The discovery of a complete fossilised ancient giant penguin skeleton in the upper Kawhia Harbour, Waikato is helping scientists fill in some gaps in natural history, Sofia Quaglia reports for The Guardian. Scientists have concluded…
As the California heat blazed outside in the summer of 2018, Rose Turnbull sat in the cool confines of a windowless basement sorting through grains of fine sand. A geologist based at New Zealand’s…
A “swarm” of bug-tracking drones and tiny radars are being developed at the University of Canterbury to help conservation of rare insects in New Zealand, Phil Mercer reports for Voice of America. Researchers hope it…
“In the past 30 years, a wilderness has grown up in the heart of New Zealand’s capital – so successfully its neighbours now complain about the raucous racket of rare birds. But this is…
The esteemed kākāpō has soared past its competition to claim victory in New Zealand’s Bird of the Year contest, a tense race marked by attempted voter interference during a divisive month of campaigning, Jennifer Hassan…
New research has found extreme melting of New Zealand’s glaciers in 2018 was at least ten times more likely due to human-caused global heating, Graham Readfearn reports for The Guardian. Twice a year, glaciologist Lauren…
New Zealand is quickly becoming one of the top dark sky destinations on earth, Valerie Stimac reports for Forbes, with the country home to two International Dark Sky Association (IDA) certified Dark Sky Sanctuaries –…
Populations of New Zealand’s critically endangered orange-fronted parakeet, or Malherbe’s parakeet, are recovering thanks to conservation efforts concentrated on bringing them back from the brink, the editor of educational geography website World Atlas, Oishimaya Sen Nag,…
Whether it’s calculating your risk of catching coronavirus or gauging the chance of rain on your upcoming beach vacation, you use a mix of statistical, physical, and social information to make a decision, Virginia…
Two arborists, chest-deep in underbrush, secured a rope slung over a branch in the Waipoua Forest, close to the northern tip of New Zealand. Scott Forrest pumped his fist, Per Liljas writes for The…
Large, plump and nocturnal, the kākāpō is the only parrot in the world that lives on the ground and cannot fly. There are only 211 in existence, confined to four small islands off the…
After seven decades of cuttings, failures, plant enzymes, a little coaxing, and a Māori blessing, one of the world’s rarest trees – which lives on a tiny island 64km off the northern edge of…
The endangered hoiho (yellow-eyed penguin) won New Zealand’s coveted Bird of the Year competition after two weeks of intense campaigning, the BBC reports. The hoiho saw off many avian rivals to become the first…
Dunedin horticulturist Barbara Wheeler is the first New Zealander to receive a fellowship from Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, one of the premier horticultural gardens in the United States. The 13-month residency aims…
Tourists have been banned from swimming with bottlenose dolphins in New Zealand in a bid to protect them from “being loved into extinction”. Chiaro Giordano reports for UK newspaper, The Independent. The population of bottlenose…
Humans can be a terrible influence on birds. Crows that live near us end up with high cholesterol, sparrows screech to be heard over oil pumps, and instead of migrating, some storks now just…
People talk about toheroa like they’re a dream, because these days, they are, Naomi Arnold writes for travel site, Atlas Obscura. The big, delicious surf clams were once plentiful on New Zealand shorelines, before…
The BBC reports on the findings of the remains of a giant penguin the size of a human that were discovered in Waipara, North Canterbury by amateur palaeontologist Leigh Love in 2018. The fossilised leg…
“When humans arrived in New Zealand some 700 years ago, they discovered a plethora of unusual birds that could be found nowhere else in the world, having evolved in isolation on the island ……
The fossils of an enormous parrot, estimated to have weighed about 7kg, have been found near Saint Bathans in Central Otago. The Guardian reports on the discovery. Palaeontologists have named the new species Heracles inexpectatus…
Michael Johnston was out taking his boss’s dog for a dip in a nearby river in Ranfurly, when he stumbled across some unusual markings in the waterbed. Jonathan Ore writes about the discovery for a…
The world’s fattest species of parrot, the kākāpō, has had a record-breaking breeding season in New Zealand, with scientists saying the fortunes of the critically-endangered bird are finally turning around. There are only 147 adult…
University of Otago researchers in association with colleagues from Harvard University have discovered new evidence of what made some of New Zealand’s iconic birds such as the kiwi and extinct moa flightless. Dr Paul…
It’s as plump as a goose, has the face of an owl and waddles like a duck. It sleeps in the day and is active at night. And it can climb just about anything…
New Zealand is three years into what many consider to be the world’s largest animal protection programme. The Predator Free 2050 government programme has a goal of removing all non-native pests by the year…
New Plymouth-born head of the Marine Megafauna Foundation and leading authority on whale sharks Simon Pierce has been overseeing a project on Nosy Be, an island off the northwestern coast of Madagascar, where there…
Kahurangi National Park, situated in the north-west corner of the South Island, the second-largest national park in the country, has expanded by 14 per cent, roughly half the size of Auckland. More than 64,000ha of…
The discovery of two extinct penguin subspecies in New Zealand is a cautionary tale of the threats faced by the waddling birds in the wild. Veronique Greenwood reports for The New York Times. For thousands…
