Kōura — WMP phase two

Kororā – little blue penguins live right here on our motu/island

Threats such as habitat loss, overfishing, sedimentation, pest control etc. have led to the disturbance of many of Waiheke Islands seabird populations. The WMP acknowledges that the health of all seabirds are equally important. However, due to the Kororā acting as a key biodiversity indicator species, their ‘At Risk – Declining’ conservation status, the WMP will begin its Seabirds focus by catalyzing Kororā centered projects as a starting point..

Efforts to understand the threats to Kororā and to monitor the island's population have been underway for many years. Native Bird Rescue are tirelessly working towards rehabilitating and releasing injured and unwell Kororā. Concerned community members have self funded Kororā PSA signs at Hekerua Bay, monitored populations at Matiatia, built nest boxes and other community powered initiatives. Recognising this, the WMP looks to support collaborative management approaches between mana whenua and the local community to protect and regenerate the Waiheke marine environment. This is also known as Ahu moana, and is a concept the WMP is actively prototyping.

How did the pipi start ?

To answer that you need to know the whakapapa of Kororā care on Waiheke which has been active long before WMP existed.

Click here for some of the history of the care our community has given to these manu.

About our islands Kororā

Across the country the Kororā life cycle is different depending on where you are. Here in Tikapa Moana our birds have their own cycle. This image done by local artist Billie is an overview of general lifecycles to give you an idea of when they might be in party mode or when they're sitting on eggs.

A new survey

To gain a better understanding of the abundance and distribution of Kororā on Waiheke we had the wonderful Jo Sim from DabChickNZ come with her two highly skilled dogs Miro and Rua to carry out a survey. Jo and Rua offer professional conservation services to find kiwi, penguin and other seabird burrows around Aotearoa/New Zealand.

See their Facebook page.

A photo from the Kororā Survey 2022

Jo Sim with her two dogs check a Waiheke Island coastal site for nesting signs

Hot spot areas of small colonies

The map above shows hot spot areas of small Kororā colonies from surveys in 2016, 2017 & 2022. Image credit Waiheke Marine Project Action Tracker

The image above focses on a Kororā colony in Omiha Bay - credit Waiheke Marine Project Action Tracker

How can we help ?

Kororā are classified as ’At Risk – Declining’ across the country.

Every morning they set off at dawn and spend their days at sea gathering food. At dusk they return to burrows to feed their chicks running the gauntlet between nesting sites and the sea

Kororā are very vulnerable to attack by rats, stoats, cats and dogs. Dogs especially worry them. They smell so attractive to a dog and freeze if they get scared. Some of these taonga manu have been killed by dogs so be sure to follow guidelines in the Responsible Pet Ownership brochure and to look out for signs, especially around these Kororā hotspot areas.

“Please do not try and find us on our beaches or nest sites: we are easily frightened and might abandon our nests if disturbed too much”

How does the WMP support our local Kororā?

This project has 3 main objectives:

To update and contribute new information (through western, citizen and mātauranga Māori) to what is known locally about Kororā on Waiheke,
To engage mana whenua and the local waiheke community in opportunities to protect and regenerate Kororā populations on Waiheke,
Support long term initiatives that continue to protect and sustain Kororā populations on Waiheke.

Some Actions so far:

Joe Simms island wide survey with her two dogs for 2 weeks occured 18th July- 1st Aug 2022

We are looking at how our abundance survey can play with different methodology in future years

We engaged a local skipper to extend the kororā survey to more areas only accessible by sea.

We spent time on community outreach to find out who has seen kororā, had visits from them at their home or historical know areas they come ashore

WMP team taught in Te huruhi School on kororā, life cycles, features and threats. The students then made posters on their learnings and a member of our comms group has created a number of posters with different clear messages. These are to go on social media and up around the schools.

An updated version of the Waiheke Responsible Pet Ownership brochure has been produced by WISCA in 2022 with support from several funding partners. WMP helped distribute this through the local Gulf News newspaper by funding 2300 copies to be printed and inserted into the paper and other areas on Waiheke. A copy of this brochure can be viewed here.

We did a walk over Matiatia historic reserve with DOC and neighbouring private landowners (The Coastal Custodians). This originally was to look at ‘No Dog’ signs however it morphed into deeper conversations about habitat creation for kororā in the area.

We have connected via email and zoom call with the Leigh Penguin Project group and The NZ Penguin Initiative to share learnings and discuss their methodologies. They had good information on burrow cams, however, both their iwi relationship was lacking and no clear path to making their projects te tiriti partnership

Further discussions happened with Ngati Paoa Ki Waiheke on June 14th at their monthly hui to discuss the direction they would like to see this pipi go in. There was agreement that more dog signage and awareness was needed in particular around the hot spot areas. It was also clear we need to build capacity in the mana whenua aspect of this pipi as so many of the members are busy with other pipi.

We organised a Rocky Bay Beach Clean and kororā korero on Sunday 26th February. This was a chance for us to share the survey findings publicly and hear from the local Rocky Bay community how they would like to act to protect their local hot spot colony.

There have been good connections building with Te Korowai o Waiheke with their stoat trapping team sharing kororā sightings with us and one of their bird enthusiasts participating in the Rocky Bay beach clean.

Photo from the Rocky Bay Beach Clean

Rocky Bay residents participating in the beach clean whilst hearing from Waiheke Marine Project whanua about survey findings in their area

Next Steps:

To transition from only Korora Care to Manu Moana. We would like to begin to weave in other seabirds to the pipi and link in the foraged fish pipi as they are all so intrinsically linked

If you are interested in either of these topics please get in touch to join our sub-group: