Who cares about kakapos?

Ranger Rick, Jan, 1998 by Claire Miller

They dance and they boom by the light of the moon, but will these parrots be around to dance much longer?

"It's too late to save the kakapo [KAH-kah-poe]." That's what people in New Zealand were saying 25 years ago. Only 15 of these huge parrots could be found--and they were all males. How did the birds get in such big trouble?

PEACEFUL DAYS

For many thousands of years, kakapos did just fine. They lived all over the islands southeast of Australia that are now called New Zealand. These chubby parrots were unusual because they couldn't fly. But they sure could dance!

On most spring and summer nights, the males gathered to stomp around and make booming noises by blowing up a balloon-like sac in their throats. They were inviting females to mate. After mating, the birds hid their nests on the ground in the forests. And they trotted over to nearby grasslands to eat plants. What a good life!

UH-OH, KAKAPOS

Everything changed when people moved to New Zealand about 1000 years ago. They brought mammals that hadn't lived there before. And the people destroyed a lot of the forests and turned them into farms and cities.

Deer and goats ate the same plants that the kakapos ate. But worse than that, cats and rats ate the kakapos and their eggs--and so did the people. The kakapos hadn't learned to run away from enemies, so they were easily snatched. Things got worse and worse for the birds. Finally, when no more females could be found, it seemed they were goners for sure.

Then--hurray--in 1977, about 200 kakapos, including females, were discovered. They were on Stewart Island, south of the big islands. Unfortunately, cats were eating about half of the birds on the island every year.

SAFER ISLANDS

As quickly as they could, scientists moved the kakapos to three small islands--Codfish, Little Barrier, and Maud Islands--where there are no predators.

Gideon Climo, a scientist on Maud Island, is watching over a flock of kakapos there. "I'm pretty hopeful that these birds will make it," says Gideon. "More than 50 of them live on the islands now. The biggest problem is that some could be so old that they might not be able to have babies much longer."

Four of the birds are young. But it may take as long as ten years before they'll be ready to have babies. Meanwhile, Gideon is giving the birds extra food. "They usually lay eggs only once every four or five years. But we're hoping the food might make them feel ready to breed more often. We need all the babies we can get.

"It will take a lot of patience," says Gideon, "but we'll do everything we can to keep these dancing parrots from dying out!"

Kakapos are the world's biggest parrots, but there aren't many left.

Since they can't fly, they climb up trees to snooze on the branches. See how well the sleepy one shown above is hidden?

Scientist Gideon Climo puts out seeds for the kakapos. He hopes that if the birds are well fed, they'll lay eggs more often.

This kakapo has scrambled up to a high branch. Now it's stretching its wings as it peers down at the ground below.

There are so few kakapos that every one is precious, including the chick in the nest above.

This young female (below), named Hoki, is Gideon's special friend. He'll be extra proud when she has babies.