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Birdle 🇳🇿 15/09/2025

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https://birdle.nz

Voting for Bird of the Year closes on 28 September 2025.

Bird of the Year ‹ Forest & Bird

Today's visitor, moments after it started to rain heavily. 🐦

I want to thank Microblogger Patrick Taillon for putting me on to this 2 hour long video — LISTERS: A Glimpse Into Extreme Birdwatching which I watched over several sessions. 🐦

Partly documentary, partly mockumentary, it was a great look into the birds of North America and the folks who dedicate themselves to seeing / hearing them and adding them to personal lists.

I laughed a lot.

Two brothers learn about competitive birdwatching by becoming birdwatchers—spending a year living in a used minivan, traveling the country to compete in a ‘Big Year'.

First there was one, then two, Matuku moana | White-faced heron. 🐦

You never get too old to rescue puffins: it's part of who we are.

Summer Puffling Patrols: Saving thousands of baby puffins from light pollution 🐦:

In this 13-minute Wild Hope video from Nature on PBS, biologists Erpur Snaer Hansen and Lucas Canas document the Atlantic puffins that breed on Iceland’s Vestmannaeyjar (Westman Islands), where roughly 400 puffins exist for every human resident.

Meanwhile, it turns out we have our very own White-faced Heron outside the back door. 🐦

A dawn walk at the beach took me to the sandspit on the north side of the Ruakākā River mouth, a wildlife refuge, where birds nest. 🐦

There were quite a few NZ Dotterels and Variable Oystercatchers, along with black-backed gulls, a shag and possibly a duck.

No photos yet, but so far the birds I've spotted around here are:

• Mynah (they don't live as far south as Waikawa Beach)
• Sparrows
• Gulls
• Magpies
• White-faced heron

I may also have heard spur-winged plovers.

I've located my bird feeder, but haven't yet found the food … 🐦

We don't actually leave for a few days but I decided just before sunset on a sunny and relatively warm afternoon would be a good time to do a farewell visit to the beach.

My bird photography skills have rusted over winter. 😒 🐦

Turns out it's breeding season for the Tūturiwhatu | New Zealand dotterel. 🐦

Moments after I hung out the bird food the tauhou were eating their way through it. 🐦

Pīwakawaka | Tirairaka | Fantails are notoriously hard to photograph in flight as they flit, dart, squirl in the air. 🐦

Today was apparently "Sit On The Railing Day" which gave me a rare chance.

For comparison:

Piwakawaka: Length: 16 cm; Weight: 8 grams. (Not sure if the length includes the tail…)

Sparrow: Length: 15 cm; Weight: 28 grams.

I finally hung some bird food in the olive tree by our front door. Sparrows and Tauhou are enjoying it. 🐦

One of the great things about Meridian building a huge solar farm very close to our new house in Ruakākā is that first all kinds of investigations take place.

That's how I came to know that all the birds listed below have been observed within a radius of about 5 Km of our house. 🐦

As well as matuku, a number of other Threatened and At-Risk species of birds have been recorded within the Proposal site, namely, spotless crake/pūweto, dabchick/weweia, brown teal/pateke, banded rail/moho pereru, pied shag/karuhiruhi, little shag/kawaupaka, little black shag/kawau tui and pipit/pihoihoi as well as South Island pied oystercatcher/torea and Northern New Zealand dotterel/tuturiwhatu.

The white dot on the map below showing where various birds were spotted is 2 Km in a straight line from our house.

I'm specially excited that Bitterns | Matuku are in the area.

I also love the special engineering provision to help prevent cars and bittern colliding as the birds fly to a nearby location:

A 2.0 m earth bund and vegetation planted on top will ensure birds flying directly from the wetland will have sufficient height to avoid the road corridor as they will need to gain elevation to pass over the vegetated bund.

It's a good thing it's not Dotterel nesting season. Last night's tide seems to have been unusually high and would have wiped out the nest. They last nested just by that larger bit of driftwood only a couple of metres from the white tape. 🐦

When I first glimpsed a black bird hopping along the railing I assumed it was 'our' Blackbird. Then I realised it was actually a Tui. See the white bobbles on its throat in this terrible quick iPhone snap through the window. 🐦

Two Pied Stilts at the beach today: one doing yoga and the other taking a bath. 😆 🐦

Bit of a headache this afternoon and very slightly concerned about a bit of red in the corner of one eye, so I looked for a Favourite photo. This Kea from 2007. Possibly taken at Arthur's Pass. 🐦

A nide of 5 pheasant chicks wandered around in the rain by my window this morning. Here are two of the well-grown chicks. 🐦

I uploaded these two photos and asked Claude to identify both birds above, like this: identify this bird seen eating flax seeds in Waikawa Beach, Horowhenua, New Zealand. 🐦

I had my suspicions and they were confirmed when Claude replied:

This appears to be a chaffinch (Fringilla coelebs), specifically a male chaffinch based on its coloration. The bird has:

• A pinkish-orange/buff breast and face
• A bluish-gray head cap
• A distinctive perched posture on what looks like a dried flax seed pod or similar plant

Chaffinches are common in New Zealand, though they're not native - they were introduced from Europe in the 1860s. They're known to feed on seeds, including flax seeds, which aligns with your observation at Waikawa Beach in the Horowhenua region.

The setting of dried seed heads against the blurred green background is typical of New Zealand coastal and wetland areas where flax plants (harakeke) are common.

And for the second:

This appears to be a greenfinch (Chloris chloris), another introduced species in New Zealand. You can identify it by:

• Its predominantly yellow-green plumage
• Compact, finch-like body structure
• The positioning on the dried flax seed head (harakeke)

Greenfinches were introduced to New Zealand from Europe in the 1860s and have become well-established throughout the country. They particularly favor seeds, including those from flax plants, which explains why you've observed it feeding at Waikawa Beach.

Like the chaffinch in your previous image, this bird is taking advantage of the abundant seed resources provided by native New Zealand flax plants, despite being a non-native species itself. Greenfinches have strong beaks well-adapted for cracking open seeds.

Such an interesting 9 minute video: Successful season for rare New Zealand fairy tern! 🐦 :

Follow along as we incubate, hatch and hand-rear tara iti (New Zealand fairy tern) for release into the wild. First, they head to a purpose-built predator-proof area on the beach. It’s here that the chicks perfect their flying and fishing skills before joining the wild population.

Tara iti are Aotearoa New Zealand’s most endangered bird as there are just 35 adults existing today. Every successful chick that reaches breeding age is a massive win for the future of the species.

This morning I pulled a fresh T-shirt from the drawer. I don't generally have black clothes so I expected this to be my Presentation Zen T-shirt.

It was not. It was a black T-shirt with a white heron on the front. 🐦

Perhaps someone gave me this? I didn't recall I had it …

On this morning's rather brief walk I spotted a Royal Spoonbill at the lake, then two more, with a Dotterel, at the beach. 🐦

Also at the beach were a small flock of White-fronted Terns (only a few of them in this photo — I liked that group of four) and a Pied Stilt with unusual black eye patch.

This morning's dawn beach walk netted me a Matuku moana | White-faced heron. 🐦

And just like on this day, 06 March 2023, a Ngutuparore | Wrybill. Note how the bill curves to the bird's right.

As I lay awake in the middle of the night I wondered if animals suffer from insomnia. Is there some little bird out there, clinging to her perch, worrying about whether she'll find enough food come daylight? How will she survive the next storm? How are her babies coping? 🐦

Then I went back to sleep.