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On Friday morning I headed off to the Waiongana river mouth to check up on the NZ dotterels. These are wonderful little shore birds now only found in a few locations along the Taranaki coastline due to coastal development and human activity.  The tide was out and it took me a while to spot were they were foraging amongst the rocks. Once I did spot them I carefully headed out slowly getting as close as I dared not wanting to disturb them. There was a group of 3 and after a few minutes t …

The Manawatu estuary at Foxton beach is one of the best places in the lower North Island to see a variety of shore birds and waders. It's one of the places were our Arctic migrants can regularly be seen over summer including the bar tailed godwit, Pacific golden plover and lesser knots.The photos below are from a brief visit on my way down to Wellington at the end of March. All photos were taken with the new Nikor 500mm f5.6 PF lense fitted with a 1.4 teleconverter.A white fronted tern ( …

One of the best places to see a variety of birds in New Plymouth is the Waiwhakaio river mouth.  As well as waders, shags and sea birds there is nearly always a good variety of small birds around in the tussock and scrub including silvereye, gold finch, green finch, dunnock, yellow hammer and skylarks.  On saturday morning I headed down there again get some more shots with my new nikor 500mm lense.One of my first shots of the morning, a black shag (kawau), lifting off from the water.A …