Stewart Island Kiwi

This story, like any good story, started with an extraordinary amount of adventure, a good dose of curiosity, a serious portion of stubbornness, a handful of excellent people and an air of the unknown.

Stewart Island kiwi, like all kiwi, are flightless, ground nesting birds endemic to New Zealand that lay eggs of mind-blowing proportions and live somewhat secluded lives away from people and introduced pests. Unlike other kiwi, the Stewart Island birds tend to hang around in family groups, share incubation and... Are active during the day!

Despite being New Zealand's national icon, most of us have never seen kiwi in the wild. And the chance of doing so is decreasing, as kiwi are in decline nationwide. Being the somewhat cryptic, long-lived species that they are, there is still a ton of valuable information to discover in our fight to support population stability & increase.

After working for the Department of Conservation on Stewart Island I became rather enamoured with the kiwi antics I was seeing, and tried to find out more about Rakiura tokoeka. In doing so, I realised we don't really know much at all... But this has to change in order to take care of them into the future. Information is the conservation manager's best tool after all.

So here I am, undertaking a PhD in order to uncover all their secret population patterns...

Follow along with me as I learn what there is to learn about this exciting, enigmatic and endearing kiwi species.

Affiliation:
PhD Candidate, Massey University, Auckland
Department of Conservation, Save Our Iconic Kiwi
Landcare Research

Awards:
Landcare Research Scholarship - Security for iconic species kiwi
Doctoral Scholarship - Massey University
Ministry of Science & Innovation - Scholarship for Masters & Business
Invasive Species Specialist Group Scholarship