The Department of Conservation has confirmed it will lay charges over a brutal attack on a baby seal in a west Auckland stream. Two men were allegedly seen bashing the mammal with a boat oar last night.

Department of Conservation officers say they are "saddened" by what appears to be a brutal attack on a baby seal.

If you've run out of ideas to keep yourself busy these holidays Julie Harries has a novel idea guaranteed to get the suggestions flowing.

In principle the Conservation Department wants as many of the public as possible to enjoy the estate their taxation maintains. In practice, it is not very good at making that possible.

DOC staff have killed 10 pilot whales which survived the stranding of a pod of 24 in Parengarenga harbour in the Far North.

Handing Department of Conservation campgrounds to private companies to run will turn them into "canvas subdivisions", says Labour's tourism spokesman Kelvin Davis.

DoC is in talks about handing over camping grounds to private companies to run them at a profit.

Auckland is home to more than 50 volcanic cones and craters. Diana Clement explores just a few.

A row over developing Coromandel's Kennedy Bay could be solved by the sort of compromise proposed for nearby New Chums, one of the parties says.

Four whales stranded at Port Waikato yesterday are to be buried in sand dunes just metres from where they lay.

Police Commissioner Howard Broad has announced police are all but giving up hope of recovering the remains of the 29 Pike River miners.

Four adult whales have died after beaching themselves at Port Waikato but Conservation Department staff have successfully refloated a fifth.

Greedy campers are rorting the Department of Conservation online booking system to give themselves more room.

With a tent and an airbed packed into his Mercedes-Benz, Jurgen Karl Ahrens made the New Zealand outdoors his home.

Who are we really fighting for access to our beaches? Herald journalist Yvonne Tahana and photographer Richard Robinson took to the road to find out...

Police and DOC investigations are continuing into the massacre of fur seals at Ohau Point, a popular seal viewing point 22km north of Kaikoura.

More signs will be installed at Rotorua's Kuirau Park as a safety measure following the death of a 10-year-old boy last week.

Fisheries officials are investigating the death of hundreds of snapper washed up on Coromandel beaches.

A whale that washed up last week around 40km north of Muriwai beach on Auckland's west coast will be left to rot, the Department of Conservation says.

White string across the Coromandel's iconic Cathedral Cove rock archway has failed to stop visitors from posing for photos.

When Mandy Hague went to White Island to count seals, she had no idea she would get a photo of a mako shark leaping from the water.