The Blue Duck is an endangered species, with a natural habitat limited to mountain streams in the shrinking wilderness of New Zealand, beset by predators (introduced by us from foreign lands), and hydroelectric dams.

( Blue Ducks... )

I never thought I would actually have anything to post here that hasn't been done before, but after a recent trip to New Zealand, I found out all sorts of cool stuff about their bird life. There have been posts about the extinct giants, the Moa and the Haasts Eagle, but none about the plethora of current incredible birds. My personal favorite: The ( Read more... )

Key points:

• Humans may not have colonized New Zealand over 2000 years ago, it may have been 1000 years later.
• This was found by new carbon dating of old Pacific rat (kiore) bones.
• The bones were no older than 200 BCE (not 1280 BCE as previously thought).

Interesting Quote:"As the Pacific rat or kiore cannot swim very far, it can only have arrived in ( Read more... )

According to a March 30th article from New Scientist, the tuatara, a New Zealand lizard sort of lizard-snake cross LET'S JUST SAY REPTILE, is the fastest-evolving animal known.


( Read more... )

Turns out I was wrong. There IS something else in New Zealand, other than Katipos, that can sting you to death - the Ongaonga, a five metre tall Tree Nettle.

I particularly like this comment about the plant -

As a caver, I am always looking out for these, especially as they often occur around cave entrances. New Zealand's deepest cave, Nettlebed ( Read more... )

Been following up a few connections after my post about Latrodectus hasselti , the Redback.

Here's a video (ignore the first 30 seconds about stingrays, or as we now call them "Irwin-Killing Bastardfish" )

Click to view

Also those photos of a Latrodectus catching and eating a snake. Thankyou, wirrrn. This is actually fairly common - I rescued a dugite from a ( Read more... )

Remember the Moa? Giant flightless bird about 13ft to the top of its head? Yeah, pretty big bird, and living on New Zealand, too, where there's not much in the way of native predators. Lots of crazy birds have evolved there, making use of the fact that New Zealand doesn't (natively) have canines or felines or mustelids or any other common mammalian ( Read more... )