A highlight of our 3-week trip to New Zealand was a visit to Blumine Island in the stunning Queen Charlotte Sound, part of the Marlborough Sounds that dominate the landscape of the South Island’s northern end. We had a delightful 6 days in the port town of Picton (below) where we were to hop on the ferry at the end of our stay to cross Cook Strait to the North Island.
Blumine Island has been cleared of predators, allowing for the reintroduction of several species that are today extremely rare and threatened elsewhere. It’s a wet landing so not a regular stop-off for tour operators. You need to arrange with the boat company beforehand to be dropped off and picked up. We had 2 hours on the island (below) - more than ample time to pick up the specialties - and used the company E-ko Tours. Be warned, the fares – like just about everything in NZ – are not cheap.
The boat takes you through the delightful scenery of the Marlborough Sounds.
We hadn’t not long left port when we encountered a pod of Dusky Dolphins, including a couple of females with small calves in tow.
We checked out a small colony of the endemic Spotted Shag on a. rocky outcrop.
The main seabirds about were plenty of Australasian Gannet (first image below), White-fronted Tern and Fluttering Shearwater (second image), with a few Sooty Shearwaters.
At another rocky outcrop we found one of the targets – the New Zealand King Shag, which is endemic to the Marlborough Sounds, with all of its nesting sites within a 50km radius. We had 5 birds at our first stop and another 9 at a second outcrop which they shared with a New Zealand Fur Seal. Another bird was seen flying near Blumine Island, giving a total of 15 seen.
We found the two targets on the island – Orange-fronted (or Mahlberg’s) Parakeet and South Island Saddleback – within 10 minutes of landing. A single parakeet was calling from scrub at the landing point and easily located (first image in this post). It was later joined by a second bird. Then another pair was found nearby, with one bird seen entering and leaving a nesting hole (below).
The saddlebacks were just as showy, putting on quite a performance around the small camping ground by the landing point.
New Zealand Bellbirds and New Zealand Pigeons were common and easy to see.
Before leaving Picton I checked out some wetlands nearby where quite a few Black-billed Gulls, another NZ endemic, were present.
As reported in the first post for this trip, I visited the Zealandia Reserve on the outskirts of Wellington to see Little Spotted Kiwi. I returned for a day trip to enjoy the resident Tuataras – an ancient reptile driven to the point of extinction before last minute intervention by the NZ authorities.
Also in the reserve were a few North Island Saddleback, until recently considered conspecific with its South Island counterpart , but the juveniles of the two species have very different plumages.
North Island Robins were common and vocal.
Takahe, another species brought back from the brink, has been introduced to Zealandia but the single pair there has yet to breed. I’ve seen this species previously in the South Island’s Murchison Mountains - the only place where a wild population survives.
A male Rifleman rounded up a fine trip.
