Whiturau..My Little Kiwi

With the smell of sulfur a thing of the past, we headed to Waitomo, eager for our next activities but sad that we had a mere two days left with volunteers from across North America. The travel day was anything but boring though. Katie and Jono made sure that every long travel day we had was broken up by visiting natural habitats, national parks, heritage points, and quaint towns, but this days stops by far topped them all.

Our first stop was the Kiwi Encounter. Besides the fruit and besides that fact that NZers are referred to as kiwis, the kiwi is New Zealand's national bird. It is a medium sized, nocturnal bird that is seen on anything and everything NZ. It is one of many flightless birds found in this fantastic habitat. The unfortunate news, however, is that the kiwi are endangered. Just imagine having a part of your national identity being threatened by extinction. It is something that cuts deep into the heart of all those in NZ.

When the Maori people were originally the only ones to live on the islands, they kiwi thrived. They had no land predators and as a result there was never an idea that the bird could be threatened. It was the arrival of the Europeans that brought the problems for the kiwi. The addition of livestock and other land animals took the habitats and the life from these precious little birds. The most threatening ones were the dogs and the much hated animal in NZ: the stoat. The stoat was brought over to control the rapidly growing rabbit population [also caused by European introduction]. The stoat's specialty? The kiwi egg.

The kiwi are unique in the fact that the size of the egg they lay is the biggest in relation to their body size. We found out it would be the equivalent of a human having a 35 lb child! Yeah. Not feeling that. In any case, the kiwi egg was and is the stoat's specialty. After the female kiwi lays her egg, it is the male's job to sit on the egg until it hatches. Originally, the male might leave the egg to go get food and know the egg would be ok since the kiwi had no predators. When the stoat was brought over, the same practice was carried on by the male, but this time with negative results. The stoat will wait up to three weeks waiting for the male to move, so that it can have its meal! Not cool stoats, not cool.

We have seen stoat traps all over NZ trying to rid the land of this harmful predator to their native, national bird, but the kiwi are still endangered and are still being harmed. Their numbers are lingering and only 5% of their eggs survive. Clearly, these poor birds were in need of help. That's where places like the Kiwi Encounter come into play.

We got to take a tour of their facilities and see just what exactly they do to help. After the eggs are laid, the kiwi encounter goes around and retrieves the eggs once the males have left. They bring them back to their base where they care for the kiwi from when it hatches until it turns 6 months. The kiwi are most vulnerable during that period. They are cared for with little human contact and at the end of that period are released back into the wild where they are able to defend themselves. The Kiwi Encounter relies completely on donations, so clearly people are getting the picture. It costs them nearly $5000 to do this for each kiwi. That's a lot of money.

We were able to raise a sum of money between all of us to sponsor a kiwi. Whiturau is its name and he or she is going to be released back into the wild on the 16th! Whiturau was found on Maori land, so when it gets released, there will be an enormous Maori celebration for it. Wish we could be there, but unfortunately we are back in our homelands then. We can still say, however, that we helped the national bird while we were there, and gave it another chance at life.

Here's to you little kiwi. Cheers.