10 Animals on the edge of extinction - you did not know about No.2

The Kākāpō ~ New Zealand's green teddy bear-parrot

The Kakapo is a bird mainly found in New Zealand. It is a rather curious creature, a pretty big, green, nocturnal parrot that cannot fly and looks like a mixture of a parrot, a penguin, an owl and a teddy bear. Kakapos are on the verge of extinction due to their peculiar breeding habits, predators, and hunters. They are flightless and nocturnal and are the biggest parrots in the world. They can also live for up to 120 years!

History

Like most living creatures, the number of Kakapos in New Zealand was healthy before humans arrived. They waddled across the islands like nothing else. However, when people came to New Zealand, they started hunting the Kakapo for its feathers, meat and skin. They also brought alien species such as rats, weasels or cats that posed a threat to which they were not accustomed to. Their survival "trick" (not really a new thing, maybe the Kakapos like it old-fashioned) is to freeze when they are in proximity to a predator, using their green plumage as camouflage. Their population decreased significantly, leaving them teetering on the brink of extinction. By 1995 only 51 Kakapos were left!

Diet

Kakapos are mainly herbivores (plant-eaters). They will feed on anything from fern roots and young shoots to fungi and fruit. But sometimes, they will also prey on bugs, larvae and even small reptiles! This varies depending on the time of year. For some reason, Kakapos are very keen on a specific fruit that grows on the rimu tree, a tree native to New Zealand. In fact, they love it so much that when the fruit is available, they won't eat anything else! So, I suppose it's a bit like chocolate!

Social structure and mating habits

Kakapos are solitary and territorial. They will only meet for mating. The males fight to attract a female, by making what is described as "booming" sounds. I listened to some recordings and would disagree with the naming, so feel free to make up your own opinion about it. After mating, the female leaves and the male continues trying to attract another mate. The female returns to her own territory and raises the chicks on her own in a kind of cave she digs underground. Interestingly, kakapos only breed during years when special trees called Pink Pine or Rimu bear a lot of fruit, however, they only bear fruits every 4-6 years! They do that as the fruit of these trees are full of nutrients that are essential for raising healthy chicks, but it results in a very slow increase of Kakapo numbers.

Kakapos are classified as critically endangered, however, their population is rising due to the Kakapo recovery programme that has been running since 1995. Scientists, rangers and volunteers have been working together, moving the Kakapos to predator-free islands, feeding them with nutrients so they breed more and supervising and checking on them. The population is increasing, however, it is a slow process. Recently, scientists sequenced their genomes so as to identify sequences that could lead to higher disease raites or chick mortality.

We hope you enjoyed this post - see you on Sunday!

Your Green World Blog Team💚

Sources:

https://www.britannica.com/animal/kakapo

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/08/070824220755.htm

https://www.doc.govt.nz/nature/native-animals/birds/birds-a-z/kakapo/

https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/new-zealands-quirky-kakapo-are-pulled-back-from-extinction.html

https://animals.mom.com/kakapo-eat-2634.html

https://animalia.bio/kakapo

https://factslegend.org/30-interesting-kakapo-facts/ https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-02702-6

Image:

This image, owned by Department of Conservation (on flickr.com), is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

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