Tel. +44 (0)1273 600030 (UK)
On this trip your conservation minded guides will be telling you the story of New Zealand's isolation and about our 'weird and wonderful' birds. You will be shown two conservation projects set up to protect our native birds.
A donation from every booking on the 'Birders Special' will go to these two volunteer projects - 'Friends of Flora inc' and 'Mangarakau Swamp Restoration Project', to help them continue this valuable work. (The Flora in the society's name is a misnomer, as it is referring to the area called Flora, not floral species).
Both of these community based projects have a trapping programme, which involves the trapping of stoats, rats and possums. The operator's owners, Maryann and Bill, set up the Friends of Flora (FOF) project in 2001, in the hope of stopping the destruction of our fauna which haven't evolved to withstand the onslaught from mammalian predators.
With only 3 species of bats, New Zealand was a land of birds. Both our bird count data and anecdotal evidence is showing the trapping is making a difference. With not only the smaller of our birds rising in numbers, the exciting thing has been to see both our Kaka parrot and our Weka bush hen rearing young in the Flora catchment for the first time in many years. We work closely with our Department of Conservation, we always report back to them on conservation issues within Kahurangi Park, i.e. the sighting of rare birds.
We invite every traveller who books a holiday via us to send in a review. Because we don't run the holidays they're completely independent and unedited... remember to read between the lines though, as two people on the same holiday can have different views!
