New Zealand: The Birding

Bird-watching is more of a supplementary hobby for me—something I’m always doing regardless of what else is going on, but not something I tend to plan as a specific event. So I was eagerly anticipating learning a bunch of new birds, but there was only one line-item in our trip brainstorming that was specifically a bird-watching event (and as it happened, we weren’t able to do that thing). So this is the bird-watching layer of the trip. (I’ll get to the non-bird-watching parts later.)

At first I was going to rely on iPhone apps for ID purposes. I picked up a free app, Twitcher, that was nice in that the menu had mini-images of the birds, to make it easier to skim for possibilities. But actually accessing the full details on each bird was an “in-app purchase” thing, which pisses me off. So instead I paid off the top for Birds of New Zealand, which is more extensive (includes a lot of rare visitors), all content is part of the app, and includes a checklist where you can note where and when you saw each bird. The down side is that the menu includes only names (grouped alphabetically either by taxonomy or by the common name). So unless you already have an idea what type of bird a mollymawk or a prion or a Pukeko is, you’re going to spend a lot of time clicking through. Oh, another feature of the app is that you can display names either by Anglo common names, Maori common names, IOC names, or genus+species

Eventually I found a print guidebook in a tourist shop, which make things a bit easier for the leafing through, and it was even small enough to fit in my purse easily: Birds of New Zealand by Geoff Moon. Includes photos of different ages, sexes, and seasonal plumage. Very useful.

Before I found that book, I got a smaller booklet: A Mini Guide to the Identification of New Zealand’s Land Birds by Andrew Crowe. (How’s that for nominative determinism?) Land birds only, illustrations rather than photos, but clearly shows distribution maps and color-coded tags for whether the bird is endemic (NZ only), native, or introduced. I’ll do a summary of that data at the end.

8/31 (Driving from Auckland to Rotorua) My very first bird ID was a Common Myna in a little village on Lake Waikare where we stopped for lunch. Also a Swamp Harrier (of which I’d see many). (No photos) At Tanner’s Point – scenic beach on the east coast (North Island). Lots of bird calls in the trees, but hard to spot the birds. I was able to ID my first Tui which eventually became my favorite bird. (It also seems to be a local favorite and shows up in a lot of art.) Thie header photo is from the aviary in Auckland zoo, because that’s my best shot, but I saw lots of them in the wild. Also depicted: large-scale street art in Rotorua.

And these are all going to be sideways, aren't they? Grr. Well, I can either spend a couple hours fiddling with the photos or I can just go for it.

Rotorua is on the shore of an enormous lake with scattered sulfer springs. There’s a large bird sanctuary both on shore and the small offshore islands. Birds ID’ed:

A large nesting colony of Red-billed gulls.

Black swans (close up from a later date, swans with cygnets from Hobbiton)

The Pukeko is ubiquitous in urban parks. A gorgeous bird with iridescent blue and green feathers and a red bill. The closely related Takahe (no photo) has very similar coloration but is larger, heavier, and flightless. It’s also seriously endangered (remember: flightless). I saw some Takahe in the Auckland zoo, but in the wild they’re restricted to the South Island.

Many graylag geese, but it’s hard to know whether to call this introduced species “wild” since they’re interbred with domestic geese, resulting in variable coloration.

Large flock of New Zealand Scaup, a type of duck.

I got internet help on ID’ing this shag (a type of cormorant). Hard to see in this photo, but the back and lower breast are black with a white bib reaching down to mid-breast. The guidebook showed species entirely black, or with an entirely white throat and belly, or with a weird racing-stripe pattern on the sides of the neck and head, but nothing that matched what I saw. Fortunately a Bluesky NZ birding acquaintance noted that the Little Shag can have a wide variety of breast colorings, and I found a variant that matched my pattern.

Also ubiquitous are the New Zealand fantail (another bird popular in local iconography) which has a flycatcher habit, swooping out from a perch and darting about acrobatically to catch insects.

Not pictured: at the Waiotapu hot springs, a sign noted the presence of Pied Stilts so I did a lot of looking to see if I could spot one. In the middle of a large sulfer flat, there was something that I thought might be a bird. Or it might be a piece of wood. Or… no, it moved. And sure enough it was a Pied Stilt. But it was too far away for a good photo. Also spotted a Welcome Swallow

9/2 Rotorua – Mostly exploring around town. No new birds

9/3 Rotorua, forest hike. Spotted an endemic Tomtit, ID thanks to the white wing patches. But moved too quickly for a photo.

