Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Day 50 - Ulva Island

Day 50 - all about birds...
We woke up to another rainy day on Stewart Island. This morning we headed down to Golden Bay to catch a ferry over to Ulva Island. Ulva Island is just off the coast of Stewart Island, only a 10 minute ferry ride, and is a bird sanctuary. There are some nice walks around the island and we were looking forward to being outside. Some of the walks go along the beach. . . .















where we spotted an oyster catcher looking for food in the sand. They lay their eggs in the sand along the beach and are said to be very protective of their nests. If you see a pair of them together they say you should stay away so as not to get attacked!















Since we arrived in the morning it was nice and quiet on the island. We could hear the songs of many different birds, and were able to see a number of them as well.

Below is one of John's favorites, the Stewart Island Weka! They are pretty brave around humans, so you could get fairly close to them. They are a flightless bird and would not be around if it weren't for the sanctuary. They have rid the island of pests (possums, stouts and rats mainly) in order to allow the flightless birds to survive. When we were eating our peanut butter and honey sandwiches at lunch time, a weka would not leave us alone! It tried to hop onto our bags a couple of times and even John's lap! He told it to shoo and it proceeded to peck at his foot, too funny.















There were a few larger birds flying around, one being the Native NZ Pigeon, which is green with a white belly, and the other is the Kaka, seen below. These parrot-like birds are harder to see as they don't make very much noise and hang out far up in the trees, so we were lucky to see one!















One of the noisey little ones is the Bellbird seen below. Cute little ones huh?















Another bird that wasn't seen too often is the Red-headed Parakeet seen below. There is also a version that doesn't have a red head, and we saw that as well, but no photos were taken of that one.






















Ohhh, the cute little Robins! These little guys were pretty brave as well. If you stayed in one place for awhile they would come closer to you as they hopped along the ground looking for yummy critters in the dirt. They were keen to be around people as more critters are exposed after us humans walk and stir up the dirt. John "bird whisperer" also had one of the Robins try to land on his lap.






















The female Saddleback is below hunting for food.















This is the male version. They were often found together in pairs and moved really fast through the bush, so it was hard to keep track of them.















We spent some time on the beach and found the small sea anemones just off the shore in some of the tidal pools.















Along one of the walks on the beach there was a huge tree with a rope swing. John had to test it out!






















In the afternoon it finally cleared up a bit, so we went up to lookout point to get a view of the water and native bush around us.















The last picture is of a Tui. They have an amazing array of song notes and calls, and it is beautiful to listen to. They have the white feathers below their beaks that shake and vibrate with their calls. They are kind of a blackish/greenish bird, depending on the light.
















We stayed on the island until 4pm. It was a lot of fun to be bird watching and enjoying nature. When we got back we cooked up the rest of our blue cod from fishing yesterday and relaxed, enjoying the evening.

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