Campbell Island Becoming a Haven for Endangered New Zealand Birds
Posted on: Tuesday, 21 March 2006, 21:00 CST
By ROBINSON, Jeremy
AT A GLANCE Campbell Island is the most southerly of New Zealand's outlying islands, 600km south-east of Stewart Island. The mountainous and rugged landscape covers 22,000ha.
The island was discovered in 1810 by sealing ship Perseverance, leading to the introduction of pests.
DOC's largest pest eradication programme cleared the island of rodents in 2001.
The Campbell Island teal was reintroduced in 2004 after a 20- year absence.
Other species now include the albatross, penguins and mollymawks.
The parakeet may also be re-introduced to the island in future.
Tourists can visit the island under a DOC permit system via a 48- hour boat ride.
`It's the first record of this species (petrel) breeding on the island (and) it's hoped that it will be followed by many other examples of this and a range of other seabird species that were wiped out by the rats.' Department of Conservation programme manager Pete McCleland A HARSH sub-antarctic island 600km south-east of Stewart Island now appears to be a "little Garden of Eden" for endangered New Zealand birds.
Department of Conservation programme manager Pete McCleland confirmed a research team returned from Campbell Island this week to report native species there were thriving.
Campbell Island was cleared of all rats and cats in 2001.
In 2004 and 2005 the Campbell Island teal was reintroduced to its natural habitat. "As well as finding ducklings, the team discovered nesting remains and unbanded adult ducks, which are last year's ducklings," Mr McCleland said.
Finding evidence of breeding so soon showed a fantastic response to the rat eradication and teal relocation programme, he said.
Other exciting findings were the discovery of Campbell Snipe at a site 3km from the closest previous record and the first discovery of a grey backed storm petrel chick.
"It's the first record of this species (petrel) breeding on the island (and) it's hoped that it will be followed by many other examples of this and a range of other seabird species that were wiped out by the rats." Mr McCleland said snipe were only discovered on Campbell Island in 2005 so DOC believed the "returning population" might be larger than anticipated.
"Amazing" plant regeneration and "huge" increases in insect numbers were also recorded by the team.
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Source: Southland Times, The
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