Common Native Birds

Common Native Birds

New Zealand has a lot of native birds.

Some of New Zealand’s native birds, like kiwi, kakapo and kokako are world famous because they are on the brink of becoming extinct. Many of New Zealand's rare native birds only live on off shore islands, or are very hard to find on the main islands of New Zealand.

However, there are some native birds that are easier to spot, and even live in town. Have you seen native birds near your place?

Why are some native birds common, while others are endangered?
All of the common birds described in this fact sheet can fly. This helps them get away from enemies like cats, dogs, rats, stoats and ferrets – which people brought to New Zealand. Kiwi, kakapo and takahe, which are very endangered, can’t fly and are easily caught by enemies.	F L Y I N G

BREEDING Laying eggs and rearing chicks. Fantails, riroriro and silvereye have several nests, each with three or four chicks a year. They must, to make sure a few chicks grow up, because rats eat their eggs and cats and stoats catch their chicks.

Unlike little birds like fantails (which live short lives and have lots of chicks) kiwi, takahe and kakapo live long lives and only lay one or two eggs in a year. But if their few eggs and chicks are eaten, there are no young birds to replace the parent birds, which get older and older and older and finally die. This is happening to the kiwi in New Zealand forests.

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Even where there is not native forest, fantails, riroriro and ruru can find insects in gardens. Tui and bellbird can sip nectar from garden flowers as well as from native flowers. Silvereyes eat nectar, insects and garden fruit. Seagulls can find food at the rubbish dump as well as in the sea. So all these birds can live in places where people are living and native forests are gone.
But kakapo and kokako can’t. They need native forest for their flowers, fruits and leaves and often these are eaten by possums.

Let’s meet some common native birds… even though they are common compared to the many endangered native birds of New Zealand, they are still very special and interesting…

Fantail / Piwakawaka
Scientific name: Rhipidura fuliginosa

1st prize , best mum and dad.

Fantails live in the forest and in our gardens. A pair of fantails raise three or four families, each with three or four chicks each summer. It is hard work. The chicks are fed every 10 minutes, which is more than 100 times a day! No wonder baby fantails grow fast. 15 days after hatching blind and naked, the chicks have grown feathers and are ready to leave the nest.

Cats, rats, stoats and mynas are the fantails' enemies. Of all their eggs and chicks, only a few survive and grow up.

"I’m piwakawaka, the fantail. I cheep a lot and I’m friendly, but really it’s the insects I’m after. People with big feet scare up the insects and then I catch them. Moths and midges are very small so I have to eat a lot and gather beak-fulls for my chicks".

Fantails mostly live on forest edges and in scrub habitats. They can often be seen in town in parks and gardens.
Fantails will usually be seen alone or in pairs during summer, but will often form flocks during the winter.
Fantails occasionally eat fruit, insects and berries, but they mostly eat insects.
Fantails are very good at catching insects in the air - they can change direction very quickly when they are flying.

Bellbird (korimako) and Tui

Scientific names:
Bellbird – Anthornis melanura
Tui – Prosthemadera novaeseelandiae

1st prize, sweetest singers

"We are different but…in some things we are alike, tui and I. We sing sweet songs and we sip sweet nectar with our special toothbrush tongues".

Both the tui and bellbird are honey-eaters. They feed on nectar, fruit and insects. Both birds are important to the forest because they pollinate forest flowers and spread small seeds.

When the bird dives into a flower to reach the nectar, pollen sticks to its head. Then the bird flies to another flower and pollen brushes of it’s head, onto the sticky stigma. This is the beginning of a seed.

Both the tui and bellbird are endemic to New Zealand.
The tui was named ‘parson’s bird’ by early European settler’s in New Zealand because the white feathers on the tui’s throat reminded them of the parson’s collar.
The tui has a wonderful range of noises and songs – they can whistle, click, chuckle, gurgle and trill. The bellbird’s name comes from the song it makes. The song can mostly be heard at dawn and dusk.
Both tui and bellbird rear three or four chicks, and the incubation period is about 14 days. The females do most of the work, building the nest and rearing the chicks, but the males do help sometimes.

Where are you tui and bellbird...

