Daily Yaffle

Wednesday, March 5, 2025

New Zealand Part 2

New Zealand Trip Report Part 2

Sunday Feb 9^th

We left the hotel at 7 after breakfast and drove down to the marina. There was a bit of time before boarding the boat for our first pelagic so we had a look at the marsh and saw another Buff-banded Rail along with several flocks of waders including our first South Island Oystercatchers.

Buff-banded Rail

We clambered aboard our boat and left the harbour at 8am, heading out to sea. The weather was perfect with good visibility and just a gentle breeze. We saw a Pacific Reef-Egret roosting on the rocks as we headed out and it didn’t take long until we encountered our first penguin – a Little Penguin and we then saw quite a few more close inshore. Once into open water we didn’t run into any more.

Pacific Reef-Egret

Little Penguin

As we progressed further out to sea we started seeing our first shearwaters, firstly Fluttering and then Buller’s and Flesh-footed. One or two White-faced Storm-Petrels began to appear and then we had our first Cook’s and Black Petrels. A small pod of Short-beaked Common Dolphins swam around us for a while before heading off.

Fluttering Shearwaters

The skipper started chucking out fish and spread a nice slick of chum which we stayed around for a few hours as more birds came in to investigate. Several shearwaters just hung around the back of the boat waiting for handouts while other birds flew in and around us.

Buller's Shearwater

Flesh-footed Shearwater

Black Petrel

Cook's Petrel

It didn’t take long before our main target arrived: New Zealand Storm-Petrel. Just over 20 years ago they were presumed to be extinct but they were rediscovered in this area and are now known to be breeding on some of the islets in this area. We had at least eight birds around the boat at any one time, they flew a lot faster than the White-faced Petrels and only occasionally put their feet down on the surface while the White-faced habitually bounced on the surface of the sea.

NZ Storm-Petrel (centre) with White-faced Stormies

NZ Storm-Petrel

White-faced Storm-Petrels

We also picked up a few other birds, the best being a single Black-winged Petrel as well as one Salvin’s Albatross and a Sooty Shearwater.

Australasian Gannets

Salvin's Albatross

Sooty Shearwater

A few cetaceans were seen on the way back – a Bryde’s Whale and a mixed pod of dolphins with Common and Bottlenose. We docked late afternoon and went back to our motel to rest. One of the reasons for me booking on this trip was the number of pelagic trips and our first one had been a resounding success.

Monday Feb 10^th

We checked out of our motel at 7.30 and headed for the Pearson Estuary, seeing a few Wild Turkeys in a roadside field, one of only a few introduced species from North America. There were a few wetland birds here including Sacred Kingfisher, Pied Stilt, White-faced Herons and both species of Pied Cormorant. A Monarch butterfly flew past, a species that has seemingly self-colonised from America.

Pied Cormorant

White-faced Heron

Next stop was at Te Arai Beach North. Along the track down to the beach was our first NZ Pipit (probably the first time I've seen a pipit walking on a sandy beach) and a couple of Brown Quail scurried across.

NZ Pipit

On the beach were a few waders with Wrybill, Variable Oystercatcher (so named as they could be all black or have some white on the belly), NZ Dotterel and Barwits while out to sea a Buller’s Shearwater flew past. Driving back we encountered another introduced species from the Americas – California Quail.

NZ Dotterel

Variable Oystercatchers

Our first Wrybill, better views would come later

Caspian Tern

Kelp Gull

We returned to the estuary as the tide had dropped allowing us to see a few more waders including Banded Dotterel, South Island Oystercatcher and our main target for the area: Fairy Tern.

Fairy Tern (the equivalent to our Little Tern)

Silver Gull

In the afternoon we stopped by a pond where there were two species of small grebe: NZ Dabchick and Australasian Grebe. There were also Australasian Shoveler and a few Brown Teal.

Australasian Grebe

Australasian Shoveler & Brown Teal

Brown Teal

Masked Lapwing

A pair of Paradise Shelduck

Female Paradise Shelduck

After dinner we went for a walk in the forest and had great views of six Northern Brown Kiwi. They were larger than I had initially expected, around the size of a domestic cat and we watched them feeding at close range, sometimes in the forest, while others were out on the wide grassy tracks. We also saw or heard four Morepork.

