King shag roost visible from Cook Strait ferries

Bird sighting information. Use this forum to report bird sightings (especially rare and unusual birds), census and field count results, and trip reports. Messages posted to this forum will also be sent as a plain text email to the BIRDING-NZ newsgroup.
Colin Miskelly
Posts: 912
Joined: Sat Jul 11, 2009 6:31 pm

King shag roost visible from Cook Strait ferries

Postby Colin Miskelly » Fri Jan 05, 2018 8:15 pm

Hi all

If you have a good pair of binoculars, there is a small king shag roost on a headland between Blackwood Bay and Ruakaka Bay on the northern side of Queen Charlotte Sound, west of Tory Channel (note that the inner section of Queen Charlotte Sound runs approx west to east). We suspect this is the headland east of Okahu Bay, but it is conspicuously splashed white with guano, even if the birds are hard to make out. We saw ten king shags there from water taxis on both 20 and 22 December and at least three there from Bluebridge ferry this afternoon (note that water taxis travel closer to the northern shoreline than the Cook Strait ferries do).

Approximate location on images pasted here.

Colin Miskelly & Kate McAlpine
King shag map 1 resized.jpg
King shag map 1 resized.jpg (144.56 KiB) Viewed 2801 times
King shag map 2 resized.jpg
King shag map 2 resized.jpg (74.31 KiB) Viewed 2801 times
Jim_j
Posts: 699
Joined: Sun Mar 03, 2013 1:04 pm

Re: King shag roost visible from Cook Strait ferries

Postby Jim_j » Sun Jan 07, 2018 5:32 pm

Thanks for the detailed info Colin - very useful

cheer
jim
Davidthomas
Posts: 1310
Joined: Tue Oct 18, 2011 10:05 am

Re: King shag roost visible from Cook Strait ferries

Postby Davidthomas » Mon Jan 08, 2018 4:07 pm

Thanks for the info Colin! I was successful at seeing four of the birds on the Roost on Saturday after getting out of the horrible storm.
User avatar
Oscar Thomas
Posts: 932
Joined: Sat Aug 27, 2011 7:15 pm
Location: Dunedin
Contact:

Re: King shag roost visible from Cook Strait ferries

Postby Oscar Thomas » Tue May 01, 2018 4:47 pm

There were two King shags there yesterday afternoon. You were right about the views, I'm really glad I got closer to the Duffer's Reef colony several days before! Nothing amazing on the Cook Strait crossing but there were many White-capped albatrosses, Cape petrels, Westland petrels, Fluttering/Sooty shearwaters and Fairy prions, as well as two Arctic skuas in Queen Charlotte Sounds.

king2.jpg
king2.jpg (587.23 KiB) Viewed 2395 times

KingShag2.jpg
KingShag2.jpg (272.88 KiB) Viewed 2395 times
User avatar
David Riddell
Posts: 959
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2009 3:46 pm

Re: King shag roost visible from Cook Strait ferries

Postby David Riddell » Thu Nov 29, 2018 5:59 pm

Had a look for these last night about 7.45pm. Nothing on the roost itself but about 15 minutes earlier as we turned from Torey Channel into Queen Charlotte Sound a king shag flew by quite close, wheeling around to give a nice view of its white underside and all black head. Great intro to the South Island.

Return to “Bird Sightings and Alerts”