New Zealand Kiwi `Free Falling' Toward Extinction
9/17/99
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Title: New Zealand Kiwi `Free Falling' Toward Extinction
Source: Reuters
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: September 17, 1999
Byline: Stephen Wright
WELLINGTON - New Zealand conservationists are warning that the
country's national icon, the flightless, burrowing kiwi bird, could
be virtually extinct in five to 10 years if rates of decline are not
halted.
Although New Zealand's kiwi population has been declining steadily
for decades, a conservation report showing an 18 percent fall in the
population in one of its few remaining strongholds within a year has
prompted a rash of concerned newspaper articles.
According to the report a kiwi is being killed at a rate of one every
two hours and is "free-falling" to extinction.
The kiwi population, made up of four different species, is now
estimated to be 70,000, down from five million in 1923.
The kiwi is under attack from "alien" predators at all stages of its
life cycle, said Kevin Smith director of the Forest and Bird Society.
The society authored the report.
Dogs and ferrets prey on adult birds. Stoats (weasels) and cats are
responsible for a 95 percent chick mortality rate, and possums and
stoats destroy kiwi eggs, Smith told Reuters on Thursday.
Smith said that if the rapid rate of decline continues kiwis will
disappear from mainland New Zealand in five to 10 years.
"The kiwi has all the hallmarks of a species heading for extinction,"
he said.
Hopes for the species survival rest on pro-active protection of the
kiwi's natural habitat, Smith said.
With a general election expected in November, the Forest and Bird
Society has called for the conservative National Party government to
commit NZ$10 million ($5.2 million) to a kiwi recovery programme.
The programme would see the establishment of 10 zones to keep kiwis
away from predators. The society has also demanded an end to logging
and clearing forests that
provide key kiwi habitats.
So far the government and the main centre-left opposition party
Labour have avoided making a commitment to the kiwi.
"If we don't do something right now the genetic base of the kiwi
population would become so small it will create a bottleneck for
recovery," Smith warned.