Hear the call
- Love Bittern
- Jul 18
- 2 min read
Updated: Jul 31
We've heard it told that Australasian bittern | Matuku-hūrepo once called the people of the land as they travelled from coast to coast, their boom a sign that eels and fish were plentiful up ahead and it was safe to move on... now it is our time to help them!
The Great Matuku Muster is just 7 weeks away as I write this. Last year was the first ever nationwide synchronised count of male bittern booming. It was a huge success with over 500 people out at 462 sites we collectively counted an estimated 223 individual male bittern booming.
We need even more boots on the ground this year - we should have at lease twice as many males.
The estimated number of individual males is used as a population index. This figure is currently doubled to account for non-vocal males and females. The jury is out on this being accurate. Research in the UK on a similar species (Botaurus stellaris) found evidence of females nesting in only 50% of the sites males were heard booming. We know there is a strong gender bias here in New Zealand, females are a bit smaller than males and look after the nest and chicks on their own so are more vulnerable we think to predation and likely starvation.
In response to this we have drafted our fourth program - 'Where the future sits' to hone our skills to detect female behaviour and influence nest success. The program will be piloted this year at strategic sites and ready to roll out in 2026.
We are making fantastic progress in raising awareness for Bittern. This year we have had 966 records of bittern being seen or heard around the country, 50% more records than the previous year.
If you havent seen it already, you can view our latest updates in our newsletter here.
As encouraging as this all is we need to keep our foot on the throttle to save this species before, like many others it shares the "Threatened - Critically endangered' conservation status with, they need to be picked up by the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff .
We need to act now to save Bittern in their natural wetland homes.
With all of our tools and resources set, we are embarking on another campaign traveling around the country to build the capacity and capability in our communities to advocate for Bittern, to protect and restore their wetland homes and to be able to record bittern in a way that provides us data that is meaningful and can help inform strategies at a national level.
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