Welcome to the Midnight Collective Broadsheet 129
Actively
supporting NZ’s endangered wetland birds
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| Very early morning at a now gentrified dune lake - after flood |
First of all – we would like to send New Year greetings to
our visitors; and what a pleasure to find so many of you, both here and
around the world, taking a keen interest in our little conservation drama.
With a little more time on our hands we can now review the
spring/summer activity of our local birds around our former dunelake. This has been a very disrupted time
with earthmoving activity constant through the period. Then major flooding in
September and November would have inundated nesting sites. There has been a
serious reduction in species variety and numbers, but some surprising
discoveries too.
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| Now rare - mallard family on the Wharemauku Usually we would have 6-10 nests. This year we have seen two - both on the Wharemauku. |
First to the birds we no longer see. Our biggest concern has
been the sharp reduction of ducks including parera, parera-cross,
mallards, shovelers and teal. No
sign also of white faced heron, nor have we heard frogs this year, although they
are making plenty of noise at Andrew’s pond, a valued wetland about half a
kilometre to the north. Here the birds are often fed by the public, but
few pukeko and no ducks came out during our visits. There has also been a
drop in the scaup population through the District, although the dabchicks seem
to be holding their own in the Waikanae estuary and at the Ratanui wetland.
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| Putangitangi - with five chicks - at Wharemauku bridge |
The first chicks to come out on the Wharemauku were putangitangi
- our paradise ducks. We haven’t seen a brood here since 2011 so were delighted to spot two this year; one in relative safety on the Western side of the expressway,
while the other came out on the Wharemauku creek beside the new bridge.
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| Putangitangi youngsters near fledging |
Within
three days the parents had moved this family to safer ground in the west as
well. Here something happened that we’ve only seen occurring with pukeko, for
the two broods appeared to merge together. These birds fledged safely, and then
a month later seemed to return for a brief stopover.
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| A squadron of adolescent visitors - early January 2017 |
The fledged youngsters of
putangitangi appear to gather in ever growing social squadrons over summer and
thirteen of these adolescents were spotted flying in.
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| Day old pied stilt youngster |
More surprisingly, we picked out two broods of pied stilt. We
hadn’t seen the nests (a good thing, because they are vulnerable to spurwinged plover
and pukeko attack out in the open), but these youngsters came out within a day of each other. One,
with two chicks, was in the area east of the expressway close to town, while
the other near the north end of the new bridge, reared one youngster.
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| Male pied stilt protecting youngster (white blob in background) |
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| That's close enough!!! A male pied stilt defending his chick. |
The males
in particular are very active in confronting intruders and this is a giveaway
for the family. The parents soon took the youngsters into safer territory and
out of our view, but the males were still actively patrolling for intruders, so
the youngsters appear to have thrived.
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| Male pied stilt on patrol 1 |
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| Coming in for a closer look - male pied stilt 2 |
One big surprise is the drop in the pukeko population. These
birds gather together in the autumn where up to 30 might be seen grazing; then split
up again to form communities of 5 to 8 birds. They share nests and nurturing of the young and are usually headed by a matriarch. They can foster two broods a year, through summer.
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| Pukeko and young. |
This year we spotted one lone chick being tended by a lone adult, presumably female. This is
a striking departure from their normal behaviour, though the chick appeared to
survive.
It is very early days in the settling down of these cleared
areas, which are weeding back very rapidly. And, with the high rainfall, (20mls
again last night!), the areas remain very waterlogged for this time of year.
This is promising and brings the hope
that this area might begin attracting back, some of our missing birds.
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| Royal Spoonbill on eastern side of expressway |
And here’s another hopeful sign - a Royal Spoonbill
surveying the changed habitat.
Meanwhile the globe holds its breath (well, we certainly are), as the former centres
of our democratic world, the UK and the US, pull up their respective sticks and
head out into the wilderness… So rather than put a track out for this post, we’re
sending this short extract from the combustible pen of Norman Mailer. This from
his comic classic of disturb,
1968’s -Armies of the Night. We’re
hoping it’s not a presentiment.
How much of
Fitzgerald’s long dark night may have come from that fine winnowing sense in
the very fine hairs of his nose that the two halves of America were not coming
together, and when they failed to touch, all of history might be lost in the
divide. Yes, there was a dark night if you had the illusion you could do
something about it, and the conviction that not enough had been done. Or was it
simply impossible – had the two worlds of America drifted irretrievably apart.
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