An ecology initiative featuring nature’s wonders photographed, in southern New Zealand
A selection of photos of the early season snow around Wanaka- most of them are in the Cardrona Valley. Click on any image to begin a manual slide show…
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Immersion in solitude, awareness of self, quietness of the spirit, and sometimes the odd challenge – all these and more are there in our mountain landscapes, just waiting to be seen, and better yet felt.
Sometimes we’re so goal driven and yet whatever it was sometimes gets replaced: to get past stinging rain in the face, a tired body or something new and unimagined.
Here is a little slide show of my favourites scenes over the last several months. Each has a story, and the best journeys are the ones we can relive and savour as needed, or when the whim takes us.
Enjoy… just click on any thumbnail to get the show going. With exception of the featured image, a tor and rainbow in Central Otago [taken yesterday], all were captured in the West Matukituki Valley, Mt Aspiring National Park…
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A few weeks ago I was involved in the capture and subsequent banding of a young kea. Probably a male, but that is not a certainty with any youngster.
At the time while recording the banding with a camera, I was struck on how he took being held in his stride, and when relaxed started looking about the hut we were in, sizing it up with what seemed like a daunting intelligence.
The plastic band was coloured green and printed on this bling was the character “E” in white. So on the books he became “white E on green”. Since then he’s become quite my friend so I’ve named him Edwin. Time and again ‘tho he’s tried as one of a party of three, to enter the hut once more, perhaps feigning friendship to do so!
He showed his true colours for my camera on a rainy Sat. recently when three experienced trampers called by on their way out of the valley…
So that’s an insight into Edwin’s personality, but what of the squadron of like minded kea he is a player in?
As it turns out the other two birds ignore him until his (superior) intelligence manifesting as curiosity finds him poking his nose into anything new.
Suddenly the others sit up and take notice and if the subject of his attention is deemed worthy, a much older kea brushes Edwin aside and takes ownership of the situation. Edwin is smart enough to back off from the aged and experienced beak of the bird I now call “the boss”. Anyway he (Edwin) has a greater purpose, and is soon off to the next phenomena demanding his attention.
New Zealand’s alpine parrot cuts right across the aloofness of a landscape and weather that takes no prisoners, greeting us with life and curiosity that never fails to get us smiling; a feathered and garrulous court jester of our mountains.
The birds decline in numbers to under 5000 has been due to an historic century-long bounty, 120,000 having been paid out on by successive governments wanting to help the farming economy, and in more later years by them eating lead headed nails on high country shearing sheds and hut roofs, and being predated on by ever increasing numbers of stoats and other vermin.
Soon they’ll be extinct unless we keep up with widespread large-scale pest control, backed by a commitment to evolving and sound science, flavoured by innovation.
This post is a brief look at some of the current methodologies, and serendipitously while preparing it a friend in the US, Don Watson [check out his recent post on Owl Baiting by unscrupulous bird photographers], a supporter of this site, just sent this message on FaceBook:
Watched a very interesting documentary about kea’s and Caledonian crows. It was called “Beak and Brain, genius birds from down under”. Very interesting, the research going on and the problems that stoats and predators are bringing to the kea. The 1 hr. Video was on Netflix. Showed the predator trapping and a kea cave that was photographed with a stoat killing the female and her 2 chicks. Stuff that you deal with every day at Mt. Aspiring, but really interesting to see some of what you do there.
A link to the movie appears below. Meanwhile here are a few photos taken very recently in Mt Aspiring National Park, of highly skilled conservationists doing their job…
Beak & Brain: Genius Birds From Down Under | Netflix
Whoever came up with the term “bird brain” never met these feathered thinkers, who use their claws and beaks to solve puzzles, make tools and more.
Source: Beak & Brain: Genius Birds From Down Under | Netflix
Thanks also to FMC ~ Federated Mountain Clubs of New Zealand for their recent article inspiring, often via choice of words, me to share my experiences
NZ on Screen also has an excellent video >>
Lastly should you wish to help, then please donate to the Kea Conservation Trust >>
More properly named the Te Waikoropupū Springs, they’re the largest freshwater springs in New Zealand, and the largest cold water springs in the Southern Hemisphere and contain some of the clearest water ever measured this side of Antarctica’s near-frozen Weddell Sea, with a visibility of 63 metres.
Antarctica aside the water clarity is in fact not equalled anywhere in the world, and is the result of natural filtering prior to the water’s emergence at Te Waikoropupu Springs.
What we’ve taken for granted for many years is now under threat, and what it’s all about is allocation of water upstream for agricultural use.
It’s not rocket science to ponder that the issue really comes back to what runs into the source areas e.g. nitrates from farming operations.
Read more about it via the link below to a post published by Radio NZ today:
Race to protect Te Waikoropupū Springs
The guardians of Te Waikoropupū Springs in Golden Bay are urging the Environment Minister to preserve and protect it from commercial ventures.
Source: Race to protect Te Waikoropupū Springs | Radio New Zealand News
