Climate Change Canary
Blogger: Campaign Manager for the Bar-tailed Godwit, and Labour’s Spokesperson for Climate Change Charles Chauvel.
Bar Tailed Godwits fatten up on the Manuwatu estuary before their big trip to Alaska.
Between 85,000 to over 100,000 bar-tailed godwits visit New Zealand every year, and it is estimated that between 8,000 and 18,000 birds remain to winter over in New Zealand. They come to New Zealand from Alaska, and make some of the longest migrations known among birds. They start arriving here in New Zealand about mid-September and can be found throughout the country, including the Chatham Islands. They flock in a few favoured places, including the Firth of Thames and Ohiwa Harbour.
They leave New Zealand in March and early April and arrive in the northern hemisphere in May and early June. Some years ago, a female bar-tailed godwit, implanted with a tiny satellite tracker, lifted off from her Alaskan breeding ground and flew south 11,680 kilometres, nonstop, until she reached her winter home in New Zealand. Called E7 by the scientists who monitored her, she flew more than eight days without food, water or rest, on the longest direct flight by a bird ever documented.
I have two reasons for nominating the kuaka as my favourite New Zealand native bird.Cl
First, as Labour’s climate change issues spokesperson, I am concerned about the effect of human-induced climate change on birds, and the kuaka, as a migratory wading bird, is likely to face serious impacts from this phenomenon. Human-induced global warming is happening at a rapid rate and there is evidence that it is becoming increasingly difficult for many bird species to adapt to the fast increasing shifts in weather patterns. Highly sensitive to climate and weather, birds are pioneer indicators of climate change. Birds from the Arctic to the Antarctic are already responding to these changes, but how well will they be able to respond to predicted sea level rises, fire hazards, vegetation changes and land use change is unknown. If atmospheric CO2 doubles, climate change could eventually destroy or fundamentally alter 35 per cent of the world’s existing land habitats. In the Arctic, where several hundred million migratory birds breed, a doubling of CO2 suggests the loss of almost half the breeding grounds of 10.4 million geese and 14.5 million waders by 2080-2099. Some Arctic birds will lose more than 90 per cent of their habitat at higher levels of warming.
What effect will rapid climate change have in the future on the kuaka? Will they be able to adjust? Will the number of birds choosing not to make the long haul north to Alaska increase, and will many of them breed here instead? What effect will that have on the sustainability of the bird’s population? These are key questions for us, and since the answers are unclear, they provide key reasons why we should all be motivated to work to limit the effects of human-induced climate change.
The other reason is more personal. The kuaka was the emblem of the National Airways Corporation of New Zealand (NAC), appearing on the tail of the airline’s fleet until NAC was merged with Air New Zealand in 1978. The bird was chosen because it was native to New Zealand, and because of the incredible distances it could cover in flight. My mother worked for NAC as what was then called an ‘air hostess’ in the early 1960s, training on Vickers Viscount ‘planes. NAC provided a vital link from the outside world to cities like Gisborne, where I grew up in the 1970s, and where the kuaka/godwit emblem was always a reminder of the wider world.
