Jon Sullivan

Kia ora! I'm a #nature nut, addict of #iNaturalist NZ — Mātaki Taiao, and an #ecologist at #LincolnUniversity in #Aotearoa-#NewZealand.

I spend an inordinate amount of my time counting nature to watch what's changing (see https://wildcounts.org/).

#TwitterMigration #NZTwits #ecology #EcologicalMonitoring #NaturalHistory #iNaturalistNZ #iNaturalist #wildcounts #RStats #Biodiversity

Born when there was 326 ppm carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

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Last Notes

2026-05-24 09:34:16 UTC

I just finished reading an interesting article in #QuantaMagazine about recent research on bird eyes. Unlike our inferior mammal eyes, bird eyes lack the network of blood vessels covering the retina. When an optometrist shines a bright light in our eyes, we see a network of blood vessels that block parts of our vision. Sleight of hand from our brain removes this from our perception, but it permanently limits what we see.
Birds retinas don’t do this at all, and it turns out that this is made possible by using a form of glucose-driven metabolism that doesn’t require oxygen. That’s crazy for such an energy intensive tissue. No other species alive today do this, and it likely evolved in dinosaurs.
It’s wild stuff.
https://www.quantamagazine.org/how-the-bird-eye-was-pushed-to-an-evolutionary-extreme-20260513/
#birds #evolution #eyes #biology

2026-05-02 09:33:54 UTC

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@nprofile…v9wr @nprofile…unhv Yes, it's one of many signs that natural world is out of kilter. We're only at the very beginning of the ecosystem chaos and extinctions that are coming.
I'm still struggling to believe that we're willing to risk tipping the Earth into a hot-house climate for tens of thousands of years, and the likely collapse our civilisation, just so the richest people of our generations can make a few more bucks.
It's like shooting yourself in the foot, but with a bazooka.

2026-04-19 08:28:12 UTC

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@nprofile…zxp6 @nprofile…wj33 @nprofile…nhss Nice. I hope Pete keeps visting.

2026-04-18 10:18:11 UTC

My day today included *two* puddle bathing piwakawaka, NZ fantails, at two separate city reserves.
It's getting a bit dry in the city and small puddles are getting popular.
Meep Meep!
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/350755648
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/350755647
#nz #birds #fantail #Ōtautahi #Christchurch
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2026-04-17 09:10:16 UTC

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@nprofile…uyu7 Neat. I like that they individually thanked in their paper all of the people that took all those flower photos on #iNaturalist. This is the way.

2026-04-16 20:44:17 UTC

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@nprofile…v23w What bollocks. That sounds like some parroting of fossil fuel industry propaganda.

2026-04-15 09:37:11 UTC

I'm seeing lots of baby birds around Ōtautahi-Christchurch, NZ, in April, like autumn is the new spring. It's really strange. Winter's not far away.
From today, here are two mother ducks with young ducklings and some pukeko chicks.
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/349979497
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/349979508
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/349979527
#birds #phenology #ClimateChange #nz
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2026-04-15 08:56:51 UTC

Bellbirds are back, baby!
The first korimako, NZ bellbird, was spotted today back on campus at #LincolnUniversityNZ. I got a photo and one of the postgrads recorded it singing.
About this time of year korimako have finished breeding in the forest reserves of the Port Hills and some birds go roaming out across the less suitable habitats of the Canterbury Plains. A few find the university campus. It's usually the male birds that get this far out, as was the case today.
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/349975490
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/349975490
#birds #nz #bellbird
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2026-04-12 23:17:08 UTC

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@nprofile…nqtz @nprofile…ffxt In that case I'm thinking about you now, as I have *hundreds* of feijoas in our kitchen at the moment. 😀

2026-04-12 20:55:37 UTC

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@nprofile…nqtz @nprofile…ffxt $USD2.99 each!! 😮

2026-04-11 06:40:54 UTC

Of the flies I saw today, this one is my favourite. It's the ngaro tara or three-lined Hover Fly (*Helophilus seelandicus*), a New Zealand endemic species.
I like the sleek colour pattern. It would not look out of place on a coverable sports car.
While the adult is sleek, the larva is a rat-tailed maggot with a long snorkle out its rear end that allows it to eat decomposing matter in stagnant water.
I saw this while on my weekly biodiversity run this afternoon through Ōtautahi-Christchurch city, NZ.
https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/348889144
#diptera #flies #entomology #nz #Syrphidae #Ōtautahi #Christchurch #iNaturalist
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2026-04-11 05:30:32 UTC

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@nprofile…ffxt @nprofile…nqtz Speaking of pickles, I just searched and there are recipes for pickled feijoas.
(I usually just eat them all raw though. I'd need more restraint to try recipes like this.)
https://gardenbetty.com/sweet-hot-pickled-feijoas/

2026-04-10 23:00:55 UTC

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@nprofile…nqtz Some of the feijoas in Christchurch are going crazy already. These fruit are from my sister's feijoas. The ones in our garden are not quite there yet.

2026-04-10 22:43:16 UTC

It's the season to be appreciative of #feijoafizz.
I think it was @nprofile…rp72 here who first told me about this neat trick. Don't throw your feijoa skins away. Put them in a clean bottle (or jar) and fill with water and leave them for a day or two.
The fruit flavour leaches into the water and the yeasts in the skin lightly ferment. The result is a feijoa flavoured lightly fizzy drink.
The recipe linked below goes all in and uses sugar. I've just been sticking the skins in bottles, waiting, then drinking.
It's surprisingly flavourful and refreshing.
http://www.thriftykiwi.co.nz/meals-and-snacks/feijoa-fizz
#feijoa #nz #drink
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2026-04-08 20:18:49 UTC

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@nprofile…7760 Seems OK for me at the moment although it has glitched out occasionally previously (503 errors and whatnot).

