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Tasman River

Biodiversity & cultural significance

Important Bird Areas on Tasman River: links to 6-page PDF file that includes maps, habitat types, and threats relevant to this river. This document was extracted from Forest & Bird’s 177-page 20Mb file on all rivers, lakes, and coastal areas.

This video showcases the Tasman River’s magnificent setting at the foot of Aoraki Mt Cook, on of the areas where black stilt/kakī live, the last stronghold for the most endangered wading bird in the world.

Part of the Upper Waitaki River catchment, the 25km Tasman River is an outflow of the Tasman, Murchison, Hooker and Mueller Glaciers in Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park. It is included here as a separate page because significant conservation activities are being undertaken in this conservation land, as part of Project River Recovery which has been incorporated into the much larger recently formed Te Manahuna Aoraki Conservation Project.

Conservation activities

Te Manahuna Aoraki is a large-scale conservation project focused on restoring the iconic natural landscapes and threatened species of the upper Mackenzie Basin and Aoraki National Park.

Launched in November 2018, the project will enhance biodiversity across 310,000 hectares of New Zealand’s most stunning landscapes, including braided river systems, alpine habitats and Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park.

The area is home to many endangered species like kea, rock wren and the scree weta in the alpine zone and braided river species like wrybill, robust grasshopper, banded dotterel, and the world’s rarest wading bird, kakī/black stilt. See their 2019 Annual Report.

Water flow

Facing North East: water from the Hooker Glacier feeds into the Tasman River from the western side of Aoraki Mt Cook (centre background)
Facing North East: water from the Hooker Glacier feeds into the Tasman River from the western side of Aoraki Mt Cook (centre background)
Facing South: Tasman Glacier (foreground – darker areas are moraine gravels over the ice) on the eastern side of Aoraki Mt Cook (right), and Tasman River (centre back).
Facing South: Tasman Glacier (foreground – darker areas are moraine gravels over the ice) on the eastern side of Aoraki Mt Cook (right), and Tasman River (centre back).

References & research material