Five translocations

Today the fifth batch of kākāriki karaka were released from the temporary-release aviaries, bringing the total number of released birds to 104 (20 birds per translocation, with one of 24). That brings to an end (for this season) the transfer of birds bred in captivity to the Brook Waimārama Sanctuary. For the most part, kākāriki karaka born this season in captivity at Isaac Conservation and Wildlife Trust, Orana Wildlife Park, and Auckland Zoo have been translocated to the Brook. Now we'll monitor them, hope they remain inside the fence, and fill the place up with more of themselves.

It is worth noting the absolute success of the translocation methodology. All 104 birds, once boxed, transferred to the airport, flown to Nelson, helicoptered to Third House, driven to Kākāriki Hatch, carried down the spur to the aviaries, then released from the aviaries two days later, flew out the aviary doors to freedom.

The rise of Phoenix

The first nest discovered in the sanctuary (nest was confirmed 21st December 2021) was not far from the temporary-release aviaries. It received regular nest watches. Male was GP-S (green pink silver) and female S-RP (silver red pink). A few weeks after nest confirmation (during what should have been the incubation period) it appeared the nest had become inactive. No activity recorded on 12th January 2022. Another watch the following day confirmed the nest had failed (for unknown reasons).

Shortly after this (18th January) GP-S was seen with a new mate (S-BW) at a new nest site (the third nest found in the sanctuary), so it was presumed that something had likely happened to his first mate S-RP (taken by a falcon, or perhaps she became unwell) thereby ending the nest and her partnership with GP-S.

But, I was at the aviary watching the feeders today (27th April), and guess who turned up? You got it, S-RP!

She was looking a bit bedraggled, and wherever she'd been she seemed to have had a hard time. It was good to see her back though, and to know that whatever went wrong with her nest it was not terminal for her. We officially named her Phoenix.

There's a footnote to this story. GP-S's nest with S-BW fledged in early April. We don't know what subsequently happened to S-BW (perhaps she'll turn up again one day), but GP-S was subsequently seen regularly with his old flame S-RP (Phoenix) from about June. It was clear they were back together again. Clearly whatever went wrong there were no grudges held, he was probably happy to see her again like we (the humans) were.

More fledglings

Over the next few weeks more of our nests fledged. Adults were seen with groups of 2-4 fledglings in 'flight training' mode. They'd fly from tree to tree, call the fledglings over if they were lagging behind, and show them how to find their own food. During this time they're given supplementary food by parents, but it doesn't take them too long to become food-independent, perhaps a few weeks or less.

Commonly the fledglings or juveniles (when they're no longer being fed by adults they're referred to as 'juveniles') would fossick around on the ground under the auto-feeders snacking on bits of sunflower seed. It made for some nice photographic opportunities.

Fledglings/juveniles snacking on sunflower seed scraps

Fledgling/juvenile (front) with adults

Fledgling (note the developing orange frontal band)

Fledgling snacking on rimu fruit less than two weeks after fledging

It was a happy time to be a kākāriki karaka monitor. These birds were once again living, feeding and breeding in original beech forest, free of cages, and most important of all, free from being killed by stoats, weasels, ferrets, rats, possums and cats. Within four months of the first translocation we had quite a few birds who had never known a cage, and the Brook Waimārama Sanctuary was the only home they'd ever known or would ever know.

The first fledgling

While watching one of our kākāriki karaka nests, I'd been on the lookout (or 'listen-out' I guess) for their second nest (if they had one). I'd heard chatter from down below on a few occasions (in rather unforgiving terrain and bush). So on this day I approached the rough location from below and walked around listening out for chatter. Silently a rather unusual bird glided down from directly above me and landed on a branch a few metres away. I was unsure what it was. It was clearly green, but did not look like any bird I'd seen before. I scratched my head and rapidly went through ideas such as mutated bellbird etc (none of which made any sense!).