2026-04-08 08:58:27 UTC

So. Much. Colour!!
Here's my pick of the sunset photos from this evening. When Ōtautahi-Christchurch turns on a sunset, it goes all in.
(My full-resolution photos, plus a few more, are at Flickr, eg https://www.flickr.com/photos/mollivan_jon/55194998475/)
#sunset #nz #Ōtautahi #Christchurch #photography
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2026-04-04 21:58:19 UTC

I spent this week up in the Craigieburn Forest Park of the NZ Southern Alps helping to teach our Masters level Conservation Biology course at #LincolnUniversityNZ.
This is the first year we've run the course field trip at this location. We did so to better understand how nature is recovering after the big December 2024 fire in the area.
We were joined by retired restoration ecologist and pine expert Nick Ledgard, who spent much of his career working at the site. Nick now has a set of restoration trials set up to learn how to increase the native cover in the burnt area. The worry is that if left alone it will transition to a largely weed dominated vegetation.
@nprofile…43ks joined us for the first days of the trip to help us monitor the soil invertebrates establishing in the burnt areas, which we're comparing with the unburnt areas.
#restoration #ecology #nz #FieldTrip #universityFieldTrip
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2026-04-02 07:57:30 UTC

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@nprofile…lant It really was. Mike Casey has an impressive interview style, calm and direct and factual.

2026-04-02 07:24:09 UTC

Q+A's Jack Tame has a good interview with Rewiring Aotearoa’s Mike Casey on the need to quickly electrify NZ’s machines to run on New Zealand-made energy and ramp up rooftop solar. I like the way he pitches this as the clearly obvious and sensible solution, which it clearly and obviously is.
https://www.1news.co.nz/2026/03/29/fuel-price-blowouts-push-nz-towards-electrification-advocate/
#TVNZ #RenewableEnergy #NZ #JackTane

2026-03-29 19:47:00 UTC

My day's just started but already my word-of-the-day has got to be "semi-zygodactyl."
"This is a pattern seen in owls and ospreys, among other birds, and it means that the fourth toe can be rotated backwards on a bony flange so that it can face in either direction as the bird wishes."
http://synapsida.blogspot.com/2026/03/the-thrush-beaked-consort-bird.html
#birds #synapsida #zygodactyl

2026-03-27 06:41:49 UTC

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@nprofile…6g3g Yes, perhaps that is notable. In both of the last two university cost-cutting rounds, the Agriculture and Life Sciences division solved its budget shortfall by jettisoning ecologists. We lost about a third of our ecologists through these two rounds (we’ve made several hires since then). Grant Edwards was the AGLS Dean the second time, and I think was head of the Agriculture Department the first time. He’s not new to this form of problem solving.

2026-03-27 04:21:30 UTC

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@nprofile…6g3g I wonder if instead there's some ulterior motive here. Perhaps senior management wants to re-focus the university as well as save money, which makes voluntary redundancies a way to achieve both. They can pick who they let go.
If it was just about saving some money in the short-term, when our student enrolments are historically high, then losing this many staff and institutional expertise seems counterproductive.
(I don't like it either way.)

2026-03-26 09:21:36 UTC

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@nprofile…6g3g Hear hear. Losing 5% of our staff will definitely have consequences. Surely there's a better way.

2026-03-25 19:17:16 UTC

It's a weird time to be working at #LincolnUniversityNZ.
We've bounced back from the earthquakes and covid lockdowns and there's been an optimistic buzz in the air. The earthquake damaged buildings are mostly replaced and in the last few years #LincolnUniversityNZ has had some of its highest enrolments ever. Last year it graduated the highest number of graduates in its 147 year history.
Ironically, getting more enrolments than expected has been bad because that doesn't equate to more government funding, which instead continues to decline in real terms. NZ universities receive about *a third* less funding than the OECD average.
The solution, we learned from the Vice Chancellor Grant Edwards yesterday, is that the university is going to have to lose 40 of it's about 700 staff. Presumably those that remain will, once again, need to pick up the slack.
This kind of austerity is squeezing the life out of NZ's universities. The same thing is happening to the science sector. NZ's newly combined Bioeconomy Science Institute also going through redundancies so it can survive on less government funding.
Please remember this at the upcoming election. Investing tax dollars in research and higher education is *good* for the country.
😔
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/590629/lincoln-university-to-cut-40-full-time-equivalent-jobs
https://insidegovernment.co.nz/record-graduation-for-lincoln-university/
#LincolnUniversityNZ #jobcuts #austerity #science #universities #AcademicChatter

2026-03-23 18:58:27 UTC

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@nprofile…vvev @nprofile…pg4v
> Back then, Luxon said the next Government would “accelerate the transition to EVs” by spending an extra $170m on building the necessary infrastructure.
>
> According to National’s policy document, an extra $42.5m would be spent each year over four years.
>
> As of this week, the Government is yet to spend a single extra dollar beyond what the previous government had allocated. That’s right: zero.
NZ’s lack of investment in EV infrastructure shows, too. Two weekends back I took our EV from Christchurch over Arthur’s Pass to Westport and back via Lewis Pass. The charger at Arthur’s Pass was broken, one of the two chargers at Greymouth was broken (the other slow), the only charger in Westport was broken, the Reefton charger worked but was only 25 kW, and one of the two chargers at Springs Junction was broken.

