What is ark in the park?

It is a conservation project in northern New Zealand rain forest, at the Cascade Kauri Park in Auckland's Waitakere Ranges Regional Park. By controlling non-native pests and predators, we help restore the ecology of the area to its natural state. There are no physical barriers between AIP and the surrounding forest, but the continuous operation of predator control within its boundaries creates a "mainland island "of sanctuary compared to the risk- laden forest around. The predator control is allowing the existing flora and fauna to recover: trees and plants, invertebrates, native frogs, and birds. As well as this natural recovery, a programme of species restoration has started. Already there have been successful reintroductions of whitehead, North Island robin, and kokako. Predator control began in 2003 and currently there are approximately 2300 predator controlled hectares where introduced mammalian predators are kept to very low levels. This is achieved by means of a grid of bait stations, in which a toxic bait is placed to control rats, mice, and possums. In addition, cordons of traps kill mustelid (stoats, weasels, ferrets). The bait stations are placed 50 metres apart, on straight lines 100 metres apart. The bait is renewed three times a season, starting late winter (to ensure low numbers of predators before the start of the bird breeding season), and finishes mid-summer (before the peak of wasp numbers makes things unpleasant for our volunteers).

Current news about Ark in the Park

Duncan is back:

Is he a free-spirited adventurer, or just a bit stupid? Is he an amazing flyer to get all the way from the Waitakeres to Glendowie, or is it just that he couldn't turn around once he started downhill?

In any case, after departing from his fellows at the time of their release two years ago, Duncan has been recaptured from his location in the suburban gardens of central Auckland, and put back in his more natural environment amongst the giant podocarps of the Waitakere Ranges, in the predator-controlled "Kokakoville" part of the Ark. In all seriousness, part of the reason for his long journey probably was that he went too far downhill. The kokako is a poor flyer, which relies on the presence of tall trees to launch from. From there it glides, making horizontal distance while descending. It then climbs, squirrel-like to the top of another suitably tall tree, to launch again. The photograph below, taken by our expert bird tracker Grant Capill, shows a bird in flight, undertaking a typical glide from the top of one large tree to another, and is passing over the smaller tree in the photograph. Once Duncan had ventured too far into surburbia, all directions might have seemed equally bad. But how he managed to safely traverse so much non-forested territory, and the danger of cats and dogs, is a complete mystery.