No local bird will avoid close inspection when internatonal birders converge for the 75th ‘Birds New Zealand OSNZ Conference’ to be held in Marlborough, New Zealand on Friday 29 May to Monday 1 June 2015. As members of OSNZ we are excited to have this special event held in our region and look forward to welcoming birders world wide.
Driftwood Retreat and Eco-Tours has been asked to provide mini tours for visiting twitchers and plans are being made to take bird enthusiasts out to the Wairau Lagoon by mini buses to view some of the 92 bird species that have been identified there.
Birds that maybe seen at that time of year are royal spoonbill; banded and black fronted dotterel; pied and the rare black stilt; grey teal, paradise shelduck, scaup and other duck species; five species of cormorant; black swan; kingfisher; caspian, black fronted and white fronted tern; black backed, red billed and black billed gull; cirl bunting; overwintering waders such as bartailed godwit. There us even a chance of catching a glimpse or photo of the glossy ibis, a rare vagrant from Australia.
Other species maybe seen on the day which is a ‘heathrow’ of New Zealand birding. We will be doing some scouting leading up to the Birds New Zealand OSNZ Conference. We would like to try to locate some birds of interest to share with delegates.
We wish all of the visiting delegates an enlightening and enjoyable conference.