Since about two weeks our dear birds have begun to return to Te Rae o Atiu, the translocation colony on the peninsula. This is a busy and social time for the birds as they are re-establishing pair bonds and settling into their burrows to eventually start laying their eggs in November. At sea you will be able to observe Hutton’s shearwater flock up in big rafts, a typical behaviour at the start of the season. Social time 🙂

It’s time to celebrate the start of another season with these wonderful birds who call Kaikoura and its mountains their only home. But it’s also time to be aware and start looking out for them again. Not only out at sea when approaching rafting birds (go slow!) but also on the roads at night as also adult birds can fall victim to light disorientation and crashlanding in unfavourable weather conditions. as there is a lot of commute between the colonies and the sea at the beginning of the season, the likelihood of this happening is higher now compared to later in the season. It can happen anytime though. As such we urge locals as well as visitors to be driving slow and with care after nightfall and keep a close eye on dark shapes on the road. Due to their grey colour, Hutton’s are not easily detected on roads at night. In addition to that, they won’t fly off!

Please take care of our Titi at this time. Follow us on facebook to hear updates from our peninsula colony throughout the breeding season. Thank you 🙂

As the breeding and now also the fledging season draws to an end, we are celebrating another year of caring for our special bird with our annual Farewell event. Please join us in wishing them well on their journey out at sea until they arrive back at our shores again in August.

Enjoy a visit to the peninsula colony, a good yarn over morning tea and the end of season updates by our trustees.

You can find all the event info on our poster here:

Hello dear friends of the Hutton’s.

Time appears to fly faster than any shearwater ever could! And we apologise for the period where you might have gotten the feeling that thee is only cobwebs gathering on this site. A few internal challenges have kept us from tending to this site in an appropriate manner. We promise betterment! 😉

Let’s kick it off with announcing this season’s FLYSAFE program being up and running, with a great group of dedicated volunteers from within the Kaikoura community supporting us in our annual search and rescue operations for crashlanding Hutton’s shearwater fledglings.

You ca find more details under our fallout / crashlandings tab on this page.

Since late last week, birds have started to fall, so it is high time to keep your eyes peeled for shearwaters on the roads, the curb, carparks, you driveway or backyard. If you find a bird, gently pick it up, place in a card board box and take to the Hutton’s Hub on Ludstone road next to the DOC office (follow the signage). From here our teams will see to their safe release but will also deal with injured birds. Record rescue data in the log sheets at the hub.This will help us to work towards fallout mitigation in the future.

You can also help by keeping your cats inside at night during March and April and drive extra carefully at night and in the early hours of the morning. Grounded Hutton’s shearwaters are unable to take off o their own once on flat solid ground. So they won’t fly off in front of your car!

We appreciate your support,

thank you 🙂

The results are in 🙂

We had the last bird rescues recorded on 14th April, which brings this season’s number of fallen Hutton’s shearwater fledglings to 85.

Of these 18 died upon impact, from predation  or roadkill, where the latter was the dominant cause of mortality.

In addition, 17 birds were injured but could successfully be rehabilitated.

As in previous years, about 80% of fallen birds could be rescued, which is not least due to the great support from the Kaikoura community looking after our precious birds.

Fallout concentrated along Kaikoura’s coastal roads, and in particular along the Esplanade.

The fallout numbers from this season as well as the distribution of rescue locations compare to results from previous years. We are looking at a ‘moderate’ fallout season. However, we hope to be able to reduce numbers by working with KDC and the community on mitigating fallout, which is predominantly caused by light pollution and according disorientation of birds having to reach the sea at night.

For more detail, follow this link to see our ppt presentation on this year’s fallout season. Make sure you activate ‘show speaker notes’ under the ‘view’ tab to see explanations accompanying the slides.

If you want to read a bit more ‘science’ on the subject, ask us for a copy of “Investigation of fallout events in Hutton’s shearwaters (Puffinus huttoni) associated with artificial lighting.” Notornis, 2017, Vol. 64: 181-191.

We finish this season with a massive thanks to our inspired, passionate and dedicated team of volunteers we have been blessed with this year. You have been fabulous!!!

Please read the flyer for our Farewell Event to be held this Sunday 7th April. Everybody Welcome!

FLYSAFE 2019 – Help our Titi fledglings to reach the sea.

Our formerly fluffy chicks have now grown most of their shiny new adult feathers and will put them to the test over the coming 1.5 months when leaving their burrows for the first time to fly out to sea.

Not all of them will be successful and as such the time of the year has come again to be extra vigilant and WATCH OUT FOR CRASHLANDED HUTTON’S SHEARWATERS in and around Kaikoura.

To support and facilitate the rescue of birds on the ground, this year’s FlySafe Campaign will run from 1^st March to 7^th April 2019.

The HUTTON’S HUB at 115 Ludstone Road (next to DOC office) is open 24/7 to receive rescued birds. From here they will be examined and safely released.

For queries or assistance, you can ring our dedicated trustee Nicky McArthur (021 351 355) who is happy to help.

Please find more information on how you can support FlySafe on our info poster here.

Read up on further details and background info under our Crash Landings / Fallout tab here.

Become an active supporter of FlySafe by joining this year’s Volunteer Workforce. If you want to:

• Raise public awareness of this annual occurrence throughout your community,
• Help out on night patrols as part of one of our Rescue and Release teams,
• Get involved in collecting useful scientific data about the Titi that crashland in Kaikoura,
• Be part of our Hutton’s Hub monitoring team,

you can register your interest here.

FlySafe 2018 is here!

Our young Titi are getting ready to fledge and will begin their maiden flights from the mountains to the sea from early March to mid April. As they fly at night, they can become disorientated by bright lights in and around Kaikoura and crash-land before they reached the sea. Once on the ground, the birds are unable to take off by themselves and are at risk to be killed by cars, cats or dogs.

Find out HOW YOU CAN HELP to rescue fallen birds here or by consulting our posters.