2026-03-20 07:52:16 UTC

While helping out Heidi Allan with her field work earlier in the week, crossing NZ's South Island, I also (of course) counted nature along the way and took photos of notable species I found. I've uploaded some of them to #iNaturalist.
When it comes to little things like insects and smaller plants, Aotearoa-New Zealand is still in the early stages of exploration. It's almost trivially easy to make important observations. There's so much still to document.
Here are five of the most notable things I found on our three day trip.
The first showy mistletoe species between Hanmer Springs and Kaikoura (Yellow Mistletoe at Mount Terako): https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/343867527
The first observation of the pretty little fly *Maorina gourlayi* from North Canterbury (the 5th observation from anywhere on iNaturalist and 15th on GBIF): https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/343609762
The 1st record of the rare native earthworm-eating snail *Wainuia edwardi* from Mount Terako, and 37th observation on iNat: https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/343863343
The 1st record of a Bobilla cricket from Westport: https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/343677893
The 1st record of steelblue ladybirds in Westport and the 2nd anywhere on the West Coast: https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/343677847
#iNaturalistNZ #biodiversity #nz
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2026-03-19 09:44:32 UTC

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One of the extra challenges, when setting up a make-shift science desk on the forest floor on the West Coast of NZ's South Island, is stopping the curious local weka from pecking at or running off with your equipment.
We had to be constantly vigilant while Heidi was working.
😄
#birds #nz #weka
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2026-03-19 09:13:05 UTC

Earlier this week I had the good fortune to help #LincolnUniversityNZ ecology Masters student Heidi Allan with her field work.
Heidi's got an ambitious big-scale discovery project going, looking at the beetle communities in native NZ beech forest canopies all the way from Kaikoura on the east coast to Punakaiki on the west coast, and from the lowlands up into the Southern Alps.
The beetle community in NZ's beech canopies is largely unexplored, and has never been sampled at anything close to this scale before. Heidi's bound to find lots of new things. She'll also greatly increase our knowledge of how this community is affected by climate.
Here are some photos from our trip. Along with Heidi are John Marris, the curator of our university entomology museum, and our university's herpetologist (and lover of creepy crawlies) Jennifer Gillette.
#fieldwork #ecology #nz #entomology
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2026-03-12 10:02:47 UTC

I can get lost in moths. They're one of nature's art galleries.
Here's a close-up of the wings of NZ's Greater Alpine Grey (Ichneutica virescens).
You can zoom into the full-resolution version on Flickr at : https://www.flickr.com/photos/mollivan_jon/55143236921/
See the whole moth on iNaturalist NZ at: https://www.inaturalist.nz/observations/342554964
#mothodon #Lepidoptera #moths #nz #photography
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2026-03-12 07:32:21 UTC

Today it was like I got *two* radioactive spider bites.
Now I’ll have the super powers to resist COVID *and* measles, and at no cost (thanks NZ!).
#HappyToBeVaccinated #covid #nz #measels
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2026-03-08 18:35:55 UTC

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@nprofile…r22f Thanks. They’re like miniature, colourful roofing tiles. On a moth.

2026-03-08 04:33:29 UTC

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Surprisingly, a springtail expert on iNaturalist has suggested a species ID for this springtail. I wasn't expecting it to be able to be identified to that detail, but it certainly matches the description. It looks like it's *Bourletiella arvalis*.
That makes the springtail a lot more interesting than the moth it's on.
The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (#GBIF) has 334 observations of the moth species (178 of which are from iNaturalist).
GBIF has only 16 observations of this springtail species from New Zealand. If confirmed, my little hitch-hiker here will be the 17th.

2026-03-07 23:40:00 UTC

Sometimes a moth is more than it seems.
I looked twice at this moth photo I was uploading to #iNaturalist. There was an orange spot on one wing. A parasitic mite?
No! It's a globular springtail!
I'm not sure if it hitched a ride into the moth light on this moth or came in on another insect.
springtail: https://inaturalist.nz/observations/341756456
moth: https://inaturalist.nz/observations/341756462
#phoresy #Collembola #Springtail #entomology #NZ
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2026-03-02 08:48:12 UTC

Here's a triangle that loomed in the sky as it approached Ōtautahi-Christchurch city, NZ, yesterday morning.
Soon afterwards the blustery rainy cool weather arrived and stuck around for the next 24 hours.
https://flic.kr/p/2rZ9p6t
#photography #weather #nz #triangle #clouds

2026-03-01 22:57:49 UTC

It's a cold blustery cloudy day in much of Aotearoa-NZ (it's hailing outside as I type this) so to brighten up your day here's a snowberry yellow moth.
I just uploaded my photo from 2023 to iNaturalist as I work through my backlog. It's now the 29th observation on iNat of the species and will be the 33rd on GBIF once my ID is confirmed.
As the name suggests, the caterpillars of this pretty yellow moth eat NZ snowberries (Gaultheria species).
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/340853987
https://www.flickr.com/photos/mollivan_jon/55123719913/
#mothodon #moths #Lepidoptera #nz #yellow
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2026-03-01 20:06:09 UTC

Have you seen my bag of weather? I left it in New Zealand.

2026-02-27 09:16:46 UTC

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@nprofile…tu5v @nprofile…m6ql Nice! That is excellent.

2026-02-27 04:09:39 UTC

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As a country New Zealand should be paying more people to work on taxonomy. Taxonomy is the foundation of biodiversity knowledge, and we still know very little about a lot of NZ's biodiversity.
According to a Science Learning Hub article from 2019, there were 360 taxonomists working in NZ (on all taxa, marine to terrestrial, birds to microbes), "although only a subset of these are employed in full-time roles".
In comparison, according to the NZ Law Society, in 2021 there were 15,769 lawyers in New Zealand. One lawyer is paid a lot more than one taxonomist.
This is no shade on lawyers. A society needs a functioning legal system. We also need functioning ecosystems and healthy biodiversity, and one of the essentials of that is knowing what species we have and where they are and how they're trending.
https://www.sciencelearn.org.nz/resources/2829-taxonomy-the-science-of-species-discovery
https://www.lawsociety.org.nz/news/publications/lawtalk/lawtalk-issue-960/snapshot-of-the-profession-2024/
#taxonomy #nz

