PENGUIN RESCUE NZ
Te whaka oraka o te takaraka
Weekly news
From the Sanctuary Manager, Rosalie Goldsworthy MNZM
rosaliegoldsworthy@gmail.com
rosaliegoldsworthy@gmail.com
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WATCH LIVE!
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 getting bigger every day Hello friends and family We learned during the week that there is a third killer on the loose among our penguin chicks. The upside is that there was nothing we could do to save the ones that died, the downside is that they are dead. It is called RDS (respiratory distress syndrome) and is fatal once symptomatic.  the Manuka is at its best The Norwegian volunteers have headed off to the north island and life is settling down a little. The spring growth, perfume and colour is amazing. The gulls have laid eggs on the headland and the hedge is full of nesting finches.  glorious cabbage trees On Tuesday the team came out for the weekly weigh here at the lighthouse. Some chicks have topped the 1.5kg mark and look fantastic. Our newest babies had diphtheria and have been treated. The ground had dried out enough for us to be able to get around without too much fuss.  well camouflaged babies At 8:30pm on Wednesday evening, Joe called me out and we watched a drone circling so low over the island that the gulls lifted off their eggs. We walked down the headland but could not see the operator. There were no cars in the carpark and no other sign of people present. Joe said that when he first saw it, it was sweeping over the penguin colony. By 9pm there was no more sign or sound of it, so hopefully it had gone.  a beautiful weed Thursday was our first clear round for some time. We weighed the chicks at the Moeraki colony and the heaviest was over 2 kg. The chicks at the Bluffs are all still young and small. We checked on 49 chicks and they were all okay. Sadly, yesterday another one had died so we now have 48 – same as last year. Have a great week! Rosalie  precious gifts Hello friends and family. The week began with full on treatment of chicks sick with Diphtheria. Hiltrun stayed over to help again on Sunday. By Monday, we were down to 9 nests being treated and all but 2 nests either hatched or pipping.  Oystercatcher chicks at Kawariki Bay The weather started off hot but then cooled to where it was comfortable in overalls. The volunteers went up to central Otago for the weekend with Jan, to bike some cycle trails, and were hosted by Walter and Theresa.  after the mildest winter in recorded history, Pohutukawa blooming in November Tuesday was a good day. No dead chicks and two new foster chicks from Green Island. The parents were super happy to greet their new chicks and for all 3 visits that day, the chicks were safely tucked under the parent. By then we were up to 58 chicks with 2 eggs to go. This was our famous lucky last female who has hatched last ever since she began breeding.  getting bigger The one remaining nest is not expected to hatch so we will hold it for foster chicks.  The gulls are back breeding on the headland All went down hill on Thursday. We had 4 dead chicks. One had an air embolism and was euthanized at the Wildlife hospital; one was predated, and the other 2 deaths were consistent with Respiratory Distress disorder.  Otago shags roosting By the end of Friday, we were down to only 5 nests to treat which was good news as we had a heavy rain warning for Saturday. The rain has arrived! The plants are growing in front of my eyes. Yesterday our last nest hatched, 3 weeks to the day from the first one. It seems we have been battling to save chicks lives much longer than that! Have a great week Rosalie   not out of danger yet Hello friends and family. Well, the lack of chick deaths did not last long. We had our first one on Sunday and by Tuesday, our DOC liaison man, Jim, had 4 bodies to deliver to the research project looking into the cause of death.  tiny scraps of life We were able to get bloods from 2 of them and found Malaria. These two will get further testing. Tuesday was a beautiful day with enough volunteers to have 2 teams on the job. This frees up the afternoon for other tasks. By the end of the day, we had 50 chicks. The chicks here were weighed and on Thursday we weighed the rest of them.  fishing in the Mataitai On Friday we had 5 more dead chicks and yesterday Robbie joined Hiltrun and I, and we had 3 more dead chicks. It gets hard to go out and look in the nests. This will pass.  It was a beautiful night to watch the eclipse Have a great week! Rosalie  Precious new life Hello friends and family What a difference a week makes! By Wednesday we had 16 chicks and 7 of them had Diphtheria. On one hand we are so thrilled to have these precious babies and on the other we fear for their lives.  Posers On Tuesday, our team was up to 8 members, so we were able to split and send 4 to monitor the Moeraki colony and 4 of us went to Katiki Beach to make the nest there possible to save the chicks. We had a plan – a good plan. With everyone in agreement we set out, fixed up the nest site, set the penguin to return to her eggs and she didn’t! Fortunately, we chose to go away and within 5 minutes she was back on her eggs, and all was right with the world.  Native Iris Once we have Diphtheria in the population, we check the nests every day as new cases can be saved if caught quickly. On Wednesday I was able to pass the Toptip on to Kate (bless her) and focus on penguin welfare. Not only did we see dolphins swimming past, but we also found a whistling frog. Robbie took the volunteers off to his place in the afternoon so I could recoup for Thursday.  What's missing? On Friday, we found our first dead chick. It had died within 24 hours of hatching and sadly, that does happen. It could be any of a lot of reasons associated with hatching, but we cannot do much about these deaths. We have had very warm days and the chicks are struggling to hatch as the membranes in the egg dry out and become leathery. We had 32 chicks, 26 of which need treatment for Diphtheria. We had 46 eggs left to hatch.  