Page 31 - 2008 NZ Subantarctic Islands

Hector’s, unique to New Zealand, and the lovely and exceedingly

rare blue shark.

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Because commercial whaling ended here in the mid-20 century,
the whales have made a comeback and return to this area of great

upwellings all during the year. The folks who chose to go whale
watching were rewarded with good views of three sperm whales
during their boating adventure along with many of the birds and

mammals we on the bird boat saw. Though somewhat contrived,
our wildlife experience in Kaikoura was splendid and exhilarating.

While hiking along the headland of the Kaikoura Peninsula, we

saw many birds, native and non, as well as red-billed gulls, and a
fur seal haul out. The headland was quite beautiful with

wonderful sea views, waving (non-native) grasses, with blue cloud
tossed skies overhead. But the wonderful thing we learned about
here was another DOC program to rescue the Hutton’s

Shearwater, a native seabird whose numbers are declining
rapidly, probably through loss or degradation of their usual

habitat for breeding.

The only place in New Zealand where these birds breed and nest
is in the alpine valleys above Kaikoura. The researchers with DOC

decided about three years ago that this area was no longer
hospitable to the birds and made plans to relocate their breeding
grounds. Because the birds always return to the same place, the

ornithologists decided it would be fairly simple to accomplish this
purpose. After the adult birds have finished their feeding of the

chicks, they abandon them in their nest burrows. It takes about a
week or two for the chicks to realize mom and dad are not coming

back to feed them. They will then emerge from the burrows and
begin life on their own. The DOC researchers use this time frame

between parental desertion and fledging to visit the nest burrows
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