Throughout the reserve, North Island saddlebacks, grey warblers, blackbirds, whitehead, New Zealand bellbirds, tuis and New Zealand pigeons were abundant. The saddlebacks here were quite tame: certainly far more photogenic than their South Island cousins! We also came across red-crowned parakeets and North Island robins. Several feeders gave great views of kaka, along with blackbirds, house sparrows, dunnocks and chaffinches eating anything that the kaka dropped. The best part of the sanctuary were feeders filled with sugar water at the Discovery area: these provided amazing looks at the extremely rare stitchbird! The wetlands of the old reservoir held lifer brown teal, along with commoner waterbirds like pied cormorant, little pied cormorant, paradise shelduck and mallard. Finally, a grassy area near the wetland was home to a pair of beautiful takahe. I also got to see my first weta: weta 'hotels' gave me looks at Wellington tree weta, while an abandoned mine was full of resting cave weta. All in all, it was a great experience.
This North Island saddleback was bathing in a stream near the path
Takahe are sometimes described as swamphen on steroids
The North Island robin is darker than its South and Stewart Island counterparts
You can tell this stitchbird is angry as it has raised the white feathers above its eyes
A brown teal sleepily sitting on some damp grass
Kaka are closely related to kea, sharing the same genus
These Wellington tree weta rest here during the day, only coming out at night
Whitehead behave very similarly to yellowhead, even having a similar call
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