This is the mountain neinei (Dracophyllum traversii) in flower. The mountain neinei is one weird tree, with tangled, twisted branches topped with wild-haired clusters of leaves. Then in spring and summer, they sprout these spiky, conical flowers, which gives the mountain neinei another name: the pineapple tree. Mountain neinei grow at high altitude, towards the [...]
Kahurangi National Park
This photo was taken on the track from the Flora carpark to the Arthur Hut, not far from the last bit of the track that goes up to the hut. The straggly looking tree in the foreground is the mountain neinei (Dracophyllum traversii) and the trees covering the nearby ridge are beech, and above the [...]
This western weka (Gallirallus australis australis) chick is a bit older than the one I posted yesterday, its fuzz is starting to look almost feathery and has turned brown. This chick was foraging, along with another, on one side of the track going up to Arthur Hut, while its parents were on the other side [...]
This fuzzy beast is a western weka (Gallirallus australis australis) chick. Weka are regarded as “semi-precocial”: once the chicks hatch, they stay in the nest only a couple of days before they’re out and about in the bush with their parents. (The chicks of a fully precocial species would start moving around right after hatching. [...]
The male chaffinch (Fringilla coelebs gengleri) sports this lovely silver aviator cap year round, but his colours get really intense in spring. Chaffinches were among the 130 bird species introduced to New Zealand following European settlement, and this seems to have been one of the less harmful introductions. They do some damage to fruits and [...]
This tarn is just a ten minute walk from Fenella Hut in the Cobb Valley. The beech trees growing alongside the tarn are rather scrubby, attesting to how hard life can be in the subalpine zone.
From the Flora carpark at the end of Graham Valley Road, you can walk up the Flora Saddle, then down to the Flora Hut. The hut is divided into two bunk rooms with a fireplace servicing each room and the woodshed in between. It was originally built in 1928 and was refurbished in 2016.
The South Island robin (Petroica australis australis) is a worm eating machine. It’s also a worm caching machine: robins are known to cache their food (and to steal from one another’s caches). Experiments conducted by Victoria University biologists suggest that these robins can also count. A video on YouTube shows an experiment carried out where [...]
Young riflemen (Acanthisitta chloris) don’t have the creamy white chest of the adults. Their colours are quite variable, and this one has a white collar that might be the start of the white chest.
This weka (Gallirallus australis australis) was near the snowline on the track going up to Mt Arthur hut.
