My Account
For a “university dropout” Chris Gaskin, of Whangateau, finds himself quite regularly working with audiences of scientists and academics, talking to politicians, and giving presentations. His study of NZ seabirds spans decades and has taken him to all parts of NZ including many offshore islands and overseas. He finds it disturbing that New Zealanders currently operate as if precious wildlife is expendable and within exploitative industries, there is still a sense of ‘what can we get away with’. He hopes that through greater awareness of how special NZ is to seabird populations globally, we will set the benchmark for their conservation a lot higher. For most of this year, Chris has been working on a joint Forest & Bird/BirdLife International project, identifying Important Bird Areas (IBA) for NZ’s seabirds. His finished report, which will be released next February, will outline a network of important seabird sites in NZ. He told Jannette Thompson that he’s looking forward to the release and although he’s not expecting it to be controversial, it will throw up some challenges for those involved in conservation ….
There are around 10,400 species of birds worldwide, but remarkably, only 350 are what we call ‘seabirds’. NZ has the greatest diversity of these birds – 140 occur within our Exclusive Economic Zone and 85 of those, breed here. Additionally, 36 species of those species breed exclusively in NZ. These figures demonstrate how important NZ is for seabirds. The IBA study I’m involved in looks at all threatened species and sites which have high representative populations. The report perhaps will help focus our conservation efforts where they are needed most and, hopefully, will encourage greater community and government support. But it will also provide a ‘watching brief’ where our efforts to take care of these special places can be measured on an international scale. The challenges will arrive when we start to look at how these sites will be managed into the future.
Who knows where a person’s interest in wildlife comes from, but I think mine stems from the amount of time I spent outdoors as a child. I loved exploring, tramping and sailing, and being out on boats gave me the time over the years to start watching and observing the behaviour of seabirds. They are remarkable creatures and I continue to be fascinated by them. We’ve learnt a lot about them, but there’s still a lot that’s a mystery and their capabilities are quite staggering. A case in point is the white-faced storm petrel, which some people refer to as the ‘Jesus bird’. It’s only about the size of a blackbird and dances on the top of the water while it forages. It breeds on two or three islands in the Hauraki Gulf but, around the end of February, it starts on its long journey flying, and skipping and hopping across the surface of the Pacific Ocean to the Galapagos Islands, Ecuador and other regions along the South American coast. Along the way, they have to find food – mainly plankton and fish eggs – in a pretty dynamic environment. By September they are back in the Hauraki Gulf, once again preparing their burrows. We hear a lot about the amazing migration of the godwits, but to me, I think the storm petrel’s journey is just as remarkable. There are other similar remarkable life-stories we’re starting to uncover through our research projects.
I didn’t really find my career path until I was in my late 20s. I was born in Auckland, but my Dad’s job as an air traffic controller in the NZ Air Force took us to Fiji for six years and then Wellington. I started a geology and engineering degree at Victoria University, but dropped out and went tramping and climbing in the South Island. My family are all artists – Mum and Dad, and my sister all went to art school – and at some stage, the NZ Forest Service saw my work and offered me a job as the artist roaming between Mt Cook and Stewart Island. The next five years were spent traversing the region drawing and painting virtually any wildlife and landscapes which caught my eye. This lead to a career as an illustrator, mainly of children’s books, and later a designer of museum and visitor centre displays. I’ve illustrated five books with writer Philip Temple and we’re currently working on one on the kea and NZ’s alpine environment. However, we’ve had to move the publication date to next year while I finish the IBA work.
For the past four or five years, my wife Karen Baird and I have lived at Whangateau. We operate Kiwi Wildlife Tours, a small birdwatching tour company Karen set up with her dad Johnny Kendrick. It offers a range of trips for birdwatchers, mostly British or North American, but we have taken parties from Taiwan, Japan and Europe. Birdwatchers tend to fall into two categories – there’s the “twitchers” who are desperate to tick off or list species, and the rarer and more unusual the bird, the better. The other type of birdwatcher is more interested in the whole experience. They want to see NZ and the birds are part of that experience. I think I fall into the second category. I can enjoy watching the little white-eyes that play in the tree right outside my office window, as much as I do any other bird. One of the most memorable sightings I remember happened in Arthur’s Pass, while I was climbing Mt Rolleston with a friend. We were surrounded by snow and ice when we spotted three large black shags flying towards the West Coast. Shags aren’t rare but it was intriguing seeing them in such a location. They knew what they were up to – minds set on the eels and fish they were snatch from West Coast rivers and lakes.
For several years I’ve been involved in a collaborative project with scientists, professionals and ornithologists, trying to identify where the NZ storm petrel breeds. The bird was presumed to be extinct until it reappeared in 2003. A few birds captured at sea between 2005 and 2009 confirmed that they were, in fact, the same as the three specimens collected in the 19th century and held in museums overseas. We are currently in fundraising mode to finally nail which island, or islands, the NZ storm-petrel is breeding on. Once we do that we will be able to fully assess its conservation status. The project is part of a larger Hauraki Gulf Seabird Project, which is trying to determine how all seabirds utilise the gulf. Seabirds as top predators are, in a way, the ‘canary in the coalmine’ – they are indicators of the health of the system. Possibly the greatest threats to their survival in the Hauraki Gulf are depletion of the marine environment and risk of reinvasion of their breeding islands by rats. Fisheries by-catch is also a real problem with estimated by-catch levels of around 10,000 albatrosses and thousands of other seabirds killed by fisheries in New Zealand waters each year.
While it’s one thing to research and study natural history, this has to go hand-in-hand with advocacy and real engagement with the community. I’d like to be part of that process, helping to develop a climate where research projects can happen and then the messages get out. Seabirds are extraordinary creatures. In NZ we are privileged to have them in such numbers and diversity, but that brings major responsibilities. Some of our practises, especially around their breeding sites, may have to be re-evaluated. We can’t afford to let our guard down, but given the relentless dismantling of DOC, coupled with a general official timidity towards compliance in some vital areas, there is a danger of all the good work done in conservation in recent years unravelling.
