Guest Work • May 31, 2017 •
By Prof Phil Seddon, University of Otago. The newly released report from the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment (Taonga of an island nation) highlights the precarious state of our native avifauna, with one in five of our 168 native bird species at risk of extinction. Birds are highly visible but also highly vulnerable indicators of habitat change, not just … Read More
Guest Work • May 19, 2017 •
Gwenllian Iacona, The University of Queensland and Iadine Chadès, CSIRO De-extinction – the science of reviving species that have been lost – has moved from the realm of science-fiction to something that is now nearly feasible. Some types of lost mammals, birds or frogs may soon be able to be revived through de-extinction technologies. Read More
Jamie Steer • Apr 13, 2017 •
Dr Jamie Steer ponders whether the ‘deer are like moa’ debate has passed its use-by date. This is the second and concluding part of the series – read part one here. Critics stuck in the past I reckon that critics of the ‘deer are like moa’ position often misinterpret it. Deer advocates have never claimed that deer are the … Read More
Jamie Steer • Apr 12, 2017 •
In this two-part series, Dr Jamie Steer ponders whether the ‘deer are like moa’ debate has passed its use-by date. Writing on the impacts of introduced deer in the Transactions of the New Zealand Institute in 1892, the Reverend P. Walsh argued that New Zealand’s native forests were poorly equipped to deal with grazing mammals. Taking the pre-human forest as … Read More
Guest Work • Jun 28, 2016 •
By Jamie Steer and Rowan Taylor Scientists tend to shape our beliefs about wildlife in New Zealand, and particularly how we think of introduced species. But what are we to think when scientists disagree? Conservation biologists, for example, tell us that introduced wildlife are invasive environmental and economic pests while fisheries and waterfowl biologists tell us that they are valued … Read More
Laura Goodall • Feb 27, 2016 •
Tangata Whenua — People of the Land — is the name that Māori call themselves as indigenous New Zealanders, and likely signifies the deep roots they have to this green and blue place of jagged peaks and valleys. The land sustains us. It carries paths to the future as well as ties to the past: whatungarongaro te tangata, toitū te … Read More
Waiology • Dec 02, 2014 •
By Elizabeth Graham Food webs are maps of “who eats who” within an ecosystem (Figure 1a). Each node, or point, in the web represents a species or group of organisms; nodes are connected by a link if there is a known feeding relationship between the two groups. Though they are built on simple predator-prey relationships, food webs integrate complex information … Read More
Waiology • Nov 20, 2014 •
By Cindy Baker Lamprey and hagfish (known as cyclostomes or agnathans) are the only living jawless vertebrates. Over 360 million years old, lampreys swam past herds of drinking dinosaurs, and have survived at least four mass extinctions. The brain of the lamprey is believed to be the closest example of our primal vertebrate ancestors, and lampreys provide important insight into … Read More
Waiology • Jun 06, 2014 •
By Jane Goodman New Zealand’s native freshwater fish are becoming increasingly threatened The conservation status of New Zealand freshwater fish was assessed in June 2013 using the New Zealand Threat Classification System. The threat ranking lists are often misconstrued as being ‘owned’ by the Department of Conservation. However, although the listing exercise for all New Zealand taxa is … Read More
Waiology • Jan 06, 2014 •
By Amber McEwan As the temperatures gradually get warmer, we aren’t the only ones thinking about hopping into our local river. A small, yet spectacularly attractive little native fish called the redfin bully uses this time of year to make the move from the sea to fresh water. The male redfin bully is one of our most brightly … Read More