Trust ProjectsDepartment of Conservation chick translocation projectThe translocation project was carried out before the Trust was formed. Between 2005 and 2008, a DoC coordinated project involving the Kaikoura community moved nearly 300 Hutton’s shearwater chicks from the mountain colonies to artificial burrows at a Kaikoura Peninsula site owned by the Kaikoura Charitable Trust. There, the chicks imprinted on the new site before migrating to the ocean off Western Australia. After 2-4 years away, about 10% of these birds In 2008-2009, the first birds returned to the Peninsula proving that this project to create a third colony will work. |
Peninsula colony predator-proof fence
Experience during the translocation process and since has emphasised the importance of having a suitable predator-proof fence around the colony. Without the fence the colony may not survive. and the effort put into the translocation project will have been futile. With a successful fundraising campaign complete, the fence may be in place in November before the next batch of birds come back from Australia. |
will come back to the Peninsula site rather than the mountain colonies. The chicks were hand-reared with a cocktail of sardines and water until they were ready leave. Despite intensive trapping and low-level predator-proofing at the colony, some chicks were lost, mainly to cats, before they could leave.