Male kiwi Tika has never quite got his priorities in life right _ or has he?
The brown kiwi has fathered 12 eggs with mate Ahi but has never assumed the traditional male role of incubating the eggs.
"He isn't at all interested in sitting on the egg so granddadTahi _ Ahi's dad _ has taken on that role, is incubating the eggs and he's doing a fantastic job,'' said Claire Travers, husbandry manager at Encounter Kiwi.
"The only challenge is that Ahi has just laid a third egg for the season, which is quite unusual as two are the norm, and granddad can't quite manage to sit on three so we've removed the oldest egg for artificial incubation.
"It appears that because Tika isn't occupying himself incubating eggs he's busy doing other things ... and we keep getting eggs. While it's wonderful for the preservation of the captive kiwi population it's quite a strain on Ahi, laying such big eggs.''
Ms Travers said there were a couple of options including putting a fake egg in with the couple so Ahi felt she did not need to lay another egg, or separating the two for a few months.
Ahi and Tika are part of Rainbow Springs' captive breeding programme at the National Kiwi Trust at Kiwi Encounter. Their new offspring will be on public display shortly after they hatch.
