Tieke returning after 150 years

Team catching tieke (saddlebacks) at Bushy Park Photo/Bevan Conley

Thanks to Wanganui's Bushy Park, a noisy red-and-black native bird is about to be returned to Taranaki - after a 150-year absence.

A team of experts and volunteers was at the 100ha, predator-fenced Wanganui reserve yesterday to catch tieke (saddlebacks) for moving to the 230ha predator-fenced Rotokare Scenic Reserve inland from Eltham.

Rotokare manager Simon Collins said bringing the birds back was a huge conservation milestone, and it was significant that two community groups were responsible. He congratulated Bushy Park on its success in building the tieke population.

There are an estimated 350-plus tieke at Bushy Park, all descendants or originals of the 40 moved there in 2006.

Yesterday and today teams were waiting in the forest to quickly grab birds that flew into nearly-invisible mist nets. The tieke were then carried, wriggling, in black cloth bags to be weighed, measured, checked for bacterial infections and banded by translocation guru Dr Kevin Parker.

After that they were released into a small temporary aviary. They will be caught and put into boxes for the four-hour trip to Rotokare on Saturday.

The team should have easily caught 40 birds by then, Bushy Park Trust member Allan Anderson said.

Tieke were good breeders, Dr Parker said. They could have two or three clutches of two to four eggs in a season. But when tieke numbers got high, fewer young bird survived to adulthood. "We're not doing anything at all to the breeding population by taking birds out of here."

Tieke are especially vulnerable to predators like cats and stoats. They died out on New Zealand's mainland before 1900, and by 1960 there were only 500 left, on Hauturu (Little Barrier Island).

There are already 20 tieke from Hauturu at Rotokare, Mr Collins said, and the Bushy Park birds would add genetic diversity. The reserve has been predator-free since 2008 and includes a 17ha lake and has also had popokatea (whiteheads) introduced.

The latest reintroduction to Bushy Park was 44 hihi (stitchbirds), which were set free in March last year.