Kiwis and Wheee!

It snowed last night on the mountains in Queenstown.  Those white lofty peaks were hard to say goodbye to this morning.  We have a double hop first to Christchurch, and then to New Zealand’s North Island and the town of Rotorua.

Again, no security at the airport in Queenstown nor Christchurch.  I was sitting next to a nice young man, a native New Zealander, on my second flight, and he brought up the subject of no security.  “A lot different than the US,” he said.

Rotorua is located in an active hot springs area and the smell of sulfur is in the air which can vary daily.  The town is known for its numerous springs and spas which I am looking forward to enjoying!  Percentage-wise, the largest population of Māori people live here also.

I forgot to mention the legend attached to Sterling, the largest fall at Mitford Sound.  Supposedly, the mist from Sterling on your face will keep you young!  Maybe I won’t need a spa treatment at Rotorua!

Seven indigenous Māori tribes that lived around the lake banded together for trade and protection from enemies.  An ancient legend and supposedly a true love story involves a warrior from a lower class who lived on the island in the lake.  He played the flute beautifully, and a chief’s daughter from another tribe would listen to him play.  She decided to go to the island to meet the flute player, but her father, the chief, heard about his daughter’s plan, and pulled all the wacas from the lake preventing her from going.

The maiden stripped off her clothes and tied multiple gourds onto her body to float across the lake, and she hide in the bushes since she was naked.  The flute player sent his servant to get water for him, and the maiden, using a deep gruff voice, asked him what he was doing.  She reached out and smashed his water jug once and then again a second time when the servant returned.  When the flutist came to get water for himself and to see what monster was in the bushes, the maiden reveled herself.  They fell in love and were married.

As I mentioned earlier, the Europeans cut down and burned the native trees which take 200-500 years to mature.  Without a source for lumber, they planted sequoias or giant redwood trees.  These trees loved the environment here growing better than they do on the California coastline, but again, they are slow growing.  The Europeans decided that pines were the best, and 90% of New Zealand’s forest today are pines.

We tour a grove of sequoias at night lit up with giant wooden lanterns on a series of swinging plank and rope bridges.  The sequoias are amazing in size, and the bridges are fun with information on the platforms built around trees.  This is foreshadowing of an event tomorrow!

The Kiwi Hatchery Center is dedicated to saving the symbol of New Zealand and helping the population of kiwis to reestablish themselves since there are only about 500 left in nature.  “Operation Nest Egg” is a major portion of this endeavor.  

Kiwis mate for life, but they are solitary birds, shy and nocturnal.  They have feathers like hair, whiskers like a cat, powerful legs, and tiny useless wings.  After mating, the female stores sperm to fertilize several eggs.  A single egg weighs about 25% of her body weight which would be equivalent to us delivering a very large baby…figure out the number yourself!  She can produce six eggs a season about every 5-10 days before laying it in her burrow for the dad to incubate.

The center tracks male birds which have been GPS chipped to locate them.  After about 50-60 days, the eggs are removed from the burrow and candled to see if they are viable.  If positive, their location is documented, and they are carefully brought to the hatchery center to finish the incubation process of 78-80 days.

The eggs are cleaned and turned four times each day just as the dad would do in nature.  He would turn the eggs with his foot, but these are handled manually and then placed back in the incubator.  

Kiwi eggs take five days to hatch.  The babies don’t have an egg tooth like many creatures and don’t want to risk injury to their delicate beak so they use their shoulders and feet to push out of the shell.  They weigh about one kilo at birth, and sleep for their initial 48 hours of life.  We are blessed to see a new baby sleeping that just hatched the previous night; so cute and less than 24 hours old!

On Day 3, the baby kiwi is placed in a raised nursery box about 6’ x 3’ with ferns and other natural items.  They don’t eat for their first five days since they ingest leftover yolk from their egg to sustain themselves.  In the wild, babies leave the nest after these first days, never to interact with their parents again.

At the center, they are handled once a day when the box is cleaned, and the kiwi is fed a mixture called “Mrs. Mingis’s Meatloaf” consisting of ox hearts, canned biscuits, fruits, and vegetables.  We watch as a baby is carefully hand fed by a center’s volunteer, and it doesn’t seem very interested at first.  Every time it nibbles on a bite you want to cheer!

As they grow and mature, the kiwis are placed in individual enclosures replicating their natural environment for 6-8 months eating the meatloaf mixture and eventually grubs and bugs which they seek out.  We watch quietly in a darkened room behind glass while these “toddlers”, all siblings of each other, roam their spaces hunting and peeking for food totally ignoring us.  The new chick that just hatched is the newest member of their family!

These birds don’t imprint on their handlers so they can be released successfully back into the wild.  DNA from their wing feathers is taken, and while all birds are banded for future identification, the male kiwis also have a GPS chip implanted to track them when they become fathers themselves and are incubating their own clutch of eggs.

In the wild, kiwis have a 5% survival rate!  Being flightless and vulnerable with a fragile chest, they are easy prey for stoats, weasels, ferrets, dogs, and cats.  At the Kiwi Hatchery Center, they have a 98% of eggs hatching, and a 65% survival rate when the birds are returned to the wild!  Since they opened in 2008, they have released over 2,000 birds!

