Kiwis helping kiwi

MEDIA RELEASE

1 August 2012

Kiwis helping kiwi

A Victoria PhD student is uncovering information about how inbreeding contributes to the fate of threatened animal populations, while also teaching travellers on Interislander ferries more about one of the rarest species of kiwi.

Helen Taylor is studying the genetics of the little spotted kiwi, which lives on seven offshore islands around New Zealand and in Wellington’s Zealandia eco-sanctuary. New Zealand has 1,600 little spotted kiwi, all of which are descended from five birds that were transferred to Kapiti Island around 100 years ago.

The British-born researcher is using radio tags to monitor the kiwi population in Zealandia and on Long Island in Queen Charlotte Sound. To reduce her costs, Helen gives talks to passengers on the Interislander in return for free travel between Wellington and Picton to carry out field work.

“It’s a great arrangement,” says Helen. “It enables the Interislander to offer something a bit different to its passengers while making my research trips to Long Island more affordable The audience is made up of tourists who often know very little about kiwi and New Zealanders who understand the threats kiwi face and want to find out more.”

Helen is investigating the effects that a severe reproductive bottleneck, of a maximum of five birds, has had on the genetics of little spotted kiwi.

The birds in her study have radio tags, about the size of the top part of a human thumb, attached to their legs. The tags are programmed with Chick Timer software that gives Helen a wide range of information on the bird’s activity patterns and the incubation status of eggs. She only tracks males—once a week in Zealandia and once every six weeks on Long Island—as in this species it’s the male who sits on the egg.

“The tags emit pulses that tell me all sorts of things, such as whether the bird is nesting, when it left the nest and for how long and when incubation began, as well as letting me know when the egg finally hatches.

“The only other way I could get that sort of detailed information would be through many hours of observation, which would be time-consuming and expensive.”

The chicks that hatch successfully are measured and weighed and unhatched eggs taken back to the laboratory so Helen can find out more about why they failed.

Helen’s goal is to find out whether inbreeding is reducing reproductive success and what that might mean for the little spotted kiwi in the future.

“We’re still in the early stages of understanding the population genetics of little spotted kiwi but we do know that big reductions in population size often lead to reduced genetic diversity and increased incidence of inbreeding.

“My findings will tell us more about this species of kiwi but could also give us clues about the prospects for other animals with similar histories.”

Ultimately, she hopes to come up with a set of recommendations that will feed into the Department of Conservation’s Kiwi Recovery Programme.

Helen is getting lots of volunteer help with her research. Keen Wellingtonians do some of the tracking at Zealandia and the staff at Cougar Line water taxis in Picton pick up data from the birds on Long Island in the weeks Helen can’t be there herself.

“The volunteer ethic in New Zealand is impressive,” says Helen. “People are really willing to go the extra mile for their national bird.”

Helen’s previous conservation research involved studying birds in Malta and the Peruvian Amazon but for now she’s focusing purely on kiwi.

“It’s a privilege to work so closely with an iconic species that is so important to New Zealanders.”

Helen is 16 months into her PhD research and is located in the Allan Wilson Centre for Molecular Ecology and Evolution in Victoria’s School of Biological Sciences.

Her PhD is supported with funding from the Ministry of Science and Innovation (now within the Ministry of Business, Innovation & Employment) and a PhD scholarship through the Allan Wilson Centre for Molecular Ecology and Evolution.

Victoria University and the Karori Sanctuary Trust (which manages Zealandia) signed a Memorandum of Understanding in May 2011. The agreement promotes closer research links between the two organisations in the areas of biodiversity restoration and management, and has led to a number of initiatives including public talks and postgraduate student research projects.

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