Moving the chicks and some boys around 

Today we are saying goodbye (temporarily) to the seven youngest kakapo in the world.  The chicks are being relocated to Nelson where they will be hand-raised until they are ready for wild release.

Daryl is looking forward to going home to his family after being on the island looking after the chicks for over a month; taking the chicks with him means they will get the best possible care without him being away from home for so long.  Though we’re sad they’re leaving it's exciting that they are one step closer to becoming big green budgies…yippeeeee!

On Wednesday we had a pretty exciting day.  After an early start we raced up the hill to catch one of our non-performing boys (that is, he didn't boom) from this season and airlift him back to the hut.  Six of us then jumped in the helicopter, leaving Daryl and Deidre to spend the day looking after the chicks.  After an amazing one hour flight to Anchor Island we released 'Lee' into his new home and then the mission of the day really started!  Three teams of people raced around the island locating the 6 boys who had been picked to be moved back to Whenua Hou / Codfish Island, to boost the lek system (see Breeding) on the summit side of the island for next season.  The day went smoothly, except for one bird not being located and us having to ring in our bonus bird, aptly named 'Bonus'!  After a fuel stop at Kisbee in Preservation Inlet (and the introduction of Felix to the many hunters that were there) we carried onto Whenua Hou where the birds were released just on dusk.