Cobb Valley, Golden Bay. Photo: Craig Potton. Short meetings beat long ones. I’m probably not alone in thinking that. So the thought of a three day meeting would normally leave me cold. But having just returned from one of Forest & Bird’s “Island Gatherings”, I can say there are exceptions. The gatherings aren’t the usual […]

Some people sail through life without doing much for their community at all. And then there are those who go to the opposite extreme, giving over perhaps their retirement, or a huge chunk of their spare time, to making the world (in our case, the natural world) a better place. These people’s extreme selflessness doesn’t […]

The Mackenzie Country is for many of us one of the reasons why we love this country so much. But those of us who have been there recently will know that it’s also a part of New Zealand that’s disappearing fast. The Mackenzie is being turned from a hundred shades of brown – which looks […]

Last Saturday (March 9), Conservation Minister Nick Smith announced that he had approved the creation of five new marine reserves off the South Island’s West Coast. On the face of it, that may sound like the sort of thing that Forest & Bird might applaud. And in many ways, this was good news. But this […]

Until a week ago, Solid Energy appeared to be the one of the prize jewels in the portfolio of state assets that the Government intended to sell. Now the company seems set to become a huge, slowly-dying albatross around taxpayer’s necks. Here at Forest & Bird we don’t like the idea of dying albatross, metaphoric […]

For many of us, the summer break probably consisted of sun, swimming, perhaps a little family drama … and just getting away from work for a while. It was an opportunity to get away from work for Debs Martin, Forest & Bird’s Top of the South Field Officer, too … but only so she could […]