The Bio Report: New Zealand

Monday, February 10, 2020

Gecko Search

As silently as I can, I step cautiously along the trail behind my house. I walk at the pace of Iron Maiden's song In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida. A slow song, but one that I was trained to survey butterflies to and thought it might be appropriate for looking for geckos.

My neck sore from staring upwards, my headlamp is at its brightest setting as I use my binoculars to survey the forest canopy. The forest surrounding me is nearly silent save for the few Morepork owls and shorebird calls in the distance. The full moon shines through the canopy in some areas adding to the eerily silent landscape.

After an hour and a half of surveying the track behind my house which normally takes me 15 minutes to walk I failed to observe any geckos.

There are quite a few gecko species in New Zealand and they keep discovering more. Many of the species people do know about they know very little information on their life history. Because of their small size, ability to camouflage with surrounding vegetation, and many of them being nocturnal and arboreal, they are often referred to as a cryptic species.

From the information I can gather, there are three species on Waiheke. Two of the species are nocturnal (forest gecko [Mokopirirakau granulatus] & Pacific gecko [Dactylocnemis pacificus]) and one is diurnal (Auckland green gecko [Naultinus elegans]).

I've contacted several people regarding looking for a geckos and haven't heard anything back. This may partially be due to wanting to keep gecko populations secret as they are a target for poaching. I have realized that it's okay that I don't have any direction as I feel like it's a rite of passage to find one on my own.

Here are some other photos from the past few weeks. Many of the photos were taken on Tiritiri Matangi island.

New Zealand Bellbird (Anthornis melanura)

North Island Robin (Petroica longipes)

Stitchbird (Notiomystis cincta)

Whitehead (Mohoua albicilla)

North Island Kokako (Callaeas wilsoni)

Mainland Red-crowned Parakeet (Cyanoramphus novaezelandiae ssp. novaezelandiae)

North Island Saddleback (Philesturnus rufusater)

Variable Oystercatcher (Haematopus unicolor)

Wrinkle Leaf Pomaderris (Pomaderris rugosa) - one of New Zealand's rare plants.

White-faced Heron (Egretta novaehollandiae ssp. novaehollandiae)

Whakanewha Park Waiheke

Southern Reef Squid (Sepioteuthis australis)

Friday, January 3, 2020

A Walk In The Bush

Holding the leaves of a shrub in my hand, I stare blankly at them trying to diagnose what separates this plant from all the other species in the bush.

For someone new to the habitat seen in New Zealand it can be a bit overwhelming. As an outsider it all looks like large glossy leaves save for a few obvious New Zealand natives that are planted horticulturally in California. Even then, the scientific names are difficult to remember. More often then not they are genuses that I have never even heard of.

Scrambling Pohuehue (Muehlenbeckia complexa)

Currently everything around me is a green blur. Just shades of green on branches of varying heights and shapes.

Looking away from the shrub in my hand, I see a fern on the ground. I tell myself, "look a fern... at least I know what a fern looks like..."

With this affirmation that I can at least identify the gestalt of some plants, I continue down the path with some positivity.

Rose maidenhair fern (Adiantum hispidulum)

Tui (Prosthemadera novaeseelandiae)

Twiggy coprosma (Coprosma rhamnoides) - identifiable by oblong and lanceolate leaves on same branches.

Toro (Myrsine salinica)

Kohekohe (Dysoxylum spectabile)

NZ takes their biosecurity seriously and wants to stop the spread of diseases. Kauri dieback disease is caused by a similar organism to sudden oak death.