2026-02-27 04:07:24 UTC

I've been continuing to upload my backlog of moth photos to #iNaturalist and am being reminded of how there are still *a lot* of NZ insects that don't have formal scientific descriptions and names.
Here are three of my recently uploaded moths that can only be identified to genus because they are unnamed. They've been given tag names on iNat while they wait in line for a taxonomist to figure out exactly what they are and how many species they are.
In 2010 it was estimated that about 11,000 endemic terrestrial insect species in NZ had names . About 7,000 were still waiting to be named. So, about two of every five NZ insects species still lack even a name.
That was mentioned in a report to government in 2021 about how we don't know if there's a general decline in endemic insects here. It concluded that "there are insufficient data to determine the overall state and trend of insect populations in Aotearoa New Zealand."
As a country we could be doing a lot more.
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/338694677
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/339970870
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/340090084
#taxonomy #biodiversity #entomology #insects #mothodon #nz
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2026-02-27 02:13:53 UTC

Check out this outrageous NZ harvestman photographed by sebastiandoak earlier this month near Charleston on the west coast of the South Island.
It's called Algidia viridata ssp. bicolor (yes, another incredible endemic NZ invertebrate still lacking a catchy common name). I've never seen one, but I want to!
The photos on the obervation are CC-BY Sebastian Doak.
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/337191626
#entomology #nz #Opiliones #harvestman #green #iNaturalistNZ #iNaturalist

2026-02-26 08:27:20 UTC

I’m watching a concert on Arte where Duran Duran, in 2025, is doing a cover of Talking Heads’ Psycho Killer.
Our insane timeline is not even trying to make sense now. Are we sure we’re not in a simulation?
😀

2026-02-25 19:10:21 UTC

I spent part of my summer on Banks Peninsula with a team from #LincolnUniversityNZ monitoring lizards, invertebrates, and birds. We also, optimistically, put out a set of bat recorders.
Native bats haven't been reliably sighted on Banks Peninsula in many decades but there's always hope that there's a colony or two out there somewhere. If you know the Peninsula, we put our recorders out at Tutakakahikura, Ellangowan, Panama Rock, Mount Pearce, Hay Reserve, and Montgomery Reserve. All have areas of old growth forest with some gnarly old trees where bats could roost.
Sadly, the results are in and we detected no bats.
:ablobsigh:
#ecology #EcologicalMonitoring #nz #bats #BanksPeninsula

2026-02-21 06:49:52 UTC

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@nprofile…xpag Antlions arr terrifying only for tiny things like ants. Here's my photo with a scale bar (0.5 mm increments).
Usually all you see is the jaws at the bottom of their pit. The rest of the antlion's body is just under the surface out of view.
https://o.mastodon.nz/media_attachments/files/116/107/279/106/749/845/original/9b972a5065e1ff11.jpg

2026-02-20 23:36:42 UTC

Here are a couple of lesser known native NZ species, which I've uploaded to iNaturalist this week from my backlog of moth light photos from NZ's North Canterbury mountains.
Pseudoscorpions are minute ground-based predators that often hitch a ride on moths (they wait on flowers for a lift). We occasionally see them at moth lights where they've dropped off their rides. https://inaturalist.nz/observations/339490489
The antlion was living in the sand under the shelter where we set up our moth light. Just like a lion, they live in a pit of loose sand and eat anything that falls in. Wait, no. Why are they called lions? They're more like a Sarlacc from Star Wars. https://inaturalist.nz/observations/339347432
#iinvertebrates #entomology #nz #iNaturalisttNZ
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2026-02-20 21:02:15 UTC

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@nprofile…xj5e I expect they’re salps. (Or slaps as my spellchecker wants to call them. Salps slap.)
https://inaturalist.nz/observations?taxon_id=122325

2026-02-20 09:50:14 UTC

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The new shared path in my photo runs along what is about to be a big new housing subdivision in Halswell. It's pretty empty now, but the houses are just starting to be built so soon there will be lots of pedestrians using it. There's a designated bus lane now, which is clever, but it means there's no longer space anywhere on the road for a cyclist.

2026-02-20 09:48:09 UTC

If you have to put up a sign asking cyclists to please use your shared pedestrian path, you've designed it wrong.
As a commuter cyclist, I want to get from point A to point B as fast as I can, without dying. Just like a car driver.
When given the option of riding on the road verge, or weaving in and out of people walking their dogs with headphones on and children walking to school and friends walking along chatting to each other, and giving way to cars at every little side road, then I choose the road verge. So do people on road bikes zipping past me at >30 km/hr.
I really like the separated cycleways that Christchurch city has built. They're safe and fast and well used.
I worry about the recent proliferation instead of "shared paths" in new road developments which combine cyclists with pedestrians and discourage bikes from being on the road at all.
Shared paths are useful for children on bikes, if we teach them how to ride around pedestrians, but they're impractical for an adult cyclist trying to travel 20–30 km/hr.
Please, let's keep investing in separated cycleways for cycle commuters. That's what will get more commuters out of cars, not shared paths.
#cycleways #bikeTooter #nz #biking
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2026-02-20 08:34:29 UTC

Here are four of the species I found today in Ōtautahi-Christchurch, NZ.
Here's a caterpillar of mōkarakara, the NZ magpie moth, eating leaves of the European groundsel, Senecio vulgaris. https://inaturalist.nz/observations/339402946
Here's a Puapua-a-Autahi, NZ's Anemone Stinkhorn Fungus, the first I've seen this season. They're really strange looking fungi. https://inaturalist.nz/observations/339402950
Here's a red fly agaric mushroom, from the Northern Hemisphere, which was at the base of a patch of pine trees. It's odd to see a lot of these about now. I expect they're responding to our unusually wet summer. https://inaturalist.nz/observations/339402947
chatter-chatter-chatter
And, here's one of the many, many Kihikihi Wawā, NZ chorus cicadas, about the city. They're an elegant insect up close, and a *loud* insect at just about any distance.
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/339402945
#iNaturalistNZ #nature #nz #fungi #insects #entomology
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2026-02-13 07:29:30 UTC

