Your chance to get closer to Kākāpō: Sirocco with ranger Jake Osborne. Photo / Supplied
Your chance to get closer to Kākāpō: Sirocco with ranger Jake Osborne. Photo / Supplied
The nocturnal green parrot has been named as New Zealand's 2020 bird of the year. Kākāpō is the only bird to have been elected twice as the nation's best loved bird.
So how did a bird with as little as 200 living examples win over the hearts of New Zealanders?
The appeal of the kākāpō is part "charisma" and part "intense survival story", says Bronwyn Jeynes an advocacy ranger for DOC's Kākāpō Recovery Team.
In the 1860s Fiordland surveyor Charlie Douglas described the birds as being so populous "you could shake a tree and the kākāpō would fall down like apples". However the birds have plummeted from abundance to a known population of fewer than 50, in around 1990.
Slow, ground nesting and not-entirely graceful; the things that made kākāpō so unique have also been their undoing with the arrival of invasive predators.
A fungal epidemic of aspergillosis threatened the rare birds: Kākāpō. Photo / File
While there is no extra funding or resources attached to the annual bird of the year award it does help put the species in the minds of the population.
However in spite of the affection felt for kākāpō, there are surprisingly few places where you can see them. Having been saved from the brink of extinction they are still alarmingly scarce.
High profile conservation mascots such as Sirocco helped capture the imagination of the public. Sirocco the 'advocacy parrot' is a regular tweeter and has quarter of a million facebook fans.
He rocketed to fame after a number of high-profile TV appearances, including getting to know actor Stephen Fry. The encounter which left a mark on the comedian and his camera crew can be seen in the BBC video: "shagged by a rare parrot".
Today the parrots only exist on a handful of sanctuary islands, under close supervision. These are mostly near Stewart Island, Fiordland and Little Barrier Island in the Hauraki Gulf.
"Sirocco's public tours are some of the few occasions for the public to actually meet Kakapo," says Jeynes. "We had been planning a trip for him this year, but Covid changed our plans."
However once every few years there are opportunities for the public to see the birds in their natural habitat. This coincides with the breeding season.
Each breeding season DOC takes teams of around 200 civilian volunteers to help with the massive breeding programmes on the predator-free sanctuaries.
"The number of volunteers we take depends on the size of the breeding season," says Jeynes.
The hours are long and the work is heavy, but you might just be rewarded with meeting a kākāpō in person. There tend to be two roles on offer to volunteers, either feeding kakapo or feeding volunteers.
"We have a lot of people managing the nests and working with the breeding programmes doing work at all hours, because Kakapo are nocturnal, so we have to have volunteer cook to make sure everyone has a full stomach."
Don't expect to be volunteering any time soon, though. Kākāpō are notoriously slow breeders – having a clutch of eggs every 2 to 4 years. This coincides with the fruiting of the rimu trees.
A hand-reared kakapo chick Heather One at Auckland Zoo. Photo / Brett Phibbs
"It's a little ironic that they won it in a year when they haven't bred," says Andrew Digby DOC scientific advisor to the programme. Last year the birds celebrated one of the biggest and most successful breeding years to date, in spite of a fungal disease that threatened the programme.
"Giving the public opportunities to see kākāpō is one of our challenges: we need people to see them so they know and care about them, but it's hard when there are so few and they're on offshore islands," says Digby.
The public residencies of Sirocco in places like Dunedin's Orokonui Ecosanctuary or displays of hand-reared chicks during breeding seasons.
"Each time these events happen a few thousand people get to see kākāpō." For more information and future opportunities visit doc.govt.nz/sirocco
