Tahi the kiwi chick, just released on Waikato's Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari, represents a step-change in kiwi conservation. Photo / Maddox Photography
Tahi the kiwi chick, just released on Waikato's Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari, represents a step-change in kiwi conservation. Photo / Maddox Photography
Eighteen years ago, kiwi were extinct on Maungatautari in the Waikato.
Deforestation and predators like stoats had decimated the original kiwi population. At night, the ngahere (forest) was silent.
But 18 years ago, four kiwi were gifted to Maungatautari. These birds were given the responsibility to recreate a population of kiwi in a place where they hadn’t been seen or heard for more than 100 years.
Those four kiwi have been joined by 400 more over the past 18 years. Today, that founder population is thriving so well within Maungatautari’s safe and lush environment that an estimated 2000-2500 kiwi now call the maunga (mountain) home.
Now, some of those progeny kiwi are ready to spread their wings and take up their own mantle to create new populations of kiwi.
It’s time for kiwi to leave the maunga and be relocated to other suitable areas. From early 2024, we expect 300 kiwi will be translocated from Maungatautari to other safe places in the wild. But the planning starts now.
It has always been Save the Kiwi’s vision to take kiwi from endangered to everywhere they once thrived.
Members of Ngati Koroki Kahukura, along with Department of Conservation and Save the Kiwi staff, farewelled the kiwi before they left Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari.
With the help of many, Save the Kiwi has generated a self-sustaining population of kiwi at Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari that will now provide hundreds of kiwi to other locations every year.
Moving kiwi from Maungatautari to other places is an expensive, laborious, and often dirty process.
Firstly, money goes towards specially trained kiwi dogs and their handlers go into the sanctuary to search for kiwi. Then each kiwi that’s found is given an extensive health check by a team of accredited kiwi handlers with veterinary support.
Suitable birds are fitted with transmitters and then re-released into a large, fenced-off portion of the sanctuary where they will continue to roam until Moving Day.
On Moving Day, kiwi rangers use aerials to locate each kiwi with a transmitter. The birds are given another health check, then they’re gently placed into purpose-built wooden transportation boxes and loaded into vehicles to start the journey to their new home. The vehicles they’re in and how long they’ll be in them depends on the destination.
In April, kiwi being transported to Tongariro enjoyed a two-hour drive. In May, birds heading to Wellington went on a six-hour drive.
The kiwi were placed in boxes, lined with ferns for comfort, to be transported to Tongariro National Park. Most boxes were brown, with these green ones showing that the birds were a pair to be relocated together.
Save the Kiwi caught 9 kiwi from Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari to relocate in Tongariro National Park. Maungatautari's iwi, Ngati Koroki Kahukura, received four kiwi chicks from Ngati Hikairo ki Tongariro 18 years ago to restart the population on the maunga. The population on the mountain has risen to more than 2,000 kiwi in that time, so the koha was returned with 18 birds released into the wild at National Park.
Save the Kiwi needs to raise $15,000 to put towards the health checks for those 300 kiwi before they leave the maunga and give it certainty it has the funds required to make this happen.
“Thanks to generous New Zealanders, we have just reached $10,000. Reaching our goal of $15,000 will give us the certainty of resources as we plan for the coming season,” said Save the Kiwi executive director Michelle Impey in a statement.
Save the Kiwi is proud to work alongside gifting and receiving iwi, Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari, Maungatautari Ecological Island Trust, kiwi conservation projects, sponsors, supporters, donors, and volunteers to turn this vision into a reality.
