Over the next eight weeks, 300 Kiwi are moving out of Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari, located between Te Awamutu and Putāruru, to boost existing populations in three areas across the North Island. Before their departure, the birds undergo health checks.
Video / Danielle Zollickhofer
The conservation effort was a joint project between Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari, Ngāti Korokī Kahukura, and conservation trust Save the Kiwi, as part of the trust’s kōhanga kiwi strategy which aims to boost the population by 2% annually.
Save the Kiwi operations manager Tineke Joustra said she was very pleased with this year’s translocation, saying “it has been a phenomenal year”.
“We had quite a lot of firsts. For example, it was the first time that kiwi were transported by plane, it was the first time that we were able to gift kiwi back to Taranaki, and for the first time, Ngāti Koroki Kahukura hosted a training event for mana whenua.
Before the Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari kiwi in the boxes were loaded into vans to go to the airport, the group gathered at the edge of the forest to send the birds off with a karakia. Photo / Danielle Zollickhofer
“And we doubled the number of kiwi translocated - it was the first time ever that we had this many translocations in New Zealand in one season - which is great news for the recovery of kiwi.”
Another first was the kiwi processing headquarters that was set up in an unused classroom at Pukeatua School.
Joustra said the school “slotted” the translocation into the curriculum to help grow the next generation of “kaitiaki for kiwi”.
In Save the Kiwi’s end of season report, Pukeatua School principal Dene Franklin said it had been an incredible experience for him, the staff and students.
“It’s so special having kiwi come off Maungatautari and having the kids being able to see something that hundreds and thousands of New Zealanders have not seen so close before.
“We have had some of our super reluctant junior writers writing whole pages and filling up their whole planning sheets with the information and knowledge of kiwi learnt from the experiences Save the Kiwi provided.”
Joustra said her highlight had been coming to Ngāti Korokī Kahukura’s “training wānanga”.
At the wānanga, all iwi involved discussed tikanga and appropriate ways of transferring kiwi between spaces, how to work more efficiently alongside each other, and how to sustain this kaupapa long into the future.
A team of volunteers from gifting and receiving sites were also involved in the hands-on kiwi transfer where they worked alongside the kiwi handling teams and learned how to handle a kiwi and participated in health checks.
Kiwi handlers Helen McCormick and Kelsi Thompson, of the Gallagher Kiwi Burrow in Taupō, perform a quick health check before a bird goes into a travel box for its journey to Wellington. Photo / Danielle Zollickhofer
“Just seeing people’s faces, listening to their stories and seeing the eagerness of people to grow. We had so many reach out already, asking ‘how can we come and help again’.”
Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari general manager Helen Hughes said she couldn’t be happier about how the translocation went this year and she was “incredibly proud” of the team.
“My highlight was seeing the joy on people’s faces, seeing what joy being close to our national bird brings people.”
Hughes said the translocation had also resulted in a number of insights.
“For me, the biggest [lesson] was that the recipient sites get an awful lot of public goodwill. We, Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari, need to get better at telling our story.
“We are a kiwi stronghold and we need to be more visible.”
Joustra said there were already big plans for next year’ translocation.
“We are hoping to add another release site that I can’t talk about yet, but it will be really exciting to get that across the line.”
Joustra said the site wouldn’t be in the Waikato, however, there was work under way at several locations in the region to prepare them to receive kiwi in the next few years.
“We are hoping to line up a kiwi corridor in the Waikato.
“We are supporting kohanga sites ... in Pureora, Pirongia and Waitomo. Pureora is very important to iwi Ngāti Korokī Kahukura, so being able to gift kiwi back [to that site] is a high priority.”
Wellington Aeroclub helped get the birds from Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari to Capital Kiwi. Pictured is pilot Charles Davis loading his feathered passengers on board. Photo / Danielle Zollickhofer
She said the Save the Kiwi team would “not rest ‘til they’re a pest”.
“It’s a bit of an in-joke, but it’s also a goal we are working towards. We’d like to see [kiwi] everywhere again.”
Joustra said the team had originally planned to translocated 300 kiwi to new homes.
“We caught 339 kiwi, but some of them were chicks, some were too small and others were founding birds.
“The target is only a number - a nice to have - not a must. We are dealing with wildlife afterall and the welfare of the birds always comes first.”
History of kiwi at Maungatautari
Since the creation of the Maungatautari Ecological Island Trust and the Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari project in 2001, it was understood at that time that kiwi hadn’t been heard on the maunga for over 100 years.
Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari.
Maungatautari has been a kōhanga site for kiwi chicks since 2005, when Ngāti Hikairo ki Tongariro gifted four kiwi to mana whenua Ngāti Koroki Kahukura.
In 2017, Save the Kiwi joined Ngāti Koroki Kahukura and Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari in this kaupapa.
Since 2005, about 400 chicks have been released onto Maungatautari, more than 300 of these were released by Save the Kiwi. Of those, 200 hatched at the Gallagher Kiwi Burrow in Taupō.
