Our final day in Fiordland National Park was spent around Te
Anu, since the forecast was for rainy weather during the day. However, that was
not how it transpired, and it was in reality quite a pleasant morning in the
town. We started by visiting the Te Anu Wildlife Centre to see the feeding of
the two pairs of South Island Takahae that are kept there, since it is not
possible to see the species any other way. It was quite cool to see such a rare
bird, even though they were in captivity. The rest of the morning was
still chilling out by the lakeside, with its confiding New Zealand Scaup and
Black-billed Gulls. From mid-afternoon we set off in the car heading south,
driving the three hours to the town of Invercargil.
Once we finally arrived in Invercargil, we unpacked quickly
and I drove the half hour down to Tiwai Bay, arriving at 19:30, to check for
wading birds. Here there were two main targets for me, so it was extremely
frustrating to find that I could not drive to the site I wanted, falling about
two kilometres short of my final destination. I decided to persevere regardless
and walked the rest of the way to the location I wanted to check, along the
shoreline of the estuary.
Frustratingly, even from two kilometres away I could see
that there were no birds present on the beach, and it looked bleak that I would
find either target here. However, the tide was very high and slowly dropping so I positioned myself on the west side of the Brandy Point peninsula and waited here.
Helpfully this was the only location where I could actually see wading birds,
with a few Ruddy Turnstones trotting about in front of me. However, as the tide
began to fall, it started to expose areas of mud and sure enough birds started
to arrive.
The majority of the birds were Ruddy Turnstone, Bar-tailed
Godwit and Double-banded Plover, with a healthy contingent of South Island
Oystercatcher also present. With the scope I spent the remaining hours of
daylight filtering through as birds continued to arrive until there was a
couple of hundred wading birds feeding on the foreshore. Additionally, there
were a pair of Royal Spoonbill that dropped in at near dark, and a few Pied
Stilts were also present, a new species for me.
The one I really wanted to see here was New Zealand Plover,
the South Island subspecies of which is critically endangered with just over
100 birds left. They were one of the last wader species to arrive on the beach,
landing when a large portion of the estuary was already exposed. In total four birds
dropped in, all of them with colour rings, much to my relief. Since they were
not too far out I tried to approach the birds with my camera, but soon realised
that they were in fact approaching me, leaving me to sit still and wait. And
sure enough two individuals came so close that I could have touched them had I
wanted to, completely unfazed by my presence. Absolutely brilliant and a real privilege
to see such a rare species so close.
Sadly the light was not on my side, and I ended up driving
back to Invercargill in the dark. Still, it was an absolutely brilliant evening,
and one of the best days birding I had since arriving in New Zealand.
Fiordland National Park: Paradise Shelduck, Mallard, New Zealand Scaup, New Zealand Pigeon, Kelp Gull, Little Pied Cormorant, New Zealand Fantail, Silvereye, Welcome Swallow, Common Starling, Song Thrush, Common Blackbird, House Sparrow, Eurasian Chaffinch, Lesser Redpoll, European Goldfinch,
Awarua Bay: Black Swan, Pied Stilt, South Island Oystercatcher, Variable Oystercatcher, Double-banded Plover, New Zealand Plover, Bar-tailed Godwit, Ruddy Turnstone, Black-billed Gull, Kelp Gull, Black-fronted Tern, White-faced Heron, Royal Spoonbill, Swamp Harrier, Common Blackbird, Lesser Redpoll,
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