I have become a kiwi fan, and hope this hatchery can continue their wonderful work!  I would love to sponsor a new baby, but it costs over $2,700 which even for our group would be about $180 each.  We buy lots of merchandise to help support the center, and I have a new orange t-shirt!

Our next learning experience is at the local Māori village with Nikki as our guide.  His family has lived on the same land for 34 generations.  He gives us a typical Māori welcome, and we sing him a simple Māori song we’ve been practicing in return.  He also welcomes us individually in typical fashion of touching heads and noses once, and on the second touch you both breathe in symbolizing the breath of ancestors.

He tells us about his tattoos and those for the Māori people which once were made with a sharpened quill from an albatross and “ink” made from dog excrement and berries.  Today, commercial ink is used, but the process continues of prayers being said as the person receives their markings.

Family is very important to the Māori, and many tattoos tells the story of their family and are specific to each person.  Men have tattoos primarily on their thighs and face including a representation of a kiwi on one check, a parrot on the nose, and bats on the forehead.  Women have tattoos on their chins…an owl with the addition of spirls for babies.  Men may also have tattoos on their buttocks, women from the chief’s tribe may have a triangle on her forehead and even tattoos as a breastplate or over her entire body.

We walk through the village of homes, a community center, restaurant where we will later have a delicious lunch…I had seafood chowder!, and a highly decorative and beautiful meeting house with hand carved wooden symbolism.   A flagpole tells the story of a man with four wives and eight children who was attacked and left for dead.  He recovered, and the village are all of his descendants.

The active Anglican Church built in 1845 and remodeled in the 1960’s (with a pulpit carved in 1914) is a total integration of European Christianity and Māori beliefs with indigenous carvings and weavings and paintings along with stained glass of the four apostles and Jesus knocking at the door.

The Māori people were converted to Christianity very early by European settlers.  They believe in an ultimate being, a supreme creator who has control of their 175 other gods which connect heaven and earth together.  Nikki’s explains his previous Māori welcome acknowledged God plus honored the dead which “shine light on us in our darkest hours”, along with honoring females of the tribe and the men who are the protectors.

Nikki’s generation did not learn their native language at school, but he was fortunate to have a grandfather….”many grandfathers”…who taught him.  It is now taught in bilingual schools plus there are total immersion schools children can attend.  Many people of Nikki’s generation are now learning their native language and customs.

Steam vents and bubbling hot pools of water are evident throughout the village. Some are still occasionally used for cooking for large gatherings but most are just part of their everyday life.  There are also communal bathhouses, smaller wooden structures, where people use to gather to bathe in the natural hot springs.

As if my day hasn’t been busy enough, I head to Rotorua Canopy Tours for some zip lining and swing bridges!  This has been voted the “Number One Activity” to do in town!  I’m excited, but also a little apprehensive as we gear up in our harness and helmet.

We head into the woods following a trail, climbing stairs, and as I’m out of breathe, arrive at our first platform.  Ash and Lucky, our expert guides, do all the hard work clipping us in and making sure our straps are tight.  I step over the edge, and I’m flying through the trees!

The first zip line was a great warm up, but then we approach a narrow two plank swinging bridge with very low handrails that I can barely reach.  We are clipped onto a wire, but I prefer to trust my own hands.  Big mistake, but I look ahead…not down!…and make it across, but that was harder than the zip line!

The next zip line has the addition of stairs into nothingness!  Clip in, walk down narrow stairs with no handrails and nothing to hold on to, sit down in my harness, and “Wheeeeee!”  I fling out my arms and legs trusting the wire will hold me flying through space to another platform.

We continue for several more zips including the longest one and the highest one about 100’ above the ground, and we “act like a bird” on one to “bring birds back to the forest”.  As we successfully navigate one after another, we applaud each other’s success and daring.

This company is also involved in conservation removing opossums and weasels and ferrets from the forests.  It was amazing how many animals have been caught and the difference in the health of the trees.  Birds are returning, and they have special permission to feed them.  We place grubs in our hands and a tiny bird darts down to grab the tasty morsel and fly away.  One bird has another trick.  I put a grub on my tongue…Yes, it is wiggling, and I am trying not to inhale it nor drop it!…and after the first bird wouldn’t dare, the second bird grabbed the worm off my tongue with his little beak!  I felt his little nip of my tongue and his tiny feet and flutter of wings on my face.  I wish I had a picture, but I have memories!

The final swing bridge is shorter but another twist.  For a photo op, we can strike a pose, and it is suggested we lean back into our harness off the bridge trusting just the gear and the wire for support.  I don’t know if I can do this, but I reach the spot, and lean out.  “Sit down in your harness” which is squatting over space, but I let go, the harness does its job supporting me, and I’m living to tell about it!

It was an exhilarating experience, and a challenging but fun one for me.  I’m afraid all other zip lines will pale in comparison to this in the future!

While others in our group head to dinner, I walk down the street to the hot springs spa.  No treatments like massages are available at this hour, but I soak in one hot springs after another deciding which one is hotter vs. the one with the better view over the hot springs marsh.  I lay back, relax, and watch birds.  This is fabulous!

Wow!  What a day, and by 9 PM, I cannot keep my eyes open.  I sleep for a while, but now I’m awake in the night writing!  Tomorrow is another busy day of adventures in New Zealand!