Its been a while since an update from the island, but we have been super-busy with the season's chicks - much busier than we normally would be over winter.

We released our little friends into the big wide world in August, first to go out were the three boys followed by the girls a week later.  We have been feeding them and checking on them regularly to make sure they are adjusting to their new homes and settling in.  The girls have been fine but the boys were pestered by one of the adult males and moved away from their food hoppers.  As a result of that we brought two of them back to the pen before re-releasing them in another part of the island; the third has found his own little niche off the back of the island in 'tiger country' - easy to get around in if you're 18 inches high but not if you're bigger than that, as we find out when we go to check up on him!

Our management has moved to Southland and we have a new boss, but not new to the team - Deidre Vercoe got the job, formerly one of the Technical Officers.  We have had a few changes in the island staff too.  Our longstanding ranger de kakapo and Anchor Island resident Jeff Hall has moved on to become a father; Ursula Poole has decided motherhood is pretty cool too and won't be rejoining us after her maternity leave; and Rebecca Wilson has moved to the West Coast to work on other DOC programmes.  As a result we have two new kakapo rangers on board: Dana Boyte and Errol Nye.  Dana was with us over the past breeding season as a trainee ranger and we are stoked to have her back.  Errol is from Australia but we don't hold that against him!

The last breeding season seems like it only just finished, yet already we have begun to get ready for another potential one this coming summer.  Our first supplementary feedout volunteers arrive in mid-October and then it's all on again!  We have also got a lot of transmitters to change on birds in the next month or two, so there will be no rest for the wicked.