News

November 2019

With fewer than 40 birds, the tara iti/fairy tern is critically endangered and despite intensive management has teetered on the brink of extinction since the 1970s.

Mr and Mrs Red, as they are affectionately known, due to the red identification bands on their legs, have produced the first egg for the season. Read more >>

Fairy Tern Newsletter

February 2019

In this issue:

Fairy tern news; Thanks; Museum exhibition; Fish Study; Recent events; Newsroom stories.

Read more >>

December 2018

In this issue:

Fairy tern news; Calendars; Museum display; Fishing Study; Coming events.

Read more >>

June 2018

In this issue:

Thanks: Sheila Coombs, Bennetts, Malcolm Pullman.

Trapping, Fairy Tern Recovery Workshop, Obama Visit Highlights Land Grab, Mangawhai Dredging Covers Nest Site, Mangawhai Museum Special Fairy Tern Exhibition, Fish Study, Calendar.

Rangers’ reports: Waipu, Mangawhai, Pakiri, Papakanui.

Read more >>

February 2018

In this issue:

Fairy tern news; Summary of Breeding results.
Events: Waipu, Mangawhai, Papakanui; Coming Events; Fish Study; Te Arai.

Read more >>

Our NZ Fairy Tern voted Seabird of the Year

It's our Tern.

Click here to read more details from Heather Rogan, Convenor, New Zealand Fairy Tern Charitable Trust

New Facebook Page

New committee member, Ria, has created a wonderful Facebook page for the trust. Check it out by clicking on this link: NZFTCT on FaceBook

NZ fairy tern Population

An August 2014 update from David Wilson, DoC Ranger, Warkworth:  From “the Kaipara wader census and other fairy tern sightings, and taking into account [earlier] sightings also I now make it 39 birds seen since the beginning of April.”

Membership renewals are due in August

Unless you have joined since April 1, 2014.

The Trust is reliant on our members for its ongoing existence and we are very grateful for your interest and support.

 2013 -2014, a RECORD breeding season !

Twelve New Zealand fairy tern chicks fledged this season, a record number since the protection programme began in the 1980s.

Nine of these hatched were on the Mangawhai Wildlife Refuge where, for the first time for many years, there were six pairs breeding.

Obviously, the efforts of the warden and the volunteers contribute to the birds' success, but what has made all the difference since the beginning of last season has been the outstanding trapping effort undertaken by Reg Whale, chief trapper, assisted from time to time by Colin Stitt.

The NZ Fairy Tern Charitable Trust received funding for trapping from the ASB Trust for the 2012-13 breeding season and again for the 2013-14 breeding season, but Reg continued trapping throughout the winter on a voluntary basis. Some new traps and bait were funded by a grant to the NZ Fairy Tern Trust from the Mangawhai Endowment Fund.

Good weather and the great support of the Mangawhai community all helped as well. Let's hope for more successful seasons ahead!

Reg Whale, chief trapper taken by Sioux Plowman

The truly astonishing trapping totals:

                                           Banding a NZ fairy tern chick

NZFT joins the Colgate Games

At the North Island 2014 Athletics NZ’s Colgate Games, (to be held in Whangarei January 10-12, 2014) all 1054 young competitors will be wearing a t-shirt with a logo that includes a New Zealand fairy tern. Thanks to our patron, Audrey Williams who organised this, children from all over the North Island may ask what the bird is on their t-shirt! Thank you Audrey and Athletics Northland!

Below is their letter head, also thanks to Audrey:

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 To read more about the Forest and Bird project to enhance a possible NZ fairy tern breeding site on the Kaipara Harbour, click here >>

To see a chart of the minimum current NZFT population
as of May 2013, please click here

Breeding results summary for 2012-13 season:

Five sites combined

Total eggs laid: 15 (known)           

Eggs hatched: 6           

Chicks fledged: 5

Number of breeding pairs: 8

The story from Lyn Whale, Secretary of the Te Arai Dotterel Care Group:

TE ARAI BEACH COMMUNITY WELCOMES NEW RESIDENTS

No corporate castle needed for this endearing little pair that arrived at Te Arai beach to prepare for and raise their chicks.   Home is a simple scrape in the sand.  Two eggs later and the community of Te Arai were very excited about the prospect of New Zealand’s rarest endemic breeding bird, the New Zealand Fairy Tern, once again breeding on Te Arai beach after an absence of approximately 20 years.