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@nprofile…nlzd Worst fire safety advice song *ever*. 😄

2026-02-09 04:37:13 UTC

Today I learned more about Wasp Parasitizer Moths, in the genus Chalcoela.
Why doing something dangerous like be out in the open for days eating cabbage leaves when you instead can be inside a *wasp nest* eating *wasp larvae*.
Respect.
(The moths are among candidates being considered for paper wasp biocontrol in the Pacific including NZ.)
https://www.bugguide.net/node/view/29597
https://doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.19811.02086
https://www.landcareresearch.co.nz/assets/Events/biosecurity-bonanza/2024/29-July-24-Brown-Biosecurity-bananas-paper-wasp-biocontrol.pdf
#Chalcoela #moths #NaturalHistory #mothodon #Lepidoptera #entomology

2026-02-06 05:05:35 UTC

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@nprofile…nlzd I'm always impressed with your breadth of knowledge of music.

2026-02-06 05:04:37 UTC

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@nprofile…6g3g Good article. It takes slow, steady work to build solid things that last.

2026-02-06 04:58:59 UTC

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@nprofile…nlzd Crumbs! Where did you excavate that from? 😄

2026-02-06 01:20:09 UTC

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@nprofile…yh4s Great (although not for the squirrel). I see the hawk is banded. Can you make out the number on the band on your photos? Someone will want to know that.

2026-02-04 05:27:06 UTC

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@nprofile…et3t Neat video. I've read about Blue Duck Scenic Reserve but I don't think I've ever been into it. I must go sometime.
Also, that's a lot of bellbirds. When I was in Riccarton Bush yesterday I only heard 3–4 singing.

2026-02-03 20:00:46 UTC

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@nprofile…et3t Yes, I’m the same. The forested Canterbury Plains that the first Polynesian settlers saw about 800 years ago would have been *extraordinary*.
I guess we’re lucky we’ve still got a few tiny scraps like Riccarton Bush (and Talbot Bush and Lords Bush) to offer us a glimpse of what it was like. And to grow from!

2026-02-03 09:24:46 UTC

At the end of today I stopped off at Riccarton Bush, the old growth forest fragment in the heart of Christchurch city, NZ. It was lightly raining which made the forest look extra green. The forest is centuries older than the city and it's definitely worth a stop if you're in the area.
Here's one kahikatea tree I found that had taken a somewhat curvy route up to the canopy. I took a panorama to squeeze it all into one photo.
https://flic.kr/p/2rUSKk9
#tree #RiccartonBush #nz #Ōtautahi #Christchurch #panorama #photograpghy #Flickr

2026-02-02 21:51:31 UTC

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@nprofile…rrtm Woah. That's a colossal yew tree. Any idea how old it is?

2026-02-02 07:12:02 UTC

It’s good to see bird window strikes getting some attention in the NZ media, here with a story today in #RNZ about lots of kererū hitting modern windows in Dunedin. A lot of birds hit windows. In Akaroa it’s been glass balustrades on decks that tūī have been flying into.
What’s missing from this story is that this is a solved problem–there are ways to manufacture glass windows that birds can see–and some cities and states internationally require this in their building codes.
The second link below is a recent new story from Winnipeg in Canada which last year past a bylaw requiring bird friendly windows. After building industry lobbyists pushed back this year, claiming this was too expensive, bird advocates put together the costings for the Winnipeg council showing that, with proper planning at the design stage, the extra costs are negligible. The bylaw was upheld.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/585726/modern-windows-suspected-of-being-behind-rise-in-serious-kereru-injuries
https://naturecanada.ca/news/blog/bird-friendly-strategy/
#birds #conservation #WindowStrikes #nz

2026-02-01 08:59:08 UTC

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@nprofile…w9yw That's curious. No, I don't have any immediate explanation, other than to mention that it's been a weirdly cool and wet summer, at least down here in Christchurch, and quite a few insects are a bit late of the mark. I wonder if your local insects will peak later?

2026-02-01 08:57:18 UTC

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@nprofile…6n2p Great. They're impressive insects at all stages. Last time I reared a gum emperor from a caterpillar, I was surprised that it stayed nine months as a pupa before the adult moth emerged.

2026-02-01 07:50:36 UTC

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Between festive moths and grumpy moths are elegant moths. Here's one of the Opogona comptella that showed up at my moth light last night.
They'd look good on a runway in any high fashion show.
This one's an Australian species that established in northern NZ then spread southwards. Its caterpillars have been found eating dead wood.
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/336923284
#mothodon #moths #insects #entomology #nz #Christchurch #Ōtautahi
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2026-01-31 09:26:06 UTC

As much as I loathe LLM "AI" built from hoards of stolen data, machine learning "AI" has become terrifically useful.
This past week I had 10 audio recorders set out in the forest and nearby grassland, all recording non-stop from Monday afternoon to Friday morning. That was on our recent university field ecology field trip.
Today I downloaded all the files to a hard drive (156 GB of data) and then I set my little M1 Macbook Air to work, using the offline desktop BirdNet app to identify all of the birds in the recordings.
It took most of the day, and now I have a 42,284 row spreadsheet of birds detected.
It really feels like magic.
Here's a quick sorted lists of all the bird detections with species IDs with a confidence score >0.9.
Together with the students in the course, we'll laterl compare how birds have changed since we started doing this in 2020, and how the birds in the grassland differ from the forest.)
#birds #BirdNet #ecology #nz #MachineLearning
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2026-01-31 05:51:12 UTC

