Community - Phil Margetts

If you’ve ever driven down Oaia Road and seen a bearded man, phone in hand, staring up at trees then it’s more than likely that it was me. I’m Phil and I’ve lived in Muriwai for about 18 months now.

I’m a teacher by trade but have now taken on a facilitation role which has meant I have the flexibility and capacity to get involved with my other passions which include poetry (@philandhisapsicum on Instagram), mountain biking and helping to look after our stunning surroundings here in Muriwai.

One of the first things I did when I moved to the area was to contact Michael Fitchett after seeing his email on the notice board down by Sand Dunz. I was lucky enough to be welcomed into the Penguin Project team. A few months later, with the help of Debs and Boyd and Cam Steel, a new trap line was being put in place along Oaia Road.

Boyd and Cam have clocked up a ridiculous number of kilometers and hours checking that trap line along with the others we have in place to form a protective ring around Muriwai. The number of catches is impressive, 514 across all trap lines in the last year alone (including 197 on Oaia Road). But how can you tell if all this mahi is making a difference?

One way is by conducting bird counts, which is where we return to the figure on the side of the road gazing up hopefully towards the sky. The general idea is that you stand still for five minutes and make a note of all the birds you can see and hear.

Five minute bird counts are far from perfect. Lots of factors can affect the birds that are recorded. For example: the time of day, time of year, weather and background noise along with the confidence and caffeine content of the person conducting the count. I’ll be honest, I’m still early on in my journey of being able to recognise birds by their calls so at the moment I go on sight alone.

Having said that, bird counts are a great way to see the positive impacts that our work is having on our native species. At one of the chosen bird count spots on Oaia Road a kererū (I assume the same one each time) often swoops right past me. I like to think this fly by is a way of thanking us for the work we are doing. I was also visited on one occasion by a leucistic tūī. This is a tūī that’s lacking it’s usual pigment so appears white or brown rather than the more familiar jet black. If you have a copy of The Gannet from June lying around you can read more about that individual there.

Speaking of positive impacts, our bird counts carried out in 2020 (before the Oaia trap line went in) came out with 5.7 birds per five minutes. Obviously this is an average, luckily no one saw 0.7 of a bird flapping around. The bird counts carried out in 2021 from the same locations at similar times of day and in the same months of the year showed an increase to an average of 9.03.

We have put together this bird count form so that you can get involved too. The more people taking an interest in this and adding their numbers to our pool of data the better. Here are a few tips to make sure your bird count is as accurate as possible:

-Be as still and quiet as possible during the five minutes.

-Avoid carrying out your bird counts in strong winds or heavy rains (which doesn’t sound much fun anyway does it?)

-Make sure your bird counts are between 1.5 hrs after sunrise and 1.5 hrs before sunset (essentially between 9am and 6pm for daylight savings).

-Record the highest number of each species that you see. For example, if you see a single tūī, then a few minutes later you see two tūī, you’d record this as two birds. This is because there’s no way of knowing if that original beauty was one of the pair who arrived later on.

-Stick to birds that you see. If you’re confident with your bird calls then feel free to record birds that you hear too but if you hear a pīwakawaka and then see it, make sure you only record this as one bird.

So if this sounds like a bit of you then open up the link and have a go. You could do this in your backyard, while you’re out on a walk or when you’re waiting for your coffee. We’d love for you to get involved and now is a perfect time for bird counts, with many birds breeding between September and December. If you want to read more about five minute bird counts there is more information on the DOC website.

Ngā mihi nui

Phil