On the street corner, waiting for the young females to arrive Yesterday we were up to 43 chicks and no more deaths. My idea of paradise. Beautiful sunny day with a breeze to take the heat out, healthy chicks and spare penguins who were just chilling or having political meetings on the landing. Long may it last! Have a great week! Rosalie  When you don't have a wife...... Hello friends and family We have entered the starting gates of activity in the new season. On Tuesday we shuffled eggs to create spaces for eggs from other places that cannot be monitored. We are proud to be part of the collaborative effort to save the Hoiho. To be able to help, we must not solve tomorrow’s problems today. We visited the Katiki Beach nest and found the male to be Mr KB who is on his 3rd young wife in 3 years. Saving her life is now one of our top priorities. I am sure that he would approve of that.  Terns to warm the heart Our two new volunteers from Norway arrived on Tuesday night and on Wednesday we went for an orienteering walk around these 2 colonies. That was good prep for our Thursday rounds because it rained the whole day. We got lots of wet gear, but more importantly, 22 mm of rain for all the new plantings.  The shag chicks learn to collaborate from a young age It carried on raining on Friday, so we went to town and visited Robbie and Barb which managed to take up most of the day.  Native iris blooming in the rain Yesterday Hiltrun came up and WE HAVE CHICKS! One in each colony. How awesome is that! What a special week – a tui came and visited for several days, the terns are still on the island, and we have new chicks. Have a great week! Rosalie  Mrs 0 has been found Hello friends and family We are racing towards hatching! On Tuesday, we were joined by 3 penguin people from Dunedin. We love having them come up because we can all talk penguin stories to an empathetic audience. They came for the last of the egg candling Once again, on the first look, we have a high fertility rate. We took the penguin in care to Kawariki Bay for a soft release in our penguin tent.  Blooming broom The penguins remain very settled which is a bonus. All around us, spring is unfolding, and we have an abundance of blossom, perfume, bird song and real warmth in the sun. Murray supplies us with trays of seedlings and Jan, Trii and I are potting them up. Soon I will run out of space to put them so maybe they can go back to Murray’s place. It is very pleasant in the garden doing this work.  a guest in our colony On Wednesday Robbie and I went to feed the penguin in soft release, and, just as we had hoped, the spare male was standing by the tent taking a great interest in the sweet young thing inside. We fed her and decided to open the tent so they could meet. We are wanting to encourage her to move to a safe place. Twice she has been found on a public beach with loose dogs.  clematis Thursday was one out of the box. Firstly, the Clematis in the garden is blooming. Then, when we went down to the point, there were 100+ White fronted terns roosting on the island with the red-billed gulls. The monitoring rounds went smoothly and then we went to Kawariki Bay to make sure our soft release penguin did not need feeding. There in the tent was the adult male, I guess he was waiting for the young one to come home, she had gone fishing. We know the penguins like the tent, but that was unexpected.  too big to fit on the screen! Then to top off the day, Elaine and Bronwyn found a nest along Katiki Beach. It is one of the missing females from here. It will be interesting to find out who her partner is. Yesterday was the first time this season that I have seen the Spoonbills. They nest just north of here and their return is always a good sign. Have a great week Rosalie  This is my box Hello friends and family This has been a steady as we go week. The penguins have settled on their eggs and only the young, single males are creating much noise. Next week we may be needed to supply some foster nests, so it was important to candle the eggs. This is earlier in incubation than we usually do it so on Thursday we ran a trial to ensure everything worked.  Play time for the seal pups It all went well. We started with eggs that had been incubating for more than 21 days and the embryos and air sac were easy to see. Yesterday Hiltrun and I did some more. We will be completing the job on Tuesday of next week.  The new stockade dominates the skyline So far, we have detected a high fertility rate with only 4 dud eggs. This is good news as a reflection on the penguins’ current health.  Not all eggs are created equal. We have one penguin in care. It is a chick from last season, a female with Malaria who is responding well to her treatment. She will be released this week. Have a great week! Rosalie  penguins playing in the snow Hello friends and family This week was dominated by an unseasonal cold snap. It started on Wednesday when it was my turn at the Toptip. I was well rugged up for the cold and the quiet was disturbed when the sun came out mid-morning and so too did the families stuck inside with their children for the school holidays. Overnight the snow came in on a strong southerly and stuck to the south faces of everything. It lingered for all of Thursday but had gone by Friday morning.  many spring blooms got frozen The other feature of the week was us stepping up to using the new penguin app in the field. We have now transitioned to using it in the field for data entry on the phone. It works best offline because the phone reception can be patchy and who has time to wait for buffering?  Dan checking Robbie's screen from my phone The penguins have settled down to incubating their eggs. We focused our search where we had missing pairs but found no more nests. We have 25 here, 14 at the Moeraki colony, and 3 at the Bluffs.  hopefully, death to mosquitoes The cold weather gave me a good incentive to get inside jobs done so I did the GST return and found that many of our Penguin Rescue members had renewed their memberships so thank you for that.  Shag babies hatched in the snow On Friday our delivery of potting mix arrived. I can now carry on with the potting up of tree seedlings without constantly running out of soil. I am having to shuffle them on outside as the hothouse is needed for the next batch. Have a great week! Rosalie |
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