They can be seen in town more often when the kowhai trees flower in spring. They drink the sweet nectar from the flower. They also like to feed on the nectar of rewarewa and flax flowers.
In summer the they will feed in the rata and pohutukawa trees, sipping the nectar from their flowers.
In Autumn they will find food hanging from the totara and kahikatea trees, eating their fruit
In winter they feed on the flower nectar of the puriri tree

Grey Warbler (Riroriro)

1st prize, best nest builder

"I’m so small and grey, you may not notice me flitting through the garden catching insects. But listen to my warble. I go tseetseetseetseetsee".

On the thinnest of branches, riroriro builds her hanging nest with a verandah, to keep out enemies. But sometimes when she is away, a shining cuckoo will lay her egg in the nest and then the riroriro parents will hatch and feed a cuckoo chick!

Riroriro eat small insects
Usually two families of four chicks will be reared each year

The song of riroriro – an old Maori story: in spring, the song of the riroriro meant it was time to plant the crops. Some people were lazy. They didn’t work hard in their gardens and in the winter they would grumble because they were hungry. The people who had grown plenty of food would laugh and say, "I hea koe I te tangihanga o te riroriro?" which means, "Where were you when the riroriro sang?"

Red-billed gull (tarapunga)

1st prize, top squabbler

Gulls can most often be seen at the beach, where they eat small marine creatures (hoppers, crabs and shellfish), but they also spend time at the dump – because they are good at scavenging food scraps that people throw away.

Grown up red-billed gulls have red beaks and red legs. Young red-billed gulls have a brown beak and legs.

Gulls live in flocks, so they have to get along with each other. It’s a bit like children at school. Gulls squabble (just like you do at school!) but they don’t really hurt each other, and they warn each other about danger.

Can you understand gull language?

The Black-backed gull is also native to New Zealand, and the Black-billed gull is endemic.

Morepork /ruru

Scientific name: Ninox novaeseelandiae

1st prize, quietest flyer

"Shhhh. I’m trying to sleep! I’ll wake up at dusk and catch a mouse or a bird that hasn’t gone to bed. Then I’ll go hunting moths and weta in the dark."

Ruru has large eyes so he can see by the light of the stars and the moon. His eyes face forward, like ours do. This helps him focus on the moths he is chasing. Most birds have their eyes on the sides of the head, so they can see enemies coming from all around.

The edges of ruru’s wing feathers are fluffy, so he flies quite silently and no one can hear him coming. This helps him sneak up and catch his prey.

Ruru usually lay two eggs in October or November. The eggs hatch about 30 days later. Owl chicks have baby down feathers. When they are about five or six weeks old they will have adult feathers and will leave the nest and hunt for their own food.

If you wake in the night you may hear ruru calling, "morepork, morepork".

Weird fact – the ruru eats its food whole – bones, feathers, everything! – so later on it will cough up a ‘pellet’ containing all that stuff. These ‘pellets’ can often be found on branches or fence posts. So you can see what the ruru has been eating by pulling apart the ‘pellet’!

Owl drawn by Charlotte Johns

Silvereye

Scientific name: Zosterops lateralis

1st prize, best ocean traveller

"We’ve been blown out to sea in a storm. It’s 1500 kilometres across the Tasman Sea. I’ll never make it. I’m going to drown. Oh, there’s a ship down there. I’ll land and have a rest. Goodbye Australia. New Zealand here I come!"

More than a hundred years ago, this is how silvereyes came to New Zealand. They were tired out and clinging to the ropes or crouched on the deck of the sailing ships bringing settlers. Many silvereyes arrived in Auckland, they nested, and young birds spread throughout New Zealand. Because they were newcomers to New Zealand, Maori called the birds ‘tauhou’ which means ‘little stranger’.

Silvereyes eat nectar, spiders, insects (especially small caterpillars) and sometimes berries
The silvereye is also known as the ‘waxeye’ and ‘white-eye’
Both female and male silvereyes help to rear their chicks. They usually rear two families of three chicks each year.

Fantail / Piwakawaka

This information was written in June 2001.
Some of this information is from the November 1999 KCC Magazine.