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@nprofile…r769 The first coverage I saw of these protests was this story with the disappointing headline, "Twin protests set to cause traffic woes for Auckland."
Perhaps I shouldn't read too much into this but my first read of that headline implied that the majority of New Zealanders would be more concerned about traffic delays than the issues being protested about. That's concerning.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/585480/twin-protests-set-to-cause-traffic-woes-for-auckland

2026-01-31 05:14:10 UTC

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@nprofile…nqtz Exhibit B: the New Zealand flatworm (Arthurdendyus triangulates) that's been eating up the earthworms of the UK and Ireland.
https://www.nonnativespecies.org/assets/Uploads/ID_Arthurdendyus_triangulatus_New_Zealand_Flatworm.pdf
#InvasiveSpecies #nz #UK

2026-01-30 06:55:57 UTC

Meanwhile, in New Zealand, Detector Gadget has been called out of retirement to track down a rat:
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/585514/13-year-old-rodent-sniffer-dog-back-on-the-job-after-rat-found-on-predator-free-island
#RNZ #conservation #nz #dogsOfMastodon

2026-01-24 20:41:55 UTC

No need to be alarmed but it appears to be triffid season in Ōtautahi-Christchurch, NZ.
😀
#bloomScrolling #flowers #nz #SoapAloe
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2026-01-22 07:30:26 UTC

We were just telling our daughter about legendary NZ weatherman Jim Hickey and I found this video of Jim Hickey’s KAPOW.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nnd_AnkckD8
#NZ #weather #weatherman

2026-01-20 10:01:49 UTC

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@nprofile…unhv great tip! This is outside our house right now!
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2026-01-17 23:54:50 UTC

For the past week four of us from #LincolnUniversityNZ were based at Hinewai Reserve on Banks Peninsula, NZ. We visited a set of monitoring sites in and our of the predator control area of the Predator Free Banks Peninsula project. Predator Free Banks Peninsula is primarily targetting brush-tailed possums at the moment and we're interested in how that is affecting birds, lizards, and invertebrates.
We've been doing this for several years so we're also interested in what the general trends are in these animals in this amazing landscape.
We counted, weighed, and photographed all the lizards in our lizard shelters (mostly geckos). Jennifer Gillette is using the unique patterns on geckos' backs and irises to track individuals over the years.
We also brought in our audio recorders, which monitored birds and, optimistically, bats. Bats haven't officially been detected on Banks Peninsula in decades. There's still hope so we put out bat recorders in several of the areas of oldest forest.
We also brought in our invertebrate pitfall traps.
We've got three more days on the Peninsula this coming week, then we can get stuck into identifying the specimens, processing the data, and finding our what the patterns and trends are.
#ecology #fieldwork #EcologicalMonitoring #BanksPeninsula #NZ
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2026-01-11 08:26:18 UTC

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@nprofile…dqgy It’s true. They are!

2026-01-11 04:50:21 UTC

Yesterday I was at The Art of Banksy exhibition in central Christchurch, NZ, "the world's largest exhibition of Banksy art". I was pretty great. There were photos and prints of the stencilled images that Banksy has sprayed on walls about the world, with lots of cutting, insightful commentary on how messed up our world is.
Then, today, I was out on the streets of Christchurch and I saw a message someone had written in chalk on the footpath (sidewalk): "I LOVE BEANS".
Fair enough. For all of society's faults, beans are good.
🙂
#graffiti #art #BANKSY #nz #tepaechristchurch
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2026-01-10 23:48:49 UTC

I made a timelapse of the Australian wildfire smoke tinting the skies brown over New Zealand's Southern Alps. This was yesterday evening from the Cashmere hills in Christchurch city.
https://flic.kr/p/2rRe52d
#weather #smoke #fire #nz #timelapse

2026-01-07 09:36:19 UTC

I've learned the hard way that there is an enormous difference between microSD cards in the amount of power they need. When it comes to putting audio recorders out in nature, that matters a lot.
As an example, I was just comparing my latest AudioMoth results with SanDisk Extreme 64GB cards compared with Samsung Pro Plus 128 GB cards last year.
In the same device, with the same dawn-dusk daytime recording settings, on the same three fully-charged Powerex rechargeable batteries, the Samsung card recorded for four days (11 GB) before flattening the batteries, while the SanDisk cards recorded for 12 days (44 GB) before the flattening the batteries.
Given that it takes a lot of time for me to get to these remote sites to deploy these recorders, this makes a big difference to how much data I get.
#AudioMoth #AudioRecorder #birds #BirdMonitoring #EcologicalMonitoring #SDcards #EcologyMethods
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2026-01-07 08:20:10 UTC

Bird news from Ōtautahi-Christchurch:
I learned tonight that the Travis Wetland ranger Matt saw a kereū flying over the wetland. They’re a rare sight that far north of the Port Hills. Hopefully it’s the first of many.
Also, a pair of adult tūī *with a juvenile* have been seen in Huntsbury. That may be the first time in decades that tūī have bred on the northern side of the Port Hills.
#birds #nz #Christchurch

2026-01-04 22:52:18 UTC

Dougal Townsend took an incredible sequence of photos yesterday of a riroriro (grey warbler), one of NZ's two smallest birds, feeding a fledgling of pīpīwharauroa (shining cuckoo). Pīpīwharauroa are brood parasites of riroriro, which raise them as if they were their own young.
(CC-BY-NC Dougal Townsend)
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/333374944
#birds #nature #nz #Wellington #iNaturalistNZ #iNaturalist

2026-01-03 07:50:56 UTC

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@nprofile…vksx It really was. Around here it’s unusual for me to see this many kererū in one place. Hopefully it’s a sign that their numbers are increasing.

