At least 55 hihi chicks have hatched in an Auckland regional park – exceeding all expectations of conservationists trying to reintroduce the rare bird to the mainland.<\/p>\n
The chicks were born in Shakespear Regional Park’s Open Sanctuary this summer following a major translocation project last year.<\/p>\n
Auckland Council, Shakespear Open Sanctuary Society and Ng\u0101ti Manuhiri Settlement Trust moved 40 adult hihi to the park from predator-free Tiritiri Matangi Island in June.<\/p>\n
Shakespear Open Sanctuary Senior Ranger Matt Maitland said the groups were thrilled to see so many new chicks emerging after just one breeding season.<\/p>\n
He said it was a great result compared with an unsuccessful translocation attempt in 2022.<\/p>\n
“They are the first hihi – one of New Zealand’s rarest forest birds – to hatch and succeed in the area since disappearing from mainland Auckland in the 1870s,” he said.<\/p>\n
Auckland Council Parks Committee chair Councillor Ken Turner said the population growth was a significant step to secure the future of the distinctive forest songbird.<\/p>\n
“The success of this project will give hihi the boost it needs to flourish again, and Aucklanders an opportunity to experience these little treasures in their natural environment,” he said.<\/p>\n
Nationwide, it is estimated there is about 2000 hihi.<\/p>\n
Auckland Council said staff and volunteers would continue to closely monitor the new population.<\/p>\n
Source: RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
At least 55 hihi chicks have hatched in an Auckland regional park – exceeding all expectations of conservationists trying to reintroduce the rare bird to the mainland. The chicks were born in Shakespear Regional Park’s Open Sanctuary this summer following a major translocation project last year. Auckland Council, Shakespear Open Sanctuary Society and Ng\u0101ti Manuhiri […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":12527,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[174],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nz-news"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12526"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12526\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12528,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12526\/revisions\/12528"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/12527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}