Season for robins the best yet

Press, 24 December 1986, Page 4

Season for robins the best yet

PA Wellington The present nesting season for the Chatham Island Black Robin is proving to be the most productive in modern times, the Wildlife Service says.

A wildlife officer, Mr Don Merton, who recently returned from the Chathams, said yesterday that this year’s crop of 28 chicks brought the total population to 55 birds, more than had existed at any time this century. ‘‘Just six years ago the species numbered only five and was regarded as the world’s rarest bird,” he said.

Their “spectacular” recovery could be attributed solely to the Wildlife Service’s management plan, which involved the crossfostering of robin eggs and young to tomtits.

This season started with 30 birds, six on Mangere

Island and 24 on SouthEast Island, but three breeding females died. "A record nine pairs laid this season (five laid last year) and to date 33 chicks have hatched from 36 eggs. Twenty-eight chicks now survive and three eggs are still under incubation.

"This high fertilityhatchability rate is quite remarkable and unexpected,” Mr Merton said. “The black robins must be one of the most intensively inbred of living animals.”

Mr Merton said 55 of the robins were directly descended from two birds, Old Blue and Old Yellow, who were the only effective breeders when the programme began in 1980.

“Another encouraging feature to emerge this season has been the successful breeding by robins

which had been entirely foster-raised by Chatham Island tomtits,” he said. Previously, only one such bird had bred and the merits of the fostering technique were in doubt. This year seven of the 10 tit-raised birds mated and six bred. Although most robin chicks from this season have been hatched by tomtits, virtually all have been returned to robins for raising.

“The black robins are now well on the road to permanent recovery. “With the impending demise of the Wildlife Service next year and the inevitable disruption to staff and management programmes, it is hoped that the black robins are now sufficiently vigorous to enable them to survive without man’s continuing intervention,” Mr Merton said.