Sparrow response to weasel

[Raewyn]

Our camper makes a good hide at times. The tinted windows can be a problem for photos, but it's not too bad when the light is good.

On our recent trip to Kapowairua/Spirits Bay we saw a weasel in the grass just over the fence from where we were parked. What was intriguing was the sparrows - they lined up to "keep an eye on it". Some continued feeding next to the van. The sentries were about half of the number present at the time. The weasel ignored them, and they just calmly sat and watched, but with body language that also looked like they were communicating with one another as well. One did fly away when the weasel got too close - the weasel wasn't threatening it, it just happened to move that way and was clearly too close for comfort for the bird.

I've seen similar behaviour once before when a cat was adjacent to the water-line at a duck pond and all the stilts, ducks and pukekos congregated until one pukeko stepped out of the water and "saw the cat off". This was the first time I've seen sparrows respond like this so thought it might be of interest. The weasel is in the upper left of the last photo.

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[zarkov]

I used to see banded rails every time I went there, till one year I saw a weasel kill a rabbit in the paddocks on the other side of the creek.

Haven't seen a rail since.

The pest control is non existent up there, last month they didn't even know there was a wasps nest in the camp at Taputuputu.

It was in the central toilet block, and it's probably still there.

[Raewyn]

My last banded rail sighting there was April 2014. I've always hoped that they just moved themselves to the bigger lagoon to the west where there was less disturbance from people. I know that there is a cat problem in the camp area - there are sometimes footprints on the beach and we've seen a black one.

I think there is occasional pest control on the hill. A few years ago we saw a woman who looked like she was laying baits throughout the out-of-bounds area. This time there were no pigs, rabbits or pukekos at all (there are never many pukekos, but usually the odd one or two) The only hawk was to the west of the camp, not across the river where there are usually a couple. So we wondered if they've done a 1080 drop. Usually we're there 3 times a year, but this trip was the first since Dec 2020, so a much longer gap than usual to lose touch with what's happening.

[Raewyn]

I meant to add, while we were at Kapowairua people were turning up from Taputaputa because they'd been driven out by a massive lot of wasps. Hopefully they'll do something about it.

[Raewyn]

While I was working on these photos the other day I sent emails to both DoC and Ngati Kuri to let them know that there was a weasel problem. Both replied yesterday, with Ngati Kuri saying "We have new 'catch boxes' out now as we have also noticed an uptake in their visits.".