2026-01-03 05:57:31 UTC

Behold, a feeding frenzy of Plum Sharks!
Plum sharks AKA kererū, the NZ wood pigeon.
Plums are in full fruit in Ōtautahi-Christchurch city, NZ, at the moment. I was on Valley Road today in Cashmere there were at least 11 kererū feasting in the plum trees up the side of the road.
I think plums are one of the big reasons that these birds venture down from the hills into the city at this time of year.
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/333255361
#birds #fruigivory #plums #Prunus #woodpigeon #pigeons #kererū #nz #Christchurch #nature #iNaturalist #iNaturalistNZ
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2025-12-29 04:24:31 UTC

I went for a bike ride today, my monthly biodiversity monitoring loop from Christchurch-Prebbleton-Lincoln-Ladbrooks-Christchurch, and I found one patch of NZ blue butterflies. They were on flowering white clovers by the Halswell Junction motorway intersection, where I've seen them before.
NZ blues are essentially only found on the east coast of the South Island, having been displaced by the Australian grass blue from the rest of NZ. While their native broom host plants are rare in most places, their caterpillars can develop on clovers and lucernes, so we're lucky to still have these butterflies in parts of our cities and towns and farms.
Still, I only see them occasionally around the city. They seem like overgrown places with open rocky ground, and not our tidy, frequently mown city parks and gardens.
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/332545570
#butterflies #Lepidoptera #nz #Zizina #Christchurch #nature
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2025-12-24 04:41:18 UTC

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@nprofile…25le And a very festive snoot boop to you too.

2025-12-23 05:26:38 UTC

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@nprofile…8e3f Hah! Thanks for that. I’m pleased (and relieved) they thought it as hilarious. It’s a good pharmacy.

2025-12-19 20:50:03 UTC

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@nprofile…6fxv @nprofile…ppzy @nprofile…pmsm I’m still stuck on “the precision and accuracy of a single Neenish tart”. It sounds like something from Douglas Adams.
Somehow I’ve missed Neenish tarts. I clearly need to cast my eye away from the custard squares and ginger crunch at NZ bakeries. I just looked and my old Edmunds Cookbook even has a recipe for them.
Oddly, Wikipedia suggests that the meaning of “Neenish” is now lost in time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neenish_tart
#NeenishTart #Dessert #recipe #nz
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2025-12-18 18:26:16 UTC

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@nprofile…pmsm @nprofile…ppzy Wow. Tough crowd. 😄 Perhaps it was the advantage to being first to market in NZ with a big American style cookie, rather than a crunchy biscuit.
Me, I’m more of a gingernut man although I happily eat CookieTime cookies when offered.

2025-12-18 09:34:31 UTC

Today I learned that CookieTime, the NZ cookie company that started in 1983 here in Christchurch, NZ, has a shop in Japan! It's "The home of New Zealand Snacking."
https://www.cookietime.co.jp/
https://cookietime.co.nz/about/
#cookies #nz #TIL #Japan

2025-12-16 08:23:42 UTC

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Here’s the diversity of colours and markings on *Declana floccosa*. Note that almost none have bright orange markings.
https://inaturalist.nz/observations?place_id=6803&preferred_place_id=6803&taxon_id=388455

2025-12-16 08:22:36 UTC

Here's my favourite moth find of the past week, which we saw at Hinewai Reserve over the hill from Akaroa, NZ. It's *Declana floccosa* which is quite variable in it's colours and patterns. This is the first one I've seen speckled with bright orange spots.
When I posted it on #iNaturalist, squidney8 posted a link of the local lichen, *Brigantiaea chrysosticta*, which also is grey with orange spots.
This colour morph of *Declana floccosa* would blend in incredibly well when on a *Brigantiaea chrysosticta*. Still, it is aware enough of its colour morph to known which background to sit on?
moth: https://inaturalist.nz/observations/330659205
lichen: https://inaturalist.nz/observations/55779194
#mothodon #moths #nz #camouflage #iNaturalistNZ
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2025-12-14 03:29:23 UTC

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@nprofile…mnh6 Wow. In this was a fairytale I’d suspect that you’d have been cursed and that you’d now have to go on an epic quest.
This week I watched by backpack filled with a couple of thousand dollars of camera equipment tumbled about 15 m down a steep forest bank into a small stream. Miraculously nothing seems to have been damaged. Phew!
Then, yesterday, I accidentally dropped my macro lens attachment in Heathcote River while photographing some eels. With care I managed to reach elbow deep into the river and fish it out while keeping an eye on the eels.
Hopefully we’re both less accident prone next week.

2025-12-07 08:57:13 UTC

Her are some of the birds I photographed yesterday on my weekly run through Ōtautahi-Christchurch city, NZ.
There's a European greenfinch up a tree. There have been lots about in the city the past month or so. I'm not sure where they all come from. https://inaturalist.nz/observations/329672174
An adult tīrairaka (South Island Fantail) was being followed about by a young one, doing its best (but failing) to sound like an adult fantail. https://inaturalist.nz/observations/329672163
A kawaupaka (NZ little shag) was diving in the Heathcote River, looking, as they do, like some half bird-half eel fishing machine. Their feathers get wet so they can dive better. https://inaturalist.nz/observations/329672165
European redpolls were down on the edge of the river getting a drink. https://inaturalist.nz/observations/329672168
#birds #nz #Christchurch #Ōtautahi #nature
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2025-12-05 06:28:49 UTC

A reminder, if it's needed, that smuggling geckos is a crime in New Zealand and you'll end up in jail.
I tip my hat to the Department of Conservation staff involved in the undercover sting to catch this smuggler.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/581020/south-korean-man-jailed-following-doc-undercover-gecko-smuggling-sting
#geckos #NZ #smuggling

2025-12-01 08:20:42 UTC

Hello, I am a spider. Will you be my friend?
😀
I photographed this little guy on the weekend in Ōtautahi-Christchurch city, NZ. It's an Australian Bronze Hopper, Helpis minitabunda. Introduced accidentally to NZ, it now occurs throughout the North Island and upper to middle South Island.
This species is unusual amongst spiders in that the male is larger than the female.
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/329039712
#JumpingSpider #Salticidae #NZ #entomology #spiders #nature
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2025-11-30 06:22:22 UTC

