beautiful pūkaha
A little while ago I visited the Wairarapa, a few hours north of Wellington. While to me the Wairarapa is a pretty uninspiring place, with lots of farmland and barely any native forest left, there is one spot where the forest has been preserved, that place is pūkaha Mount Bruce. Pūkaha is home to some amazing and treasured birds like the kōkako and North Island Brown kiwi, as well as lots of smaller forest birds.
The scenery at pūkaka is stunning, and even on a cold winters day the birds were still happy and enjoying the sun. I walked around the main tracks at the base of the mountain, then walked up the lookout loop, which offers nice views, I just wish they looked out over more forest, rather than farmlands.
I got to see kakurangi, the beautiful captive kōkako, she was in a funny mood, and when I tried to take photos of her she’d hop away out of sight, then come running towards me at a great speed and climbing right up to my face. It was quite bizarre, and she’s such a sweet bird.
kahurangi the kōkako at pūkaha
One of the drawcards to visiting pūkaha is that I know they have quite an established tītipounamu/rifleman population. If you know me at all you’ll know I’m obsessed with our smallest native bird and will do anything to find them. They are very tricky to find at Zealandia, mainly because they’re recently translocated there, but at pūkaha they are abundant. Within about a minute of walking into the forest I heard some calling. Of course I snapped lots of photos of the tiny birds, even though they were everywhere they’re still a challenge. I also hear lots of tomtits, but only managed to get one photo!
After walking the lookout loop track I came across a particularly odd looking bird in one of the aviaries, it was a kererū with a mullet! The poor bird had its scalp ripped off by a kārearea/falcon and had to get it surgically reattached, hence the funky feather growth. I don’t like making fun of birds but I had to have a giggle at this guy, he’s lucky to be alive after all! That concluded my day at pūkaha, I can’t wait to visit again over summer when it’s not so cold, and when there are baby birds to see. I’ll leave you with Ariki the kererū and his funky mullet!
