The food of honeyeaters (stitchbird, bellbird and tui) was studied on Little Barrier Island in April by collecting droppings and pollen from mist-netted birds. All three species were taking nectar from puriri and climbing rata. Stitchbirds were the most frugivorous and bellbirds the most insectivorous of the three species.
Authors: Charles G. Sibley and Jon E. Ahlquist.
In: Evolution Today, G.G.E. Scudder & J.L. Reveal (eds) . Proceedings of the Second International Congress of Systematic and Evolutionary Biology, pp. 301-335. 1981.
During 1980, 2,736 km of coast were patrolled by 146 members of the Ornithological Society of New Zealand and their friends. 4,351 dead seabirds were found. There were no major wrecks. During one patrol sooty shearwater (Puffinus griseus) were found at a rate of 68.5 per kilometre. Unusual finds were: eastern little tern (Sterna albifrons), grey ternlet (Procelsterna cerulea), brown booby (Sula leucogaster) and yellow-nosed mollymawk (Diomedea chlororhynchos) which is also a new record for the Beach Patrol Scheme.
The first sightings of the North Atlantic (Cory’s) shearwater, Calonectris diomedea (Scopoli, 1769), in the Australasian region were made 47-78 km off the Canterbury Bight on the east coast of the South Island, New Zealand. These birds were probably vagrants, and the species may also occur sporadically in Australian waters.
A summer and a winter survey of the distribution and numbers of the southern crested grebe (Podiceps cristatus australis) were carried out in Canterbury during 1980-81. Grebes stayed on the alpine and subalpine lakes throughout the year. In summer grebes moved from lake to lake within a lake system, but during the winter they were concentrated on fewer lakes and some moved between lake systems. These observations are compared with those of the southern crested grebe in Australia and the great crested grebe (P. cristatus cristatus) in Europe. Breeding season counts of the Ashburton lakes and the Alexandrina group during 1978-1981 indicate that the crested grebe population in Canterbury is stable after a possible increase during the 1970s.