire Sullivan said the initiative is the first of its kind nationwide and is currently focused on Whangārei Heads and the Tūtūkākā Coast but with hopes to keep expanding.
Kiwi Link encourages and co-ordinates pest control carried out by 12 community groups that covers 15,000ha between Parua Bay and Ngunguru Ford Rd. This way wild kiwi have a safe path to roam between populations which hopefully encourages breeding.
And it appears to be working, Sullivan said.
One of the kiwi, Fetu Mama, was tracked moving from a block on Owhiwa Rd in Parua Bay where she was released to the Maungatika Scenic Reserve at the top of Mount Tiger.
The strong call of male kiwi picked up by automatic acoustic recorders in the area suggested Fetu Mama’s hike was made in hopes of finding a mate.
But she is not the only kiwi traversing the wild via the Kiwi Link corridor.
Backyard Kiwi project manager Todd Hamilton made the discovery while in Mount Tiger listening for Fetu Mama. He heard the transmitter signal of a 3-year-old Northland brown kiwi, Te Motu Manu Hine — nicknamed Hine.
Hine was released seven months ago in Parua Bay but had made her way to a Northland Regional Council pine forest block on Mount Tiger, not far from Fetu Mama.
Fish the kiwi survived being hit by a car in 2022.
Like the others, he had been released in Parua Bay but his signal showed he had decided to take a different direction as he was near Pataua North on the Horahora Estuary.
“If these three are doing it, then other kiwi are too,” Sullivan said.
She described Kiwi Link as, in some ways, “a genetic rescue mission”.
“If we don’t connect these kiwi strongholds of Northland the kiwi will get genetically bottle-necked,” Sullivan said.
“We’ve got to get them walking back and forth, breeding between the populations.”
“It should help kiwi thrive into the future instead of becoming genetically bottle-necked at isolated sites,” she said.
Roughly 10,000 North Island brown kiwi are estimated to be scattered around Northland. The Department of Conservation says that overall there are about 70,000 kiwi left but the country loses around around 20 kiwi per week every year.
Kiwi Coast is working hard to stem those statistics. In the 10 years the organisation has existed, it has helped kiwi populations in the area stabilise or increase at most managed sites.
Pest control has played a key role as the 225 groups involved - up from the 32 in Kiwi Coast’s first year - have helped trap 708,536 pests, such as rats and possums.
A summary of Kiwi Coast's success in the past 10 years in Northland. Photo / Kiwi Coast
Sullivan said Kiwi Coast got under way at the request of the community-led projects because kiwi conservation was thriving in Northland.
“It needed to be sustained and we wanted to start to try and link the projects together.”
Kiwi Coast was blown away by the climbing community involvement.
“We never thought it would reach people in this way,” Sullivan said.
However, people outside of the community-led projects can still play a part in the region’s successful kiwi conservation.
Sullivan is encouraging people to make it a “kiwi Christmas”.
“What that means is keeping an eye out for kiwi crossing the roads at unexpected times or places, walk your dog on a lead and keep them on your property.”
Also, tell visitors with dogs who might not know that Northland has kiwi almost everywhere, Sullivan said.
“Get involved in your local community project – they always need a hand, they always need extra people.”
