I've been intending to make a Nelson Birds calendar for 2025, and wanted one native species per month. I had nine, perhaps ten at a squeeze, so needed two or three more species. On my 'wanted' list were pīpīwharauroa (shining cuckoo), riroriro (grey warbler), and tītitipounamu (rifleman). Today I got lucky with two of them: pīpīwharauroa and riroriro (a bit of 'making my own luck' involved).
Pīpīwharauroa are an enigmatic bird. They're migratory, and a brood parasite. They breed in NZ, Australia and a few other Pacific Islands. The NZ subspecies only breeds in NZ.
Each bird begins its life hatching in a riroriro nest; riroriro are widely spread throughout New Zealand. It instinctively upon hatching ejects all riroriro eggs and/or hatchlings from the nest and is then raised by the tiny riroriro pair until independence. Some months later (autumn) it heads 4000km to the Bismarck Archipelago or Solomon Islands where it spends the winter. In spring it heads back to New Zealand, pairs up, and lays a single egg in a riroriro nest (after ejecting one riroriro egg). The bird has no part to play in incubation or raising its young. The cycle then repeats.
I'd been looking for these birds for three years. In the 2022/2023 season I heard them regularly, both at home and in the Brook Waimārama Sanctuary. I briefly saw a pair up the hill above my house, but no camera. In 2023/2024 I heard them everywhere. Never even saw a feather!
Today the cuckoo drought ended. I was having lunch (while watching a kākāriki karaka nest in the Brook) and a pair landed mid-canopy not too far away. I grabbed my camera and stalked them for a few minutes, long enough to take a few hundred photos (commonly in burst mode). Here are a few.
Edit: A month later I was walking down the western fence-line at the Brook and had another interaction with a pair, so I'll post them here. Here is one (below) calling (presumably to its mate). Note how the body shape changes, the torso flattens and cheeks puff out while calling.
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