Urgent rescue campaign wanted for rare whistling duck

By ANNE BESTON environment reporter

The rare blue "whistling duck" will be in unstoppable decline within 10 years unless a way is found to save it, says the Government's conservation agency.

The warning comes in a Department of Conservation newsletter, prompting New Zealand's biggest conservation group to call on the Government to mount an urgent rescue campaign.

"This is a tragedy - the bird is in freefall," said Forest and Bird president Gerry McSweeney. "This is a fantastic bird and I think it's accepted within DoC this is a crisis."

In the Rare Bits newsletter, the department's blue duck recovery group leader, Tim Shaw, writes that the bird "will be functionally extinct from much of its present range within 10 years".

Remaining populations were "invariably in poor health, highly fragmented and mainly comprised of lonely adult males", and populations monitored by the department were in "systematic decline".

"Management to address the decline of many whio populations has been left too late and the birds are already gone," he said.

Dr McSweeney said a few "well-publicised" success stories over the past two years, including the trebling of the critically endangered kakapo population, had lulled DoC into a false sense of security.

He wants the department to immediately launch 1080 aerial drops in areas where the duck still has a habitat.

"They are loath to use it because of public pressure yet it is the one effective tool for extensive control of predators," Dr McSweeney said.

A survey being completed on whio populations in Fiordland National Park showed "a huge collapse" in blue duck numbers. He said a 65km stoat-trapping grid along the Dart River in Mt Aspiring National Park was unlikely to succeed.

"Sadly, there is clear evidence that riverside trapping is inadequate to save these birds. Stoats simply re-invade from outside the river corridor."

Dr McSweeney also called on deer hunters, trampers and climbers to report every sighting of the bird to DoC.

Blue ducks mate for life and are scattered over some of the most inaccessible and rugged land in the country, living beside fast-flowing rivers in the central North Island, the West Coast and Fiordland.

Last year they jumped higher on the international red-list of threatened species issued by the influential World Conservation Union.

The total population is not known. Estimates vary from 1200 to 2000, with about 400 breeding pairs.

Blue ducks have attractive blue-grey plumage and a dark, speckled chestnut chest. The male's characteristic whistling sound means they are sometimes dubbed the "whistling duck".