A request for help from birders who have visited the Auckland Islands

[Colin Miskelly]

Birds New Zealand is preparing a major publication on the birds on the Auckland Islands. Co-author (and Heritage Expedition founder) Rodney Russ has provided a treasure trove of information from his personal diaries and Heritage Expedition trip reports, but it is likely that the notebooks and hard-drives of expeditioners and others who have visited the Auckland Islands will hold information and images that could provide further detail, and possibly verify records of some of the rare vagrants reported.

The Heritage Expedition reports are typically tick-lists of species seen on each day, and rarely provide precise numbers, or detail of the rarer vagrants. If you kept your own notes on the numbers of each bird species seen, or have kept images or descriptions of the rarer vagrant species, we would love to hear from you!

Rare vagrant bird species reported from the Auckland Islands in Heritage Expedition trip reports and bird lists include: Antarctic fulmar, Antarctic petrel, Arctic skua, Arctic tern, Australasian shoveler, black shag, black-billed gull, blue petrel, broad-billed prion, Buller's shearwater, chestnut-breasted shelduck, Cook's petrel, fairy prion, Fiordland crested penguin, greenfinch, grey teal, Hutton's shearwater, king penguin, lesser knot, little penguin, paradise shelduck, pectoral sandpiper, pomarine skua, red-necked stint, royal penguin, Salvin's prion, sanderling, sharp-tailed sandpiper, short-tailed shearwater, Snares crested penguin, soft-plumaged petrel, South Georgian diving petrel, South Island pied oystercatcher, South Polar skua, spotless crake, thin-billed prion, tree martin, Westland petrel, whimbrel, white-bellied storm petrel, white-throated needletail (spine-tailed swift), Wilson's storm petrel and yellowhammer.

If you have records, descriptions or images of these or other vagrant species from the Auckland Islands that you are interested in contributing to this project, please contact lead author Colin Miskelly [colin.miskelly[at]tepapa.govt.nz]. Even a simple "I saw this species at this location on this date" may provide verification or detail that is currently lacking.

Many thanks
Colin