By Sorrel Hoskin

Without help, kiwi - the nation's iconic bird - could be extinct from New Zealand's mainland within 20 years.  It's a sobering thought. So what's being done about it in Taranaki?

Somewhere in Egmont National Park two little North Island Brown kiwi are curled up in their burrows fast asleep, at night the pair venture out to fossick in the undergrowth - their long beaks probing the soil for tasty morsels. Tara and Naki are unaware that they are part of something big - the first concerted effort in Taranaki to save the kiwi. They're the beginning of a project that will hopefully halt a downward slide: without help local kiwi could disappear within 20 years.

A man with vision

Enter the Taranaki Kiwi Trust, set up in 2001 to help get the New Zealand icon off the endangered species list. The Trust was the brainchild of local man Peter Winter - a visionary, conservationist and expert on Taranaki. He saw that unless locals banded together the wild kiwi population would be lost within our lifetimes.

Tara and Naki, released in April 2005, were the celebrated first of hopefully hundreds of kiwi released into the wild by the trust and Department of Conservation.

Home to the "Westies"

Taranaki is home to the largest population of North Island Brown kiwi says Kiwi Trust technical officer Cees Bevers. "We're the strong hold. We've got a western race of the kiwi - affectionately known as the 'Westies'."  There're around 8000 to 10,000 of the birds in Taranaki the Department of Conservation estimates - but it's difficult to tell - a nocturnal bird, kiwi are notoriously difficult to track.

Cees (pronounced "keith", but with an s on the end) is an ecologist with wildlife management training. His part-time role with the Kiwi Trust involves everything from egg collecting through to behind the scenes work - liaising with the Department of Conservation, networking and generally spreading the word in the community about the trust and its work.

Operation Nest Egg in the limelight

The Kiwi Trust is taking a multi-pronged approach to kiwi conservation in Taranaki. The project capturing most of the limelight is Operation Nest Egg - working with the Department of Conservation to increase the population of 60-80 adult birds in Egmont National Park. It's a doubled edged operation - pest trapping and introducing chicks from areas where there's no pest control.

Taranaki Kiwi Trust's Cees Bevers with a carefully collected kiwi egg. Image: Taranaki Daily News.

"You grab the eggs and hatch them out at Rotorua's Rainbow springs Kiwi Encounter - a specialised team with a high success rate. When they reach over 1kg - about six months old - they can defend themselves against most predators, and we release them into the park."

Taking the eggs to the centre gives the chicks a greater chance of survival. "We know that without any pest control, and through natural causes, 95 per cent of kiwi chicks die before they reach six months of age; an extraordinary scary figure, considering it is now believed kiwi can live for up to 50 to 60 years. Populations halve every 10 years because the chicks are taken out." If the trust can reverse that then kiwis can at least (metaphorically) tread water or grow in numbers.

The season has been spectacular - they'll easily reach the aim of ten chicks released into the wild. At the moment eight chicks and four second clutch eggs are being babysat at Rainbow Springs. That number is likely to increase as there're more eggs to collect - kiwi often lay a second clutch. "There's basically only about three months of the year when kiwi don't breed," says Cees. "But our collection season runs from about July/August through to April/May."

A kiwi female weighs around 3kg while the egg she lays weighs in at 500gms - a whopping 1/6th of her weight.   A kiwi can produce four to six eggs a year - but about half of those are duds, says Cees. Of the eggs that do hatch about 70 per cent are killed by predators before they reach six months old, another 20 per cent die of natural causes. Only 10 per cent of kiwi chicks survive to 6 months old and a mere 5 per cent last until adulthood. "So a kiwi couple will see only one chick every two years."

In the wild incubation takes 82 days and the male does the sitting. Once the eggs hatch the chicks are basically on their own. "They hit the ground running, instinct takes over and within a week they're foraging on their own." But it's then - when the young kiwi head out on their big OE that they are most susceptible to predators.

900 traps and counting...

The chicks from Rainbow Springs are bigger and able to stand up to predators with a penchant for kiwi. But there's no point in releasing young into an environment full of predators. Pest control is a huge project - 900 traps have been placed around the eastern side of the park. The variety of big wooden boxes are placed every 100 metres, for 86km of trap line.

"That's a heap of trapline to check, and we're aiming for 18 checks a year, which is pretty heavy going. Checking the traplines is our biggest cost - we get contractors in who check 6000ha - it's pretty hard on them." The death toll from the traps is encouraging - so far 3371 pests have been caught, most of those in the past 18 months: 571 stoats, 29 ferrets, 98 weasels, 9 feral cats, 2601 rats and 59 hedgehogs.

"We think we've now got a pretty low density of pests. You can see the downward trend on the trapping results."

The traps were bought by DOC and Kiwi Trust supporters - members of the public can donate a trap for around $65. Trap checking is one of the top priorities on our list - but it's something that is difficult to fundraise for. "It's not very sexy."

Educating Kiwis

But there's more to the Trust than that - education and inspiring people are key elements of the package that will hopefully lead to the trust eventually taking a back seat and guiding the public in kiwi conservation.

Cees has talked to schools and adults Taranaki wide. In the past year he has passed the message about kiwi onto nearly 2000 children, "they love it… primary school kids are the best because they go and tell people about it." Passing the message on and inspiring people to act is the key, he reckons.

Passing on the message: Cees Bevers talks to schoolchildren about saving the kiwi. Image: Taranaki Daily News

"We try to help people to help kiwi, because we can't do it all alone - it needs the public to buy into it." And they have.

The Kiwi Trust has been helping the Lake Rotokare Scenic Reserve Trust, setting up a three to five year plan, already into year two. The Rotokare plan is to build an 8.4km pest proof fence around 229 hectares of lake reserve and private land.

"At Purangi, the Eastern Taranaki Environmental trust has emerged, in part catalysed by our activities there. We get a lot of support from the Taranaki Regional Council; they've got plans to pest control over two and a half thousand hectares. They think there are 100 kiwi in the block."

Dogs in for a shock

Then there's the dog aversion programme started in October 2005, where dogs learn to avoid kiwi. Dogs are a threat to the breeding population says Cees. "A dog just has to grab a kiwi and it's a gonner, because they've got a very weak chest structure." Three Taranaki kiwi are known to have been killed by dogs in the past year.

A moving stuffed kiwi, droppings and feathers, kiwi sounds and an electric shock collar are used to train hunting dogs to stay away from kiwi. If the dog shows an interest in the bird a mild shock from the collar gives them a fright - and they learn to stay away. Thirty dogs went through the first programme, subsidised by the Kiwi Trust - they will have follow up training in one, two and five years.

The future looks bright

In 2006 a special operation will be kick started. It's an exciting programme encouraging farmers to set and check traps on their properties, in a bid to protect surrounding kiwi. Funded by a $50,000 grant from the TSB Community Trust the operation will pay for enough predator traps to cover 1000 hectares in the Taranaki back country. It's a big ask - checking traps is time consuming - but farmers have bought into it, says Cees. The ultimate aim is to connect all the trapping projects in Taranaki.

Yet another step is enlarging the area of protected forest on Mt Taranaki - the aim is to eventually include the whole park including the Pouakai Ranges.

 "We want to try and protect as many Taranaki kiwi as we can and ensure that the birds in Taranaki stay in Taranaki and maintain the levels - it's a massive job.  But we've made a good start," says a passionate Cees. "We've got to get out there and just cover the ground and help as many kiwi as we can - we can't let their population decline any more."

With passion like that spreading around the province the future for little kiwi like Tara and Naki is looking a lot brighter.