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Grand Magnate
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Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: Sydney, Australia.
Posts: 3,093
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Grand Magnate
Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: Sydney, Australia.
Posts: 3,093
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I wonder if NT members might enjoy another good NZ story. This one is the story of the Black Robins, which are related to the various Australian Robins.
A while ago the Black Robins were in a very bad way - there were just five of them left, confined to one island. Now, thanks to a great man called Don Merton and a much greater bird called Old Blue there are about 250 of them on two islands. Old Blue was the last female - she got her name because she lived way longer than usual and had a blue leg ring.
What Merton and his team decided to do was to take eggs from Old Blue's nest and put them into the nests of a related species (Chatham Island tits) on another island. In effect the Black Robin chicks got foster-mums and Old Blue kept on laying eggs in her nest. This was a very high-risk plan but it worked - the Black Robin chicks were moved back to their original island once they were old enough.
Special thanks to Old Blue.
There is more on this here; . .
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