Experts are battling to save the remaining 68,000 kiwis in a country once home to millions
Eleanor Ainge Roy on Kapiti Island
Fri 1 Jun 2018 09.17 BSTLast modified on Fri 1 Jun 2018 22.00 BST
Below a mottled sky, a lone sea craft cuts across the water towards Kapiti Island. It’s been forsaken by people and gifted to the rare and vulnerable birds of New Zealand to forage undisturbed. Kiwi stepping carefully up the beach at midnight. Kokako waking no one with their shrill calls. And hihi flitting freely through the dense native bush. With no predators allowed, the birds are confident and thriving.
“New Zealanders are a shy and reclusive bunch, the kiwi is a bird we identify with,” says Paul O’Shea, an administrator for Kiwis for Kiwi, a conservation group set up to save the bird from extinction.
“It’s as vital to protect the kiwi in New Zealand as it is to protect the orangutan in Borneo, the sumatran tiger in Indonesia, and the panda in China. Losing these species from the planet might not affect your day-to-day life, but it is a loss to the human experience.”
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