A Walk on the Wild Side
Last morning three tourists were rescued by helicopter from Fiordland National Park. They were not prepared for an overnight stay in the area when the weather got bad and had to be flown out in the morning.
Well, there’s nothing too interesting about those three, so let’s just take a short look at the park instead:
Fiordland National Park is located on the southern island of New Zealand, in the South West.
As the name reveals, the melting of glaciers over the time formed huge fjords in the area and also two bigger islands, Secretary Island and Resolution island, as well as some large lakes.
Here are some impressions of the park:
The two most famous inhabitants of this peaceful place are the Kiwi ( yes, the bird) and the Kakapo- the only flightless parrot in the world, wich is also very endangered because of it’s behaviour: When it senses danger, it stops moving, becoming nearly invisible from the air because of its’ colour, and waits motionless until it feels safe again. That’s a great trick against birds of prey wich were the only predators of Kakapos for a very long time- until the settlers came along and brought rats, foxes and ferrets that quickly discovered their appetite for Kakapo and profited from it’s previously successful survival instinct.
Some efforts were made to relocate remaining Kakapo populations to save islands, but at least one of them failed because the predators were able to reach the new refuge by swimming.
the wonderful Stephen Fry covered the Kakapo in his series “Last Chance to See”
So despite some tourists not being able to survive in the wild for more than one day, New Zealand’s National Parks are not only pretty, they also provide an invaluable contribution to the preservance of unique and endangered species. In my next blog entry, I will take a closer look at the unique fauna of New Zealand.
