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Hello and welcome to our winter newsletter.

 

The penguin season is getting underway, penguins are pairing up and Ranger Linden Brown is seeing blue penguins or kororā pairing up in their burrows in our monitored colony near Charleston - see story below.  Breeding success monitoring will begin next month in South Westland for the Fiordland crested penguin or tawaki.

 

We are moving things up a notch for our blue penguin research through the imminent installation of a fixed and automated microchip reader.  Linden and former Ranger Matt Charteris have ensured that penguins will have to pass through a narrow gap to their nests, where the reader will be installed.  This, and using mobile wand readers in other areas, will revolutionise what we know about the population dynamics - more on all of that in the next newsletter!

 

You may have seen our promotion of Stone Arrow in previous newsletters.  

 

Stone Arrow create beautiful sustainable art and jewellery in Takaka and you can find it online.  Rather than a discount code, they use donation codes!  If you pop 'bluepenguin' in the discount code box, a very generous 20% of your purchase price will come to the Trust, so you have something special, this excellent little company has a sale and the Trust is supported to do penguin conservation.

 

They have a wide range of gorgeous jewellery - I especially love my earrings made from old Bombay Sapphire gin bottle glass! - and now they also have metalbird penguin garden sculptures - photo above.  How gorgeous are those!

 

Another small sustainable NZ business that supports us is Tumbleweed Tees.  Their wonderful artwork is used on tee shirts and other products and they support relevant conservation projects through sales of adult tee shirts.  We recently received a donation of $100 from Tumbleweed Tees - 20 adult tawaki tee shirts sold in recent months - a huge thank you to them and you if you bought one!

 

Hokitika Glass Studio also support the West Coast Penguin Trust with a donation box in the studio and the very generous donation of a beautiful glass penguin now and then - see below for photos and the lucky winner of our annual Supporter draw! 

 

Please support businesses who support us where you can. 

 

As usual, we're including the DOC hotline so that it's handy in case you come across an injured penguin or any wildlife that seems to be struggling, 0800 DOCHOT (362 468), and do all you can to ensure they are safe from dogs.

 

Also, if you see or hear about a dead penguin, please let us know using our simple reporting form, ideally with a photograph, and, if you can have a look and it's obvious or apparent, your thoughts on possible cause of death.  We can then add the information to our database - which informs our conservation actions.  

 

Thank you again for your continued interest and support, and please feel free to forward this newsletter or any stories - who doesn't love talking about penguins?!

 

 

Inger

 

Manager, West Coast Penguin Trust

 

News from the Trust

Three steady tawaki breeding seasons 

 

A major mast event with massive seedfall in Autumn 2019 did not result in the expected stoat plague in our monitored tawaki colonies and breeding has remained steady since. 

 

Read our news story and find the reports here

penguin tracking map

Blue penguins pairing up in June

 

Fortnightly breeding success monitoring is getting underway, but Linden found penguins cosying up already in early June. 

 

Read a brief update here

 

Penguin maps illustrate wide presence

 

With DOC's help, the Trust has been collecting penguin mortality data since 2006.  That data has been critical to the Trust's work and we wanted to be able to view it spatially to support our advocacy role.  Our wonderful volunteer, Fung Lai, has spent hours translating location descriptions from that database as well as the penguin count plus other records into points on a map. 

 

Find out more here.

penguin tracking map

Annual Supporter draw

 

Annual Supporters, those who make a donation of at least $50 a year, go into an annual draw for a special gift as a thank you for their support,

We are hugely grateful to the team at the Hokitika Glass Studio for the gift of two of their beautiful glass blue penguins.

Drop into their shop or hop onto their website to see and buy their beautiful creations. 

Carolyn Hewlett is the winner of the draw this year and she might have even more appreciation than some having been a glass blower herself in the past!  Carolyn has also helped us out at a Taiko Festival in those pre-covid days.  Thank you to Carolyn and to all our Supporters for their wonderful support.

 

To become a Supporter, find out more here

Find more glass penguins in the online shop

Tawaki chicks on video

 

Catherine Stewart, our Tawaki Ranger based down at Gorge River, goes through many hours of video clips as part of tawaki monitoring and watching for predators.  She has found a few to share and we will add more to our Vimeo channel soon.  Here are the first two:

 

Adult cares for young chick

Older chicks 'creche', explore and more.

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Kerry-Jayne in our thoughts

 

As you can imagine, Kerry-Jayne Wilson MNZM, Founding Trustee, Chair for 13 years and guide, scientist and inspiration, remains in our thoughts and hearts.  We held our first meeting without her a few weeks ago and took time to remember and honour her before getting down to the business of upholding her legacy. 

A memorial service is yet to be arranged and we will let you know when we know.

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Have you ever thought about including the West Coast Penguin Trust in your will?

 

Other than right now, there never seems to be a right time to mention or discuss this, so here goes. Whoever you are, whatever your situation, you can help make a difference and help create a better world by including a gift to our charity in your will. You can even link giving now to giving later.

 

Read a brief introduction here and we'd be very happy to discuss your ideas with you.

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In other penguin news ...

La Niña blamed for penguin deaths

 

You will probably have seen tragic pictures of piles of dead penguins found on Northland beaches.  It seems they died of starvation and hypothermia due to shifting cold water food sources as La Niña conditions warmed up the water.  We know this happens occasionally but it seems to be happening more often as our climate changes - and another La Niña event is now expected next year.  

 

Read the NewsHub story here.
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A big THANK YOU to all our supporters, donors, volunteers and the community for all your support.

 

We really appreciate you!

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Don't forget to follow us on Facebook to keep up to date with all the important and fun local penguin news!

 

 

And remember our website also has all the latest news, up-to-date information about the Trust, our projects and much more!

 

Stay connected....

www.westcoastpenguintrust.org.nz/

 

Coming soon:

  • 2022 season gets underway
  • Microchip reader installed
  • Education programme back to normal with Lucy home
  • And much more - local as well as some other penguin news

Follow us on Facebook and Vimeo and find out more on our website

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West Coast Penguin Trust

info@westcoastpenguintrust.org.nz  |  www.westcoastpenguintrust.org.nz

 

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