Malcolm Rutherford captured this image of these kōtuku ngutupapa (spoonbills) in Tairāwhiti while observing birds for The New Zealand Bird Atlas project. Photo / Malcolm Rutherford
Malcolm Rutherford captured this image of these kōtuku ngutupapa (spoonbills) in Tairāwhiti while observing birds for The New Zealand Bird Atlas project. Photo / Malcolm Rutherford
Volunteers in Tairāwhiti have made a significant contribution to The New Zealand Bird Atlas project, one of the largest community science projects in Aotearoa New Zealand, which was completed at the end of May.
The project took place over five years from 2019 to 2024, co-ordinated by Wildlife Management International on behalf of Birds New Zealand.
More than 441,000 checklists and 145,000 hours’ worth of effort have gone into the project from volunteer birders across the country, to help gather as many observations as possible and upload them via the community science platform eBird.
The pīpīwharauroa or shining cuckoo.
In Tairāwhiti, 78 people spent 1083 hours observing birds around the region. Most of the local bird data were contributed by Geoff Foreman, The New Zealand Bird Atlas regional representative for the Gisborne/Wairoa area, Raewynn Foreman and Malcolm Rutherford, who is the project’s co-ordinator.
There were 103 species observed and 3532 checklists completed.
Magpies were found in the most areas across the region, with the native riroriro/grey warbler following close behind.
Preliminary results from The New Zealand Bird Atlas show that since the last project 20 years ago, species such as the royal spoonbill, weka, eastern rosella and spotted dove have increased in Tairāwhiti. Other species, such as the Australian brown quail, have reduced significantly in the past 20 years.
“Seeing these changes shows the value of these long-term data sets,” Rutherford said.
Three three things stood out as highlights for him.
“One highlight would be the rare species I hadn’t seen before, including a gull-billed tern at Te Wherowhero Lagoon, which had never been recorded in the region.
“Also, the cryptic species such as matuku [bittern], matata [fernbird] and pūweto [spotless crake], which was recorded in a wetland within the city limits.
“And the third highlight was spending Waitangi weekend 2022 based out of Tikapa marae with 17 others, walking as many roads, beaches and rivers between Tokomaru Bay and Potaka as we could, recording all the birds we could see.”
A weka. Photo / Malcolm Rutherford
This data becomes the best information on the distribution of birds across the country until the next edition of The New Zealand Bird Atlas starts in another 15 years.
The atlas project also motivated Rutherford to start the Tairāwhiti Birds Facebook page, which has been a useful place for people to learn and share interesting sightings.
The New Zealand Bird Atlas co-ordination team lead Dan Burgin said: “The key aim for every participant was to try and detect/observe all the possible species within grid squares that covered the entire country. Over 3,232 grid squares, each 10 x 10km, were established to help guide surveyors’ efforts.”
A group of Gisborne birdwatchers at the Tikapa Marae north of Ruatōria, where they were based over Waitangi Weekend 2022 while observing birds as part of The New Zealand Bird Atlas project.
The project has finished with over 97.3 per cent of those (3,145) having received bird observational data.
The community’s efforts have been bolstered by data also being uploaded by the Department of Conservation, several regional councils, Environment Canterbury, Environment Southland and many more organisations. Additionally, Toi Toi Wines provided funding for six expeditions to target under-surveyed areas and increase coverage.
A tauhou or silver eye. Photo / Malcolm Rutherford
The project envisaged collecting up-to-date information on bird species in Aotearoa to help inform conservation decision-making in the future, and ultimately trying to prevent more species from coming as close to extinction as species like kākāpō, Burgin said.
“That aim was met with the amount of coverage and the numbers of checklists submitted.”
Burgin noted that an important output from this new project will be the ability to compare bird distribution between the past two project data sets, enabling them to describe nationwide changes in bird distribution over a large timescale.
A pīwakawaka or New Zealand fantail. Photo / Malcolm Rutherford
