Birds New Zealand - Summer 2025 magazine

[Michael Szabo]

The new Summer 2025 Birds New Zealand magazine is now online, featuring:
* Photos of kākā, kiwi, terns, bitterns and black-billed gulls
* New research on kiwi, long-tailed cuckoo koekoeā, bitterns and fluttering shearwaters
* Tips on finding unusual terns
* Good news for pukunui southern NZ dotterels
* News on new species of extinct penguins and shelduck
* Feature article on birdwatching in the Solomon Islands
* The President's report, regional roundups and book reviews
* The 2026 NZ Bird Conference & AGM in Wanaka (30 May-1 June - King's Birthday weekend)

Link to the low resolution PDF: https://www.birdsnz.org.nz/wp-content/u ... _web99.pdf

Cover photo of kākā in kowhai at Otari-Wilton's Bush by Michael Szabo.

As a registered charity Birds New Zealand relies on membership subscriptions and donations to support the important work it does for our birds:
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[RichardLitt]

Thanks for all of your work on this, Michael!

[Michael Szabo]

The December 2025 edition of Birds New Zealand magazine has been published with a cover photo featuring a Kākā feeding on flowering Kōwhai. This summer’s edition includes reports on new research funded by the 2024 Birds New Zealand Research Fund on Long-tailed Cuckoo tracking, Fluttering Shearwater and Spotless Crake monitoring, a repeat nationwide Black-billed Gull survey, the diets of kiwi chicks and Chatham Taiko and Chatham Petrel, and the ecological requirements of Australasian Bittern.

There are also items reporting on new research about Australasian Bittern nutritional stress funded by the David Medway Scholarship, a project monitoring for highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) in Australasian Gannets at Farewell Spit, and a report of a New Zealand Falcon collecting and eating ‘rangle’ stones on the south Wellington coast.

There is an illustrated feature article about a birdwatching trip to the Solomon Islands by Notornis editor Colin Miskelly and the regular ‘A Bird’s Eye View’ column by magazine editor Michael Szabo has a focus on ‘Finding unusual terns’.

There are notices about our 2026 NZ Bird Conference and AGM in Wānaka over King’s Birthday weekend (30 May–1 June), the online publication of the latest edition of our scientific journal Notornis, the upcoming publication of a special issue of Notornis on the NZ Fairy Tern, the digital archiving of Notornis (1939-2025), reports from the 2025 Fledgling Fund recipients, and a call for submissions on the upcoming re-assessment of the conservation status of New Zealand birds.

Other items report on new papers describing five new extinct species of ancient penguins, a possible early bowerbird from ancient New Zealand and a new extinct species of Rēkohu Shelduck. It also includes the regular quarterly reports from Birds New Zealand President Natalie Forsdick and our regional representatives, plus some book reviews.

The link to the low-resolution PDF of the magazine is here: https://www.birdsnz.org.nz/wp-content/u ... _web99.pdf