For the previous few months we'd been watching kākāriki karaka nests, and closely observed the adult behaviour. But none of us had even seen an egg, let alone a hatchling, let alone a nestling being fed at a nest entrance, let alone a fledgling! It took me a lot longer to work out what I was seeing than it should have. This bird had no leg bands, pink legs, no orange frontal band, so did not look like our 'normal' kākāriki karaka. When the penny finally dropped, I was kicking myself, as my camera was in its holster by my side, zipped up, lens cap on, lens hood reversed. I stayed as still and quiet as I could while frantically getting my camera ready to fire. I was silently begging this precious creature to stay exactly where she was.... please, please, please...... She did. She was in no hurry to move. She was a wide-eyed youngster taking in her new environment. She'd look one way, soak up the information, look another and soak that up too. She didn't pay me any attention other than as part of the scenery to digest.

It later occurred to me that the tree she alighted under happened to be the same tree I'd heard parakeet chatter from a month or so earlier, high in the canopy about 20m up. At the time I thought a pair were stopping there while travelling / feeding etc. But looking back on it with greater knowledge and the benefit of hindsight, what I heard was likely nest chatter. My guess is it was a nest we'd missed, with unidentified occupants. This fledgling likely came from that nest. It's possible she'd been out of her nest for a day, but unlikely to be longer. It's also possible she'd only been out a few minutes, I may have witnessed her first flight. Anyway, she stayed where she was for a few minutes more, long enough to fire off a few photos, and I breathed a massive sigh of exulted relief. Three and a half months after the first translocation we had babies!

The first kākāriki karaka fledgling spotted in the Brook

Anyway, the excitement was shared when I got back to the sanctuary base. Needless to say, it was a story, and this wee girl ended up in the Nelson Mail a week or two later.

The nesting cycle

A kākāriki karaka nest goes roughly:-

• Prospecting - Anywhere from a few days/weeks up to several months.
• Nest preparation - 1 week
• Laying - 2 weeks
• Incubation - 3 weeks
• Hatchlings - 2 weeks
• Nestlings - 3 weeks

Nests can contain anywhere from one to ten eggs.

During the incubation and hatchling period, the male does not enter the nest. He will provide most of the food that the female and hatchlings need by feeding the female outside the nest. She will then pass the food onto her hatchlings.

About two weeks after hatching, the male may begin to enter the nest and feed the nestlings directly. The female will begin to leave the nest for longer periods and the pair may then start their next nest. For the last couple of weeks the male may be solely responsible for feeding the nestlings, this will initially be done inside the nest, but as the nestlings get ready to leave they will commonly be fed at the nest entrance.

Once the nest has fledged, the male (and perhaps the female if she isn't moving onto her next nest) takes care of the fledglings for a few weeks teaching them how to fly and find food. Within about six weeks they're pretty much independent.

If food is plentiful, nests will commonly overlap. So while the male is feeding the nestlings at Nest 1, the female will be preparing and laying at Nest 2. This is a busy time particularly for the male, as he will be gathering food, feeding his fledglings at Nest 1, then onto Nest 2 to feed his mate (or the other way around). Then when Nest 1 fledges, he'll be looking after his fledglings and also responsible for feeding his mate in Nest 2 while she incubates.

The below graphic shows roughly the chronology of two nests (although in a season this could become Nest 3, then Nest 4....)

If conditions are good (plentiful food) then this species has been known to do up to five consecutive nests, although two or three in a season would probably be more common. Usually Nest 1 will begin sometime around September/October, but could be any time of the year, including winter if food is plentiful. They are a boom-and-bust species, they will quickly turn excess food into rapid population growth. The difference between proliferation and extinction is the presence of introduced mammalian predators for which they have no defence.

Second translocation & nest watching

Twenty more kākāriki karaka were sent to the Brook and released on 2025-12-22. Birds in this release seemed more intent on nesting than the first release, a few of them quickly paired off and led us to their nests through radio tracking.

I began the task of nest watching. One reason for this was that on 2025-12-08 I had a fall in the sanctuary, and broke my neck! Avulsion fracture of the C5 and C6 cervical vertebrae. Fortunately no spinal cord damage, and was advised to let it heal naturally. No pain worthy of note either. However, I was also advised to not do any further damage while healing. Many thought it inadvisable to go bush-bashing while chasing birds and risk another fall, so I took on the task of sitting or lying down watching nests while the others went radio-tracking.

A nest watch is exactly what it sounds like. You watch a nest for as long as it takes to form an opinion on the stage of the nest. When a female is in the nest incubating, the male takes on the task of feeding her. He may visit every 40 minutes, or visit every 2.5 hours, perhaps even less frequently. So you sit or lie down, watch the nest hole, don't take your eyes off for more than a few seconds, binoculars on your chest, two-way radio at one side, bottle of water at the other, and notebook and pen and/or data-entry device (usually a mobile phone) ready for use. And of course snacks nearby, that are eaten while you watch the nest like a hawk.