Tuesday, March 4, 2025

New Zealand Part 1

New Zealand February 2025

I booked up a 21 day trip with Wrybill tours last year and it soon came around. Visa and immigration forms were completed online easily enough.

Wednesday February 5^th

I started my trip late afternoon on Wednesday although the tour didn’t actually begin until Saturday. I left home mid-afternoon and took the train from London Bridge down to Gatwick arriving just after 5pm and checked in for my Emirates flight. Once I’d gone through the various queues there was time for a light meal before boarding commenced. The flight left on time at 20:25 heading to Dubai.

Thursday Feb 6^th

We landed in Dubai at 07.10. Normally when I fly through Dubai it’s in the middle of the night so it was nice to see it in daylight for a change and it seems to get bigger each time I see it. I only had a couple of hours before boarding the next flight to Auckland which was the long leg at 15 hours.

Dubai

Friday Feb 7^th

We arrived at Auckland at 11:35 and went through immigration and biosecurity very quickly and without issue.

I took a cab to the Rose Park Hotel, arriving at 1pm. After checking in I went for a walk into town to do some shopping for snacks and then popped over the road to the rose garden and park for a little birding. Aside from the various introduced species like House Sparrow, Starling, Common Myna and Australian Magpie there were a few naturally occurring birds like a flock of Silvereyes, Welcome Swallow, Sacred Kingfisher and some Kelp and Silver Gulls (of the NZ race known as Red-billed Gull). I met up with Todd and Steve who were on the same trip and we did a circuit of the park then headed down to a fish ‘n’ chip shop on the corner to grab an early dinner.

Downtown Auckland

Rose Park Hotel

Australian Magpie (one of the common sounds in Neighbours!)

Sacred Kingfisher

Silver Gull (in NZ it's Red-billed Gull)

Silvereye

I lost track of how many hours I'd actually been travelling due to the two changes of time and heading East but it spanned three days. I was now ready for some proper birding!

Saturday Feb 8^th

I had breakfast in the hotel and checked out before we all met up in the car park at 07.30 and loaded up the van. There were seven of us, our guide, Brent, and a trainee guide, Bradley. Our first stop was a short distance away beside a golf course. The first bird we saw was a California Quail, another in the long list of introduced species in New Zealand. A few Masked Lapwing were up next, a species that has colonised from Australia. Another Aussie species – Eastern Rosella – was yet another introduction, although I'd not seen one before.

Eastern Rosella

We drove a little way to a forest where our first proper NZ endemic was a New Zealand Pigeon, a large and colourful pigeon.

NZ Pigeon

This was shortly followed by our first Tui, a bird we would become familiar with very quickly as it’s one of the commonest endemics. A NZ Fantail became our next endemic and a small flock of Sulphur-crested Cockatoos were our next introduced species.

Tui

Sulphur-crested Cockatoo

We went along the coast to Muriwai National Park where there’s a large breeding colony of Australasian Gannets numbering into the thousands. As it is late in the summer here, breeding is well advanced and there were a few juveniles flying around as well as some young fluffy chicks.

Australasian Gannet

Our last stop was at Tawheri Park where we briefly saw a Banded Rail cross the track. It has a small wetland area so there were plenty of birds around including some more endemics: Paradise Shelducks and Brown Teal.

Australasian Swamphen or Pukeko

Brown Teal

Variable Oystercatcher (either all black or with a white belly)

White-fronted Terns

We walked up the hill through native forest seeing yet more endemics - Whitehead, NZ Robin, Bellbird and Saddleback before encountering a Morepork, the endemic owl which was at a regular day roost.

Snoozing Morepork

North Island Robin

North Island Saddleback

Silver Fern

At the top of the hill we walked around an open area and saw a pair of Takahe with a juvenile. They’re like Purple Swamphens on steroids, being almost twice the size with huge powerful beaks that they use to rip out grass roots. They have been reintroduced back into many areas, as had this pair which had been tagged with a radio transmitter.