Scientists at the University of Adelaide have revealed the African origins of New Zealand’s most mysterious giant flightless bird – the now extinct adzebill – showing that some of its closest living relatives are…
“New Zealand’s clean, green image took a beating this summer as tourists travelling through the countryside posted pictures of lakes and rivers off limits due to contamination by farm effluent, rubbish and human faece.”…
In Alega, American Samoa some delicious banana varieties are getting harder to find. A New Zealander, known only as Candyman, collects the fruit. Acquiring a new one can be as simple as trading with…
Whale whisperer Hori Parata was just seven years old when he attended his first mass stranding, a beaching of porpoises in Northland, their cries screeching through the air on the deserted stretch of sand. Seven…
Millions of amateur naturalists around the world have been tuning in to the secret lives of albatrosses as Department of Conversation (DOC) rangers on the Otago Peninsula employ YouTube in a bid to save…
Ahead of Penguin Awareness Day on 20 January, a story has been doing the rounds about The Wildlife Hospital in Dunedin. They are using baby onesies to aid in the recuperation of endangered yellow-eyed…
“Located at the bottom of the planet, New Zealand has a diverse range of landscapes in a country with a population that is tiny by world standards” and “it’s no surprise that New Zealand…
While whale strandings are not uncommon, they usually involve just a single animal rather than a whole group. The recent flurry of mass strandings on New Zealand beaches has brought…
The North and South Islands are moving closer together after a series of earthquakes in 2016 that lifted the sea floor, GNS Science has said. Over about a minute-and-a-half, parts of the Marlborough coast were…
Wellington could soon have kiwi nesting beside Parliament House thanks to an ambitious conservation project that aims to reintroduce New Zealand’s iconic national bird to the capital city within the next decade. There are 68,000…
The Kererū – “a native green and bronze wood pigeon with a taste for fermented fruit has been named the 2019 bird of the year in New Zealand” in a poll organised by Forest…
Every December, the Fiordland crested penguins, Eudyptes pachyrhynchus, which live on the South Island, disappear, Jason Daley reports for the Smithsonian journal. A new satellite study shows the penguins migrate up to 7000km to…
New Zealand’s oldest and most sacred tree, Tāne Mahuta (Lord of the Forest), stands 60m from death, as a fungal disease known as kauri dieback spreads unabated across the country. Despite stringent efforts by…
Kiwis for kiwi is a national charity working with community and Māori-led conservation projects to put a stop to the horrific decline of our national icon. With the support of Old Mout Cider, they have…
A huge southern right whale frolicking in Wellington harbour brought the capital’s waterfront to a standstill last week as locals skipped work to catch a glimpse of the animal. Southern right whales used to be…
“Seabirds are more at risk of dying due to plastic in New Zealand than anywhere else in the world, new research presented to parliament has shown.” Eleanor Ainge Roy reports for
At Forest and Bird’s 2018 Conference, New Zealand Conservation Minister Eugenie Sage announced funding for the first step in the country’s “most ambitious island pest eradication”. Sage has committed $2 million over the next three…
To try to keep New Zealand’s Mountain Parrots “out of harm’s way, conservationists have developed roadside kea gyms which is equipped with ladders, spinning flotation devices, swings and climbing frames,” as reported in an…
New Zealand is rich in wildlife and, because of its isolation, there are hundreds of plants and animals that evolved here that cannot be found anywhere else. The country’s giant wētā (wētā punga) managed…
Every March, glacier “watchers” take to the skies to photograph snow and ice clinging to high peaks along the length of New Zealand’s Southern Alps. Researchers Andrew Lorrey, Andrew Mackintosh and Brian Anderson write…
There are 68,000 kiwi left in New Zealand, and they are declining at the rate of 2 per cent per year. A century ago, there were millions. Outside the predator-free zones, kiwi chicks and…
It has been a busy first six months for Dubai Safari under the stewardship of its technical director, New Zealander Timothy Husband, Nick Webster reports for The National. Too big for owners to manage…
A new population of at least 700 blue whales has been found living between the North and South Islands. The gigantic marine mammals are genetically distinct from whales found in the neighbouring Pacific and…
“A spectacular sinkhole the length of two football fields and the depth of a six-story building has opened up on a New Zealand farm” near the North Island town of Rotorua, writes Guy Birchall in…
Life can be tough when you’re a blue penguin. For starters, you are no taller than a house cat and weigh less than a kilogram. That means many other creatures – rats, ferrets and…
A fossil found in South Canterbury is now one of the earliest members of the filter-feeding family of behemoths known as baleen whales. Modern baleen whales include many of the world’s largest cetaceans, such…
“It’s likely you’ve never heard of a hihi, let alone seen one in the wild. Also known as stitchbirds, these colourful little critters are a true taonga. They’re only found in New Zealand, and…
“If you want to experience a starry night in New Zealand even when it’s cloudy, there’s an option. When foul weather hides the Southern Cross and the Magellanic Clouds of the southern skies, you…
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