9/4 Hobbiton tour, so there was a lot of rural driving and then the Hobbiton site itself to spot things. Multiple introduced species:

Eurasian blackbird

The English sparrow is so common I wouldn’t have bothered taking a picture except it was being photogenic.

Also (not pictured) Australian magpie (which has flashy black and white coloring, but not the long tail I normally associate with magpies), Common Chaffinch, Eurasian Coot, Mallard Duck. Native birds included the White-faced heron. Several of these in the millpond at Hobbiton but I couldn’t get a good picture.

9/5 Driving from Rotorua to Wellington by way of Tongariro Park. Birds spotted by not photographed: Black-billed Gull, European Greenfinch. Bird not spotted even though the Tongariro information center said that was the best place to spot them: Blue Duck (though I did see them at the Auckland Zoo).

9/6 Wellington – No new birds, although I suppose I should mention that pigeons are everywhere. So common I didn’t even bother to note them on my checklist until now.

9/7 Wellington – No new birds, but had an amusing encounter with the very aggressive Red-Billed Gulls at an outdoor café, where I had to warn another diner that his lunch was about to be snatched.

9/8 Wellington – No new birds. At this point in the trip, we were doing a lot more relaxing than running around.

9/9 Day-trip to Kaitoke Park (site of the Rivendell set). No bird photos, but spotted the following: European goldfinch (in a small flock), Paradise Shelduck (unusually for ducks, the female is easier to ID, having a russet body and white head, but it also helps that they tend to work in m/f pairs, so you can see the contrast with the dark-headed male).

9/10 Drive from Wellington to Auckland. Spotted on the way (but no photos): introduced ring-neck pheasant and wild turkey.

Spotted the flashy New Zealand Pigeon, which I illustrate with a more photogenic one from the Auckland Zoo.

9/11 Auckland – We went to the zoo and stuck mostly to the NZ section. The big attraction was the kiwi exhibit (in a darkened enclosure where they’ve swapped day and night so they’ll be active for visitors). I got a video, but it’s really too dim to be work trying to pull a still from. I believe these are Brown Kiwis. Other birds seen in zoo enclosures: Bellbird, Grey Teal, Little Owl, Little Penguin, North Island Saddleback (surprised I didn’t see these in the wild), Sacred Kingfisher, Takehe, Yellow-Crowned Parakeet. And a Kea. Have a Kea, showing off its under-wings.

Spotted while at the zoo, but not in the exhibits so I get to count them for real: Eastern Rosella, Song Thrush.

9/12 We'd planned to take a ferry out to Tiritiri Matangi island bird sanctuary, but the ferry was cancelled due to weather conditions, alas. There are a LOT of seabirds  in the bird books, but most are found on the outlying islands.

Summary (41 species: 23 native, 18 introduced)

Endemic or Native (13 species)

• Black-billed Gull
• Little Shag
• New Zealand Fantail
• New Zealand Pigeon
• New Zealand Scaup
• New Zealand Tomtit
• Paradise Shelduck
• Pied Stilts
• Pukeko
• Red-billed gulls
• Swamp Harrier
• Tui
• Welcome Swallow

Introduced (or recently migrated) from Australia (4 species)

• Australian Magpie
• Black Swan
• Eastern Rosella
• White-Faced Heron

Introduced from Europe (11 species)

• Common Chaffinch
• English Sparrow
• Eurasian blackbird
• Eurasian Coot
• European Goldfinch
• European Greenfinch
• Graylag Goose
• Mallard Duck
• Pigeon
• Ring-Neck Pheasant
• Song Thrush

Introduced from elsewhere (2 species)

• Common Myna
• Wild Turkey

Zoo (11 species, native except as noted)

• Bellbird
• Blue Duck
• Brown Kiwi
• Grey Teal
• Kea
• Little Owl (introduced)
• Little Penguin
• North Island Saddleback
• Sacred Kingfisher
• Takehe
• Yellow-Crowned Parakeet