Birds of New Zealand Birds of New Zealand The birds of New Zealand evolved into an avifauna that included a large number of endemic species (that is, species found in no other country). As an island archipelago New Zealand accumulated bird diversity and when Captain James Cook arrived in the 1770s he noted that the bird song was deafening. The mix includes species with unusual biology such as the kakapo which is the world's only flightless, nocturnal, lek (competitive display) breeding parrot, but also many species that are similar to neighboring land areas. A process of colonization, speciation and extinction has been at play
Kakapo pre-Polynesian times, the kakapo was New Zealand's third most common bird and it was widespread on all three main islands. However, the kakapo population in New Zealand has declined massively since human settlement of the country. Since 1891, conservation efforts have been made to prevent extinction. The most successful scheme has been the Kakapo Recovery Programme; this was implemented in 1995 and continues. The first factor in the decline of the kakapo was the arrival of humans. Māori folklore suggests that the kakapo was found throughout the country when the Polynesians first arrived in Aotearoa 700 years ago. Subfossil and