I was reminded this week that trout in New Zealand rivers are introduced predators and that this is not good for some native fish.
I was up in the mountains at Craigieburn Forest Park on Thursday (scoping out a new university ecology field trip). One of our team thought she saw a trout in Cave Stream, and I got a quick photo.
We were with retired forester Nick Ledgard, who spent much of his career working here. He had seen native galaxid fish in the stream before and thought it was trout free, since trout would have difficulty getting up past the cave system that Cave Stream is known for.
Looking at my photo later, I unfortunately confirmed that it was a brown trout.
NZers love trout and trout management is an important way to advocate for cleaner rivers. Still, it is also important for native fish conservation (especially non-migratory galaxid fish) that some stretches of our rivers remain trout free.
http://inaturalist.nz/observations/328459396
#fish #nz #BiologicalInvasions #trout

2025-11-29 22:01:34 UTC

Look! Cinnabar moth!
Last summer I was surprised to find cinnabar moth caterpillars feeding on the native pahokoraka, Senecio quadridentatus, in the middle of Christchurch city, NZ. Cinnabar moths were released to control the European pasture weed ragwort back in the 1940s.
I collected four caterpillars and fed them on pahokoraka leaves until they pupated on 16 January. I put them on some scrunched up newsprint in a plastic container and put that outside in a shaded area of our garden. Today, three adult moths emerged.
They're day-flying moths which retain the poisons of their host plants and advertise that to would-be predators with their bright colours,
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/328816568
#mothodon #moths #nz #Christchurch #BiologicalControl
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2025-11-26 18:33:17 UTC

And to critics who argue that trapping, neutering, and releasing feral cats is better than culling them, Bailey has a blunt response: "They're killing our native birds and not shagging them."
That’s quoted from a good article this morning by Farah Hancock on #RNZ, on NZ’s big problem with feral cats and the social tension around what to do with them. “Predator-free” without dealing with feral cats makes no sense.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/in-depth/580105/how-feral-cats-spread-toxoplasmosis-risk-across-hundreds-of-kiwi-farms
#FeralCats #InvasiveSpecies #Conservation #NZ

2025-11-24 23:53:38 UTC

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One of the sites at Travis Wetland where we set up our invertebrate sampling yesterday was in the new southern woods.
I helped with a planting day for this back in 2014, when it was still a wet field. Now, it feels like a real forest, with a canopy well above my head and lots of wild seedlings scattered about underneath. It's amazing how quickly trees grow when the ground is always wet.
Here are two photos of the same part of the wetland in September 2014, when trees were being planted, and now. It's like magic!
Many of the trees planted here were sourced from Pūtaringamotu, Riccarton Bush, the old growth fragment of kahikatea swamp forest in central Christchurch. Pūtaringamotu is a much drier site than it was when the city was founded so it's fantastic to see a new swamp forest emerging.
(Now we just need to rein in our carbon emissions to stop the impending sea level rise that will otherwise submerge all these sites in a few centuries.)
#UrbanEcology #ForestRestoration #wetland #nz #Ōtautahi #Christchurch #nature
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2025-11-24 22:59:07 UTC

I spent yesterday at Travis Wetland, Ōruapaeroa, which is a large wetland restoration site in eastern Ōtautahi-Christchurch, NZ. One of my MSc students, Tommy, is embarking on an invertebrate survey of the wetland, and we spent the day setting up Malaise traps (to catching flying insects) and pitfall traps (to catch invertebrates on the ground).
Tommy is repeating a survey done back in 1995–1996, when the wetland (then mostly wet farmland) was being purchased from a housing developer by the City Council.
We expect a lot to have changed (hopefully mostly for the better) as the vegetation of the wetland is much more diverse and native than it was.
Stay tuned over the summer for insect discoveries.
#entomology #wetland #restoration #InsectSurvey #insects #nz #LincolnUniversityNZ #research
https://o.mastodon.nz/media_attachments/files/115/607/129/060/756/937/original/7448aac3177e8142.jpg
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2025-11-21 09:25:28 UTC

Oh stop clowning about Doris!
This photo of a clown doris was taken by Gillian Houston in September on NZ's Tawhiti Rahi, Poor Knights Islands. Gillian uploaded to #iNaturalistNZ today. This is now the 654th NZ observation on #iNaturalist of this extravagant mollusc.
Just look at it!
https://inaturalist.nz/observations/327481914
#marine #nudibranch #biology #mollusca #colourful

2025-11-21 06:11:31 UTC

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@nprofile…wjp8 Wow. Top effort!

2025-11-20 09:46:19 UTC

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@nprofile…r0h3 In case you've not looked at iNaturalist NZ yet, lots of people have mapped out lots of harakeke in the general red zone area: https://inaturalist.nz/observations?nelat=-43.471291877591874&nelng=172.7546484321822&subview=map&swlat=-43.53977091147084&swlng=172.5634176582564&taxon_id=51754&verifiable=any

2025-11-20 09:44:26 UTC

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@nprofile…r0h3 There's also lots of harakeke around Anzac Drive between New Brighton Road and Travis Road, where the Kate Sheppard retirement home used to be before the quakes, and some along Corsers Stream that runs past Donnell Sports Park south to New Brighton Road.

2025-11-20 08:45:53 UTC

NZ's Out There Learning YouTube channel has an excellent new video on NZ's Taupo supervolcano.
That's in case you needed a reminder of how colossally violent past eruptions of this volcano have been, and a reminder that it's still active and magma is gradually building under the lake.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fiq9TSKiWaw
#nz #volcano #SuperVolcano