Newsletter #105
Tēnā koutou katoa,
Thank you to everyone who attended our last General Meeting and our Annual General Meeting. The minutes, reports, and finances for these meeting are available here. Our previous officers and committee members were re-elected, and we would like to welcome Bec Simpson from Boffa Miskell and Grant Davey from ARRG as our newest committee members.
Our next General Meeting will be held Thursday 26 February 2026, and out next AGM had been tentatively set down for Thursday 24 September 2026.
We have also confirmed that the next Braided Rivers Conference will be held at Lincoln University Wednesday 08 July 2026. To that end, we are now inviting expressions of interest (not abstracts at this stage) to present. If you have not previously presented or attended one of our seminars or conferences, we recommend browsing past presentations here. The committee will be meeting early next year to shortlist possible speakers.
As we head into Christmas, if you’re looking for some great presents (including for yourself!) we highly recommend the Braided River Bird collection of Karikaas’ award winning cheeses. These are seriously yummy individually boxed cheeses presented in beautiful ‘braided river bird’ packaging. My personal favourite is the ‘black-fronted tern’ Pumahana. And as a bonus, a portion of every sale goes to the Ashley Rakahuri Rivercare Group. To date, Karikaas has donated $4,925 to ARRG for operating costs of predator control and monitoring. You can order these cheeses online and have them delivered or drop by their shop at 156 Whiterock Road, Loburn, open 11am-3pm Mondays-Wednesdays.
Enjoy!
Ngā mihi,
Sonny Whitelaw
manager@braid.org.nz
Bird surveys
News/articles
- Pūkorokoro Shorebird Centre are running a Field Course 31 January-6 February 2026. “The course includes both mist-netting and cannon-netting. On these days you will be catching and banding birds for research purposes. This ‘bird-in-the-hand’ experience is for most participants the highlight of the course.”
- DOC: Flight initiation distances PDF & XLS: DOC aim to develop a database of distances at which birds exposed to an approaching human activity exhibit alert behaviour. If you can help, the PDF explains the research and techniques and the XLS spreadsheet to record your findings.
- Science Media Centre: Biggest beech mast in seven years – Expert Reaction
- Astrum Earth (Youtube 33mins): Don’t let the title fool you, This River Will Kill You in 10 Seconds is a fascinating look at several rivers around the world, including here in Aotearoa, as stunning as they are unexpected.
- Stuff: Think a 1-in-100-year flood happens once a century? Think again Good explainer on why this term is misleading.
Research & Reports
- Lower Upukerora Restoration Group Annual Report 2024/2025
- Coleridge Habitat Enhancement Trust: Abbreviated minutes from their last meeting. Some good thing happening in this space.
- Nature (open access article): Digital flocks, predators allow ecologists to simulate real-world animal behaviour
- NIWA: Flood hazard across Aotearoa New Zealand New mapping tool; recommend using the ‘Flood Depth 1% AEP +3°C Warning’ layer, as per below, for built structures as global average temperatures of 3°C is currently the most likely scenario before 2100.
- IUCN Red List “This update includes reassessments of 1,360 bird species and completes the eighth comprehensive assessment of all bird species worldwide by BirdLife International. Involving thousands of experts over nine years, 1,256 (11.5%) of the 11,185 species assessed are globally threatened. Overall, 61% of bird species have declining populations – an estimate that has increased from 44% in 2016.”
- Bird Flu preparations: Recently SONZI ran a training workshop tailored for the sanctuary and wildlife sector on preparing for a potential for Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI), incursion. A reminder that the risk has not gone away, due largely to migratory species. See the FAO current update. The symptoms video is here; including waterbirds and gulls and the workshop video is here.
