Kokako reintroduced into New Zealand’s Doubtful Sound

• Secretary Island will be a safe haven for a range of native species and has huge potential as kokako habitat due to its large size (8140 hectares) and rodent and possum free status. It will provide the single largest pest-free area for a kokako population in New Zealand.
• The kokako belongs to the endemic New Zealand wattlebirds (Callaeidae), an ancient family of birds which includes the North and South Island saddleback and the extinct huia.
• Kokako are renowned for the clarity and volume of their song which carries far across the forest. In the early morning, a pair may sing a duet for up to half an hour with other kokako joining in to form a "bush choir".
• The kokako is the only member of its family still surviving on the mainland. A dark bluish-grey bird with a long tail and short wings, it has a pair of brightly coloured, fleshy "wattles" extending from either side of its gape to meet below the neck. The North Island kokako has blue wattles, while the South Island kokako had orange or yellow wattles.
• In the early 1900s the South Island kokako was widespread in the South Island and Stewart Island. It is currently assumed to be extinct, although it is possible individual birds may survive in remote parts of the South Island and Stewart Island. The last reliable record of a kokako in Fiordland was some feathers found in the Borland Saddle area in 1967.
• Primary causes of kokako decline were forest clearance by settlers and the introduction of predators such as rats, stoats and possums.
• A "research by management" approach has demonstrated that the North Island kokako decline can be reversed and populations maintained on the mainland by innovative management of their habitat. It has also demonstrated that intensive management of introduced mammals can result in rapid expansion of kokako populations.
• Several years ago the Department of Conservation embarked upon an island restoration programme for Secretary Island. The programme is aimed at enhancing the ecological values of the island and providing a sanctuary for threatened species by eradicating and/or controlling stoats and deer to a level where they no longer impact on the island's ecosystems.