Bird conservation into areas with native wild birds. Translocations involve moving populations of threatened species into areas of suitable habitat currently unused by the species. There are several reasons for doing this; the creation of secondary populations that act as an insurance against disaster, or in many cases threats faced by the original population in its current location. One famous translocation was of the kakapo of New Zealand. These large flightless parrots were unable to cope with introduced predators in their remaining habitat on Stewart Island, so were moved to smaller offshore islands that had been cleared of predators. From there a
Kakapo present and the kakapo were never seen again. In 1912, three kakapo were moved to another reserve, Kapiti Island, north-west of Wellington. One of them survived until at least 1936, despite the presence of feral cats for part of the intervening period. By the 1920s, the kakapo was extinct in the North Island and its range and numbers in the South Island were declining. One of its last refuges was rugged Fiordland. There, during the 1930s, it was often seen or heard, and occasionally eaten, by hunters or roadworkers. By the 1940s, reports of kakapo were becoming scarce. In the