Ulva Island Bird Sanctury, Stewart Island, N.Z.
All the shots below were taken on Ulva Island which is very small island located in Stewart Islands Patterson Inlet. These photos were the first I have taken of birds using my digital gear and this was back in mid October 2006. They were all taken with a 200mm lens which proved to be a bit short to capture some of the birds.
Ulva Island has been made predator free and is particularly of interest to bird watchers as it is home to the very rare South Island(SI) Saddleback. The Saddleback pretty much all have bands on their legs as do many of the other birds on the Island.
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Stewart Island Robin. |
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South Island Kaka feeding on some foliage.
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South Island Kaka with a bit more colouration than the one above.
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South Island Saddleback.
Like the Kakapo pictured below there are only around 80 S. I. saddlebacks left in existence, and they exist pretty much entirely on ulva Island. However unlike the Kakapo there is also a North island subspecies which are not as endangered. The only obvious difference between the two is that the immature S.I. Saddlbacks lack the browny coloured saddle. There was one juvenille present for a very brief moment and he looked alot like a blackbird, so I continued to focus on the colourful adult and regretably missed the photo chance.
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South Island Saddleback.
Even though the quality of the image is lacking, they are shown cropped and enlarged because of their rarity.
After talking with other visitors to Ulva Island it seems I was quite fortunate to come across the S.I. Saddlebacks(and in two distinct areas) .They were all very active and seemed to like the vine thickets.
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Tui.
The white buff on the underside of the neck is very distinctive as is their beautiul song.
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Tui, in full song. |
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The Kakapo is the largest parrot in the world(up to 3kg males), and no doubt the most severely endangered with only 84 known to exist.
Even though they have well developed wings, they are only able to glide short distances. Many birds in N.Z evolved into flightest birds as there were very few if any predators. This all changed with the influx of Europeans to N.Z around the 1800's.
The Kakapo was only visited at night as it is nocturnal. No flashes were allowed so the only lighting was the DOC workers headlamp, making for a tricky shot.
Codfish Island is the home to all the remaining kakapo and has been made predator free. This male Kakapo is the most domesticated of those remaining today due to being hand reared from chick, and apparently he has not been all that interested in breeding. So he was brought to Ulva for about a month where the public were able to view him, and I guess also to increase awareness of the conservation progamme.
For anyone interested in seeing more images of the Kakapo, they have been covered very well covered by N.Z National Geographic in the past year with images from Codfish Island(located off the remote Southern coast of Stewart Island. |
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This shot is taken from Ulva Island looking back towards Stewart Island and showing the short journey across Paterson Inlet.
There are many blue penquins in the inlets and on a calm day it is a great sight to see them going about their business in small groups. |
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