When a male arrives to call his mate out for a feed, if you're lucky you hear him, or the entire visit may be in complete silence. A typical visit to a nest involving incubation may go something like:-

• Male arrives and calls out the female (noisily or silently, or something in between)
• Nothing happens. Male eventually departs after a few attempts to call her off (perhaps over a few minutes, or maybe much longer, half an hour or so). Or,

• Male arrives and calls out the female.
• Female comes out of the nest, for a feed, or for copulation (fertilising the next egg), and maybe they head off to the nearest stream or water source for a drink and/or bathing.
• Female heads back into the nest and the male departs. She'd normally be out of the nest from somewhere between about 3 and 15 minutes.

One mistake easily made here. Let's say you were watching a potential nest hole (that may or may not be in use). A male kākāriki karaka arrives behind you and calls out. You turn to see what may be happening and hopefully ID him from leg bands (using binoculars or a camera with telephoto). Suddenly another bird turns up (clearly his mate) and you have no idea where she came from. Did she come out of the nest hole you'd been watching for the last hour, or somewhere else? Had you been watching an active nest, or an empty hole? If you don't know, then you start again.... You wait another hour or two for the next visit, and this time pay attention to the nest hole! Ignore all other kākāriki in the area trying to distract you.

About this time I decided to take my camera on every visit to the sanctuary. I wanted kākāriki photos! I had a Nikon D5200 and 18-55mm kit lens but needed much more reach, so bought an entry-level 70-300mm.

On of my first photos of an active kākāriki karaka nest

The female above has just been called from her nest. Note she seems to have immediately noticed the change in her environment (my presence) even though I'm about 17m below and probably 15m horizontally from the base of the tree. Also note that no ID is yet possible, as her legs are not visible. This photo was taken at 300mm (or full-frame equivalent of 450mm). Clearly the more reach the lens has, the better. Full-frame 1200mm would have been appropriate here.

Courtship feeding

A crop of the above

Hopefully at some stage during a nest watch both birds will be ID'd. It's not often easy. Sometimes multiple visits over days or weeks result in failure to ID. It may be the nest is difficult to see from the ground, or it could be the behaviour of the birds (e.g., rapid entry or exit). In the above photo, both birds can be identified. On the left is the female, her leg bands are blue over white. On the right, the male is feeding his mate, his left leg shows green over pink (just barely visible through the foliage).

In the photo below, the male is feeding his mate, but all legs are hidden. This view is all too common!

Courtship feeding

Female flying straight into her nest hole without stopping (tail feathers visible mid-photograph)

Other times the bird(s) will perch at the nest entrance, or on a branch nearby, giving you all the time in the world to note their leg bands (below).

GP-S (Green Pink - Silver) at his nest entrance (just behind him)

Female entering her nest (radio transmitter antenna visible)

Supplementary feeders and trailcams

Kākāriki karaka released in the Sanctuary were raised in captivity. Part of their diet was sunflower seeds from auto-feeders. Use of these feeders continued in the soft-release aviaries for the two days before their release into the wild and freedom. Initially eight of these feeders were installed in the Sanctuary, four immediately around the aviaries, and four more somewhat further afield (within a few hundred metres). The reason was to ground the birds, to make them feel like their new home was a good place to be; that there was nothing to be gained by leaving the Sanctuary. Mostly it worked.

Sunflower seed drops up to four times daily, in controlled amounts. Standard drop times are 7am, 11am, 3pm and 7pm. The engine runs for a few seconds each time. Food normally runs out between seed drops, but sunflower seed is not the most nutritious food and the birds are expected to live mostly off food they find naturally in the forest (seeds, buds, fruit, and scale insects). Some birds made regular use of the feeders, others quickly lost interest and preferred natural, wild food.

Some of the feeders had motion-detection cameras. Visiting birds were recorded for monitoring and subsequent population analysis. Initial plan was DOC personnel would go through the images, and note (from leg bands) which birds were visiting.

A water bath was also installed (for drinking and bathing), it also had a trailcam.