Pukekos and Babes

In the mood for another bird blog? If so, it's a good thing because we just got home to Helios after four-ish weeks of scenic exploring and sandfly swatting on the South Island...adventures that left very little time for photo uploading or memory recording (especially as public internet access is somewhat stingy here: "free wifi" at a cafe is generally limited to 100 megabytes, less than a single photo upload or podcast download!).

Anyhow, enjoy these pukekos, an endemic but very common bird in New Zealand. With their brilliant indigo necks and breasts they are easy to spot, and they often act like ducks, cruising around campgrounds looking for snacks. In Wenderhelm we found a large flock with a brood of fledglings enjoying the sunshine with us.

We are going to spent the next few weeks getting Helios ready for another season on the tropics (yes!), and I'm looking forward to sharing our South Island adventures on the blog—assuming I find a decent Internet cafe, that is.