Jan 13, 2026 Birds
The blooming flax plants along the deck of the B&B are frequented by multiple tui birds, the largest concentrations of these birds we have seen! The flax flowers are providing nectar to the birds, and the birds are transporting the flower pollen from plant to plant! The Tui and the Flax Flower.
The orange face on the tui is actually the flax flower pollen! I thought this orange-faced tui was a subspecies of the normally black-faced tui. No, he just has a dirty face!
We decided on a short walk today, to the beach, then through a wetland, forest and up a hill for a view above the windy beach.
From above, we can see the blue ocean beyond the ‘dirty’ rough waves, stirred up by the wind and the influx of silty glacial outflow from the Whataroa river, the Okarito Lagoon and the Waiho river surrounding us.
On our walk back we were visited by a South Island robin, a native wren-sized, apparently fearless bird. It hopped around us and almost landed on us, snatching insects out of the air and from the ground that we had stirred up walking along the trail.