Penguin Walks - kororā count

On a couple of spring days every year, volunteers from Kāpiti Biodiversity Project get up very early. It's still dark outside as they make their way to a meeting point at Paekakariki Beach. It's chilly and they are rugged up in coats and hats. As the sky begins to brighten, they make their way slowly along the beach scanning the sand for footprints.

A trail of footprints being examined by volunteers

The tide is out, the sand has been washed clean of yesterday's footprints, so any new prints on the beach have been made since the last high tide. The volunteers are looking for prints like these:

Return to Rakiura - Kiwi

Rakiura - Stewart Island is a special place, it's wild, it's mostly National Park, it's home to many native animals. Best of all it is one place in New Zealand where you can see kiwi during the daytime.

Kiwi are generally nocturnal, they have poor sight and hunt by smell. It is thought they evolved to be nocturnal to avoid the (now-extinct) Haast's Eagle.  I've heard lots of theories about why Tokoeka (the Stewart Island kiwi species) come out during the daytime as well as at night. One is that the summer nights are so short they also need to feed during the daytime, another that because they live in family groups they all get a different shift off the nest. Whatever the reason it makes this the best place in New Zealand to see kiwi.

On my first trip, I was tantalised by hearing calls at night and, in the morning, a beach covered in footprints.

Kiwi footprints on the beach

Follow that kiwi

This is a ‘kiwi’ nature blog, sharing my observations with people young and old who are curious about the New Zealand natural environment.

These footprints are from a real kiwi on Stewart Island.