Wildlife March 2013

[Michael J Campbell]

European Robin. Erithacus rubecula

This fellow/girl was sitting on my upturned wheelbarrow watching me working in the garden this morning.

[ranunculus]

Lovely shots, Michael ... the robins must be taking modelling courses ... this one posed at Harlow Carr Gardens today.

[mark smyth]

'My' Otter again

[Peter Maguire]

They look like two different animals Mark - the upper one has a broken lower right canine and heavy wear on the equivalent lower left tooth. The otter in the lower picture has no wear on these teeth (nor does it have the white whiskers), probably a young animal.

Sorry about getting technical! 

[Maggi Young]

They look like two different animals Mark - the upper one has a broken lower right canine and heavy wear on the equivalent lower left tooth. The otter in the lower picture has no wear on these teeth (nor does it have the white whiskers), probably a young animal.

Sorry about getting technical! 

Takes a dentist to notice this stuff! Well spotted, Peter!

[mark smyth]

I noticed that. Its a very tame, too tame, mother and cub. If a male is a dog it a female a bitch? Yesterday my lens at 150mm was too long to focus

Here are photo that shows how close one was. This is the uncropped photo, lower one, reduced to 700 pixels wide. Close enough to hear it chewing and close enough to hear it smelling me. No hide used and no fish as bait.

[David Nicholson]

They look like two different animals Mark - the upper one has a broken lower right canine and heavy wear on the equivalent lower left tooth. The otter in the lower picture has no wear on these teeth (nor does it have the white whiskers), probably a young animal.

Sorry about getting technical! 

Possibly a market out there for internet consultations?

[Peter Maguire]

You couldn't afford me - after Thursday night I become absolutely priceless until Monday morning! 

[David Nicholson]

 

[ruweiss]

Some nice animals with no visible teeth - An article in our local newspaper mentioned two
storks standing in a field beside a well frequented road since more than a week They are
not shy at all and are surely the most photographed objects in our region!
The egret in the background also seems to enjoy the public ovations since some days.

[Armin]

Mark & Rudi,
you can feel lucky to have otters and storcks in front of your camera lenses.
I would be happy to see any here.

[Anthony Darby]

You couldn't afford me - after Thursday night I become absolutely priceless until Monday morning! 

We used the term 'miraculous', but usually after a Friday night.

[Anthony Darby]

Yesterday I went on a field trip to Shakespear Open Sanctuary which is located in Shakespear Regional Park at the tip of the Whangaparaoa Peninsula and is named after the Shakespear family which bought the land in the 1880s from local Maori. The sanctuary is now behind a 1.7 km pest/predator-proof fence (completed March 2011) and since they got rid of the cats, rats and other vermin the lizard population has boomed. This day was organised by the NZ Herpetological Society and over twenty enthusiasts were taken to examine gecko hides attached to trees round the perimeter of the forest and pitfall traps set for ground dwelling skinks. We clocked up six of the eight species present in the reserve: pacific gecko (Hoplodactylus pacificus); rainbow skink (Lampropholis delicata); copper skink (Cyclodina aenea); ornate skink (C. ornata); moko skink (Oligosoma moco - one of only four mainland colonies) and shore skink (O. smithii). The first pictures show the extent of the park and gecko habitat. Only one green gecko (Naultinus elegans) has been seen in the park recently. Pacific geckos are fairly common, but occur in huge numbers on the offshore islands. The peninsula is close to Tiri Tiri Matangi island, which is a bird sanctuary. They hope to reintroduce kiwis to the park this year. The other species we didn't see was the striped skink (O. striatum).

[Anthony Darby]

After examining 30 odd gecko hides, where we found two pacific geckos and a dozen or so tree wetas, we headed off in the ute and two mules (four wheel drive golf carts by any other name) to a moko skink hot spot which had been divided off with another pest-proof fence. Skinks are trapped in buckets sunk into the ground as pitfall traps. They are covered with a corrugated roof tile and have food and a wet sponge as well as straw and some rocks in the bottom. Alas, the commonest skink is the Australian rainbow skink, which lays eggs and can reproduce and four times the rate of the native skinks.

[Anthony Darby]

We did find a copper skink, but I didn't get a picture. We headed back to the ranger station after checking a dozen or so pitfall traps. Before our barbecue lunch the park ranger checked out the plant nursery for ornate skinks. We found three and caught two. We also found a large male tree weta. The last pic shows Brian, the park volunteer who had set up all the pitfall traps before hand and led our day.