Endangered bird back in Doubtful Sound

BACK IN THE SADDLE: Department of Conservation biodiversity ranger Hannah Edmonds with a saddleback during a relocation project.

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A group of endangered saddleback birds has been released into its new predator-free home in Doubtful Sound, with the help of a Gibbston winery.

Thirty-nine of the birds were captured on Breaksea Island by a team made up of Department of Conservation and Peregrine Winery staff in early March and released on to Bauza Island at the head of Doubtful Sound in Fiordland.

The ground-nesting birds were plentiful in South Island forests before European settlement, but the arrival of rats and stoats made them an easy target and today they exist only on a series of predator-free islands.

The winery, which entered into a 10-year sponsorship with the Fiordland Conservation Trust to support the bird in 2008, funded the cost of the project.

Peregrine sales and marketing manager Greg Hay said the team worked hard to capture the birds, which were transported to their new home by helicopter. The aim was to increase the saddleback's chances of survival in case one island was invaded by predators.

Plans were also under way for other species of birds to be released on Bauza Island, he said.

The saddleback population dropped to only 24 in the early 1970s so it was great to be a part of restoring their numbers, and it was hoped they could one day be reintroduced to the mainland, Mr Hay said.

"It's our responsibility to right the wrongs that we (people) have done to these birds and if we don't do something they'll be lost forever."

Department biodiversity programme manager Lindsay Wilson said the project was extremely important to ensure the survival of the bird. Saddlebacks had been introduced to Bauza Island a few years earlier but had been killed by a stoat, he said.

The island had been predator free for four years and while there was a chance something could swim to the island, the team was confident a network of traps would protect the birds, he said.

- © Fairfax NZ News

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