In New Zealand 50 kiwi were released into the hills of Wellington. Conservationists are calling this move an important step towards restoring the country’s wild kiwi population.
The first 25 North Island Brown kiwi from the Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari in Waikato and were initially released while the other half followed a week later.
The aim of the arrival of the birds is to help boost the number of kiwi in Wellington and is a milestone for multiple groups including iwi, landowners, founders and sanctuaries.
The group are part of the Kōhanga Kiwi breeding programme which is managed by Save the Kiwi and is Aotearoa’s largest predator-fenced sanctuary at 3400 hectares. A partnership has been achieved and represents a change in the way conservation was attained in repopulating kiwi, according to the founder of the Capital Kiwi Project, Paul Ward.
Working across 24,000 hectares of mostly private land, the Capital Kiwi Project is a community initiative. In order to restore a large wild kiwi population in Wellington, 4500 stoat traps are contained in hte area, which will help the kiwi live in an environment where they can thrive.
Photo: (c) NEIL HUTTON/DOC
