Great Kererū Count 2019 - ENDS MIDNIGHT SUNDAY.
Hi everyone, just a quick reminder that the Great Kererū Count ends tomorrow and you will need to have all your observations completed by then. You will have until midday Monday to make sure they are all loaded before the project closes. Thank you for your observations to date - make sure you go hard tomorrow :-)
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I'd be interested to know the thinking behind the dates for the GKC, as it seems to co-incide with the disappearance of kereru from our area - not just this year but each year I've participated.
Kereru were a very common sight in the fortnight before the GKC - feeding on Tagasaste and sweet broom buds, often within an arm's length of footpaths around Wellington - then once flowering started properly they went away. I've only seen 3 during the whole GKC period.
Thank you for your comment. The timing was decided to coincide with when people might be most likely to see courtship displays (which is an indication of attempted breeding nearby). However, this is a compromise for the country as a whole, as peak time in one place may be too early or too late for soemwhere else. The other factor that strongly affects their presence/absence in an area is what local food sources are avaialable, since kereru will move around to find the best food source for the time of year and place. What happens each year can be affected by whether the plants are experiencing an "early" or a "late" spring, and we suspect the high availability of fruit in the forest from last autumn may also have affected distributions this year. This too will vary across the country. I'm sorry to hear the kereru keep disappearing just before the end of September at your spot. To offset this, we also ask "based on your experience, what is the frequency of occurence at this location?". That way people can tell us where they normally see kereru (or normally don't see kereru) even if they are sparse at the time of the count. The genreal opinion in Upper and Lower Hutt seems to be that kereru were not as abundant there, this year compared to previous years. Thank you for your question and participation - hopefully with the power of many observations like this we will be able to pick up seasonal and regional trends like this.
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