New Zealand 2024
Here are some of the birds that Ethan managed to photograph when he was in New Zealand.
Ethan had always thought of Albatrosses as majestic creatures but after spending hours watching dozens of these birds sitting around the boat and greedily begging for food, he began to lose respect for them and even got the urge jab one of them in the beak with a clay pipe for some reason. (He didn’t because he forgot his clay pipe that day.) This Southern Royal Albatross crash-lands in an attempt to steal some fish from the more numerous but smaller White-Capped Albatrosses.
Stockton Rush, is that you?
The Albatrosses that Ethan saw with the best name, Antipodean Albatross (left), and the best appearance, Bueller’s Albatross (right).
Ethan saw lots of exciting seabirds besides Albatrosses like this endangered Black-Fronted Tern (left) and his first Skua, the Brown Skua (Right).
Ethan’s favorite pelagic bird thus far is undoubtably the Northern Giant-Petrel. This absolute unit puts the “tubenose” in “tubenose.”
Ethan’s least favorite pelagic bird was the New Zealand Storm-Petrel. Nasty does not even begin to describe these disgusting, little freaks. Like winged rats, they scurry across the water’s surface in search of Rice Krispies dragging there disturbingly long legs behind them. They were declared extinct way back in 1850 but as it turned out, the world had breathed a sigh of relief too soon and they were rediscovered, alive and as vile as ever in 2003. They are still classified as critically endangered so there may be hope yet…
Ethan finally saw some penguins in New Zealand and he found them sort of creepy. Although he would have liked to get a bit loser to take better pictures, he was also relieved to keep his distance from these nasty, little men.
Ethan noticed a putrid stench emanating from below the hut he was staying in and was told that its source was a Little Penguin that may or may not have been dead since they apparently smell pretty much the same either way. Here is a Little Penguin that is all too alive watching Ethan from the darkness. How are these freaks so popular with the masses?
Ethan did not find very many native land birds outside of predator-free zones but he enjoyed getting another shot at several species he had missed from around the world including this Brown Quail, originally from Australia.
The Blue Duck was one of the cooler ducks Ethan has seen so far.
Since he likes both ferns and nicely textured birds Ethan was very happy when this New Zealand Fernbird decided to peak out from the bushes for a second.
When Ethan ran into his first pair of Takahe he noticed that they were walking towards him kind of fast and had a wild look in their eyes so he starting backing away. This only made them increase the speed of their advance and pretty soon it was a full speed chase. Eventually, Ethan became too tired to continue running and turned around to meet his fate which turned out to be two very sad looking birds gently bumping his legs repeatedly while cooing softly.
New Zealand has produced a second excellent the rail in the Weka. If only the Snipe-Rail was still with us…
When Ethan first saw this Yellowhead’s family, Mohouidae, he thought he had seen a ghost as he was more familiar with the extinct Mohoidae family of Hawaiian Honeyeaters.
Ethan has always been a big fan of externally asymmetrical birds (mostly just a bunch of owls) so this Wrybill was right up his alley.
Here are a couple of more New Zealand endemic plovers. On the left is the Red-Breasted Dotterel and on the right is the rarest Plover in the world, the Shore Plover.
Ethan also photographed the rarest Stilt in the world, the Black Stilt. The good, pre-land predator times seem to have made for some weak birds.
Two new families for Ethan, neither of whose member(s) didn’t like sitting still for long. On the left is the North Island Saddleback and on the right is the monotypic Stitchbird, the bird with two backs.
Ethan was very happy when he finally managed to get a decent photo of the Gray Gerygone on his final day in New Zealand.
Ethan had a premonition that he would miss the New Zealand Falcon but when he saw a funky lookin cormorant flying directly towards him as he stood on a clifftop, he got his camera ready just in case and was pleasantly surprised when this fellow swooped past.
Despite his best efforts, Ethan was unable to see the legendary Kakapo. He did however see lots of New Zealand Kakas which look a bit kakapo-ish if they look directly at you.
After some inclement weather Ethan was worried that he was going to miss the iconic Kea but he should have known that it would show up on the patio of the restaurant that he was eating at just before leaving the Kea’s territory for the final time.
Ethan somehow managed to miss both the Southern and Tasmanian Boobook in Australia but that pattern of bad luck would not continue thanks to a helpful Bellbird who snitched on this Morepork.
Ethan really liked the New Zealand Parakeets and although they could be somewhat mercurial, in the end they cooperated much more than most of the Parrots in Australia ever did. On the left is the Red-Fronted Parakeet and on the right is the Yellow-Fronted Parakeet.
Ethan completed the mainland New Zealand set of Cyanoramphus Parakeets with the critically endangered Malherbe’s Parakeet. Ethan found this one minutes after he was dropped off to look for it resulting in a long, boring wait.
What an upsetting creature! Although Ethan observed a Daywalker on Stewart Island, it evaded his attempts to photograph it so he instead settled for a nocturnal image of the Southern Brown Kiwi taken under a red light so as not to damage the “bird’s” pitifully sensitive eyes.