Mohua is a small, yellow bird endemic to the South Island. With only about 5,000 birds left in the wild, these awesome little birds need our help.
Description
Yellowheads are small, sparrow sized birds with a yellow head and breast, white lower belly and brown back, wings and tail. Both male and female birds make machine gun sounding chatter, while the male also makes a musical song and the female makes a descending buzzing call.
Habitat
While Mohua were found in forests all over the South Island and Stewart Island, human arrival in New Zealand has meant that they now only live in Southland, the lower western corner of the South Island. They are most common in tall red and silver beech forests.
Diet
Yellowhead eat mostly invertebrates, gleaned from the upper leaves of trees. Their favourites are caterpillars and spiders. Mohua will occasionally eat small fruit.
Threats
Mohua's main threat comes from stoats and rats that will eat the Yellowhead, especially when it is nesting or roosting. As Yellowhead are extremely sensitive to predation their numbers decline quickly when there are lots of predators around.
How do we help this bird?
The most important thing we can do to help the Yellowhead is to trap stoats and rats, especially if you live in the South Island. A few more things we can do to help our native wildlife is to get our dogs trained in avian awareness, to volunteer for DOC or another wildlife conservation group to help with pest and bird management.
References
DOC:
https://blog.doc.govt.nz/2021/05/27/were-worried-about-mohua/
https://www.doc.govt.nz/nature/native-animals/birds/birds-a-z/yellowhead-mohua/
NZ Birds Online:
http://nzbirdsonline.org.nz/species/yellowhead
ICUN Red List:
https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/22705397/94016621
Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowhead_(bird)
Yellowheads are small, sparrow sized birds with a yellow head and breast, white lower belly and brown back, wings and tail. Both male and female birds make machine gun sounding chatter, while the male also makes a musical song and the female makes a descending buzzing call.
Habitat
While Mohua were found in forests all over the South Island and Stewart Island, human arrival in New Zealand has meant that they now only live in Southland, the lower western corner of the South Island. They are most common in tall red and silver beech forests.
Diet
Yellowhead eat mostly invertebrates, gleaned from the upper leaves of trees. Their favourites are caterpillars and spiders. Mohua will occasionally eat small fruit.
Threats
Mohua's main threat comes from stoats and rats that will eat the Yellowhead, especially when it is nesting or roosting. As Yellowhead are extremely sensitive to predation their numbers decline quickly when there are lots of predators around.
How do we help this bird?
The most important thing we can do to help the Yellowhead is to trap stoats and rats, especially if you live in the South Island. A few more things we can do to help our native wildlife is to get our dogs trained in avian awareness, to volunteer for DOC or another wildlife conservation group to help with pest and bird management.
References
DOC:
https://blog.doc.govt.nz/2021/05/27/were-worried-about-mohua/
https://www.doc.govt.nz/nature/native-animals/birds/birds-a-z/yellowhead-mohua/
NZ Birds Online:
http://nzbirdsonline.org.nz/species/yellowhead
ICUN Red List:
https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/22705397/94016621
Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowhead_(bird)