Newsletter #97
Top image: Banded Dotterel South Beach Kaikoura – Ailsa Howard
Tēnā koutou katoa,
Minutes of the General Meeting held 28 February are now available in the Members’ Area of the website, as too is the Manager’s report. Thanks to everyone who came along. Your input is always appreciated.
Our next General Meeting will be 1.30pm-5pm, 26 September 2025. This will follow our Annual General Meeting 1pm-1.30pm at the Department of Conservation office, 31 Nga Mahi Road, Sockburn.
Upcoming events:
- Proposed Banded Dotterel Breeding Sanctuary at Kaikoura. Please contact Ailsa Howard if you would like to assist in this.
- braided Rivers Seminar, Lincoln University Wednesday 09 July, 2025. We’re currently developing the programme and I’ll notify members by email once it’s finalised and open for bookings. As with 2024, we will be charging a moderate fee to help cover some of the costs.
- Tarapirohe black-fronted tern workshop, Environment Canterbury, Thursday 10 July 2025. The format and duration of this workshop is currently being developed. If are interested in attending, please complete this online form as soon as possible.
Bird Surveys
- 2024 Waiau Uwha River Bird Survey (PDF)
- 2024: Ashley Rakahui River Bird Survey (Word)
- 2024: Upper Haketere Ashurton River Annual Bird Survey (PDF)
- 2024: Lower Hakatere Ashburton River Annual Bird Survey (PDF)
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Please remember to send me your bird surveys when they are completed. These are added to each of the river pages on the website. This helps researchers and community groups to discern trends over time.
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Please also send a copy to Miles Burford at ECan, as Miles is compiling an amazing database with the aim of eventually making it accessible online through Canterbury Maps.
News/articles
- Blythe Valley Community Catchment Group field day Sunday 30 March focused on the group’s successful trapping programme, followed by a walk through native planting sites. After lunch, you’ll visit a wetland under restoration, then drive to a spectacular lookout and out to the Nape Nape coast. See here for more details; booking is essential.
- The Ashley Rakahuri Rivercare Group are running a writing competition for young people ‘to stand up for an ecological gem in need of help.’ The competition is now open and runs until 11 April 2025.Industries back continued discharges into waterways, but better compliance
- Didymo: The invasive freshwater algae has been detected in Te Tautea o Hinekakai/Devils Punchbowl Creek near Arthur’s Pass.
- Industries back continued discharges into waterways, but better compliance – Newsroom
- Loss of forests brought new birds to NZ during the last Ice Age – we’re witnessing a similar process now. – The Conversation
- Wisdom, the world’s oldest known bird at 74, has a new chick: The Laysan albatross (Phoebastria immutabilis), or mōlī in Hawaiian, was spotted caring for her chick – Mongabay
- Buried in the U.S. Interior Department Secretarial Order on “Unleashing American Energy” is an attack on birds, indicating the reversal of “Regulations Governing Take of Migratory Birds; Revocation of Provisions,” 86 Fed. Reg. 54642.
- Declared extinct: slender-billed curlew (Numenius tenuirostris) – The Revelator
- Bird Flu (H5N1): is now rampant across the U.S. in poultry farms and dairy cattle (around 1,000 herds at last count).The new U.S. administration has left the WHO, shut down parts of the CDC, NIH, and undertaken mass firings of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and other Federal agencies, which is limiting monitoring and a response. At this time, there is no evidence that the H5N1 strain of avian influenza circulating globally can be spread easily from human to human and it has not yet appeared to have entered Aotearoa. The Department of Conservation (DOC) is “currently preparing for an outbreak”. Recommend that you download these fact sheets:
And visit these websites:
Research & Reports
- 2025: Lamb et al; Relative Pest Abundances of Rangitahi/Molesworth Recreation Reserve, Spring 2024. WMIL (PDF)
- 2025: Shaw et al; Global meta-analysis shows action is needed to halt genetic diversity loss, Nature 29 January (Open access)
- 2025: McDowell et al; Anthropogenic nutrient inputs cause excessive algal growth [in rivers] for nearly half the world’s population, Nature Communications 16 |1830 (Open access)
- 2025: Copping et al; Solar farm management influences breeding bird responses in an arable-dominated landscape, Bird Study 12 Feb. Researchers studied six solar
farms in the UK, finding that they contained greater numbers and diversity of
birds, as compared to arable farmland. These benefits could be magnified by
managing the farms with biodiversity in mind. - 2025: Ryan-Keogh et al; Global decline in net primary production [oceanic] underestimated by climate models, Nature Communications Earth & Environment 6 | 75 (Open access)
- Plain English article (Open access)
- 2025: Zhang et al; Shellfish and shorebirds from the East-Asian Australian flyway as bioindicators for unknown per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances using the total oxidizable precursor assay, Journal of Hazardous Materials 487 (open access)
- 2025: Pinsky et al; Warming and cooling catalyse widespread temporal turnover in biodiversity. Nature 638 pp995-999. “…assemblages with limited access to microclimate refugia or that faced stronger human impacts on land were especially responsive to temperature change, with up to 48% of species replaced per decade.”
- 2025: Wan et al; Pesticides affect a diverse range of non-target species and may be linked to global biodiversity loss. Nature Communications 16 | 1360 (Open access) “Negative effects were more pronounced in temperate than tropical regions but were consistent between aquatic and terrestrial environments, even after correcting for field-realistic terrestrial and environmentally relevant exposure scenarios.”
Study locations across the globe are shown (world map in World Robinson projection). A literature search identified study locations for insecticide impact on animals (820 locations), plants (112 locations) and microorganisms (56 locations), for fungicide impact on animals (148 locations), plants (74 locations) and microorganisms (52 locations), and for herbicide impact on animals (286 locations), plants (161 locations) and microorganisms (69 locations), respectively, from a total of 1705 published articles from 1497 locations. Nineteen articles included more than one study location (range 2–5). Grey and non-English literature were not included in this meta-analysis. Map © ARCGIS Software. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.
Donations
BRaid is an Incorporated Society (No: 2453663) with Charitable Status (Registration Number CC50089). Membership is free but donations are much appreciated. Donations can be made to BRaid Inc. Account number: 01 0877 0818466 00. Please include your name in the reference line and ideally email us, so that we can thank you and send you a receipt. Donations are tax deductible citing our NZ Business Number 9429043210572.
