Dear Friends of Flora (FoF) and supporters, please take a minute to look at our email newsletter No.7
(July 2004) informing you of our efforts to bring the birdlife back to the Flora.
Whio recall.
Quoting from Tim Shaw's report to FoF: "Of the ten whio released, five are still alive. The five that have perished have all died of starvation. We believe this has occurred due to a combination of poor weather washing invertebrate food away and the birds' lack of knowledge of how to find 'difficult' food."
DoC have so far recaptured three of the birds (two of them females) and returned them safely to Peacock Springs, where they were reared. The whio are all in poor condition, having lost 200 - 300g since release in late March.
DoC plan to re-release the captive reared birds back into the Flora Stream this summer, after they have fattened up. Whio release will continue next year with captive raised birds, but with improved husbandry to better prepare them for feeding in the wild.
On a brighter note, over the past few months the captive reared birds have been joined by up to three wild whio from time to time.
Pest purge.
FoF volunteers' efforts in June led to a pest population drop of 5 stoats, 22 rats, 9 mice and 5 possums, bringing our total pest kill since Feb 2002 to:
Stoats:169
Rats: 304
Mice: 461
Possums: 9
plus odds and sods - wasp nests, weasels, cats etc.
Possum trapping.
This is a new responsibility for us. DoC have installed 'Sentinel' possum traps on some lines in areas not currently covered by possum control by poisoning. By all accounts they are absolute pigs to bait and set and could make our monitoring take longer than most volunteers could reasonably bear. We have asked DoC to look into this urgently to make it less of an ordeal.
ECOFEST
FoF has organised a stall at the last two ECOFESTs (and won an award for it in 2003!) but as we are spread a bit thin at the moment we have decided to give it a miss this year. We will, however, have information on our activities available there.
Ivan Rogers
FoF Committee