                                                                                   Photo/Reg Whale

The community, supported by the Department of Conservation, began a timetable of nest minding while the department arranged for and made an appointment of a full time warden for the beach for the breeding season. Sadly this is one love story that did not have a happy ending.   Late one evening the eggs, which were well on the way to hatching, mysteriously disappeared. No tracks or prints were found, but the on-site camera had been tampered with, suggesting human intervention.

A successful concerted effort of trapping predators has been in place at Te Arai over the last six years, with volunteers also putting up fencing to protect nesting shore birds and talking to beach users about the needs of our endangered species. Te Arai enjoys the protection of the Wild Life Act and so is therefore a no dog beach all year around and under Auckland Council by laws is a no vehicle beach.

Te Arai Dotterel care group would like to thank members of the public who stay out of the fenced off areas and remind dog lovers that there is a designated dog exercise area at Te Arai Point car park.

A spokesperson for the New Zealand Fairy Tern Trust said that it was inevitable that fairy terns would return to breeding again at Te Arai. As populations re-build they will seek out more sites and Te Arai is an obvious choice.  More sites also provides greater security against extinction as it spreads the risk of predator invasions and storm effects on nesting birds.

Footnote: Shortly after the Te Arai NZ fairy tern eggs disappeared, dotterel eggs also vanished from a site nearby and this time footprints were seen leading to the nest!

NZ Post Issue Fairy Tern Coin

Each year New Zealand Post issues an endangered species coin and last year’s coin. launched February 23, 2012 featured the New Zealand fairy tern! The coin may be purchased from Post Shops or on line. To purchase coins, read more here

All proceeds from a Trade Me charity auction for the No. 43 Proof currency set were donated to our trust.

Thank you, New Zealand Post!

What's New?

OUR NZ FAIRY TERN WAS

VOTED SEABIRD OF THE YEAR

2015

IT’S OUR TERN!

Indeed it is our tern!
We at the NZ Fairy Tern Charitable Trust are absolutely delighted that so many Kiwis have responded to the call to vote for “our tern”, and made it New Zealand Seabird of the Year, winning with 1882 votes .

We’d like to thank Wade Doak for being the bird’s champion, and Kristi Henare of Forest and Bird’s northern branch for being joint campaign manager. Thanks too to all those who voted for our rarest bird and to Forest and Bird for running such an interesting campaign.

In many ways the success of this campaign gives recognition to the efforts of all those who work so hard for the fairy tern’s survival - the Department of Conservation rangers and wardens; the volunteers who monitor the birds and trap predators and all those people who support the Trust and Forest and Bird.

While there are only 35-40 birds, including 8-10 breeding pairs, the intensive efforts put in by DoC and volunteers have paid off in recent years. Last year’s tally of 12 chicks surviving to fledging was a record since the protection programme began. So far this breeding season six chicks have hatched and there are hopes for more as the season goes on.

The NZ fairy tern is a beautiful little bird, found only in New Zealand and it’s wonderful that through this competition so many more people have become aware of the bird and its plight. With a concerted effort, this bird can be saved from extinction!

You can join the Trust and help with our efforts to protect the fairy tern.
Go to ‘The Trust’ page on this website and see Join us

- Heather Rogan
Convenor, New Zealand Fairy Tern Charitable Trust

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Click hereto read part of our latest newsletter - (June 2015)

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NZ fairy tern have been observed at their post-breeding flocking sites at Te Arai and on the Kaipara.

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New Zealand Fairy terns are expanding their breeding grounds – an exciting development at Te Arai!

At least 15 eggs were laid on five breeding sites during the 2012 to 2013 season and the 8 breeding pairs fledged 5 chicks.

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Photo / Malcolm Pullman

On February 7, 2011 we celebrated the 18th anniversary of the banding of the Waipu Patriarch (on the right above) and Wilma (below right), two of the oldest known living NZFT. They were both banded on February 7, 1993 by Dr. Ray Pierce at the Mangawhai Wildlife Refuge. They are not brother and sister.

Photo/ Danielle Shanahan

In the picture above, very little of Wilma's legs (bird on right) are showing compared to her partner Fred's (bird on left). Her underparts are distended. She laid an egg the next day.

Photo/Ali McDonald

The first chick at Waipu for the 2011 season, most likely hatched on December 2.

Feral cats are prolific predators of NZFT. Here, DOC warden Campbell Rathe is holding a feral cat killed at the Papakanui breeding grounds.

Photo/ Bree Hunter.

Protection of the birds began in 1984

after the then Wildlife Service could account for only three or four breeding pairs. Management has continued under Department of Conservation (DOC) and intensified since 1991 lowering their risk of extinction within 50 years, but not eliminating it. (Ferreira et al 2005)