Weka finds better menu after slim pickings at cafes
After unfulfilling visits to Picton cafes, a starving young weka is now guzzling worms and fruit on the road to recovery.
The lost weka was spotted scavenging around cafes in the town’s High St on Friday and reported to Ecoworld Aquarium & Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre by several members of the public.
Ecoworld manager Janelle White said it took a while to find the weka, now named Tita, but once found ‘‘he was pretty easy to catch’’. ‘‘Just after I netted him he fell over, which was massive cause for concern, but we wanted to remove him from the town centre, as there are a lot of risks in town for wildlife, such as dogs, cats, people and vehicles.
‘‘We brought him back to our rehabilitation facility, where we assessed him and found him to be seriously underweight. His keel [breastbone] was protruding, and that indicates severe malnourishment,’’ White said. ‘‘We are feeding him up, and he is eating incredibly well, and seems to be really enjoying the foraging activities we have provided.’’
White said foraging enrichment was extremely important because it taught the behaviours necessary to find food in the wild.
‘‘Optimistically, we will be releasing him on Monday evening and are currently considering Rarangi as the release location.’’
White said interactions with wildlife in urban areas were becoming more frequent as people encroached natural habitats. ‘‘We are spreading out into their areas and as a result we are reducing their range and the space available for them to forage for food. So it is common to see them coming down and adapting to scavenging in urban areas, because they can’t get enough food out in the wild.
‘‘That is exactly what has happened to Tita. He has been out in the wild, he has struggled to find food, and he has come into town as an absolute last resort on the brink of starvation, absolutely desperate,’’ White said.