Together at Home

Arno Gasteiger

Together at Home

Here we are—a nation of parents, grandparents and children all in the same boat, together at home. He waka eke noa. Every day of the lock-down we will post a story or video and set of activities that can be shared among your family to fill our days at home together. Mauri ora.

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Science & Environment

Nov 16: Valley of the whales

The North Otago limestone country holds one of the world’s most important fossil cetacean records, a coherent story of how whales and dolphins evolved in the Southern Ocean. It’s a story that one small rural community has embraced as its own.

Science & Environment

Nov 15: Natural values

For 200 years the Hauraki Plains and Firth of Thames have been bent to the commercial interests of man. We have extracted timber, gold, peat, fish and shellfish, then tipped in millions of tonnes of sediment as our thanks. We have drained the marsh and farmed it, then intensively farmed it, returning the run-off of agriculture. Today, the region is a case study for the carrying capacity of land and sea. How resilient are our natural systems, and how much development is too much?

Living World

Nov 12: Enraptored

The New Zealand falcon, or karearea, is the country’s only endemic raptor. Able to take prey six times its own weight, it has no enemies but man. Habitat destruction, the gun, and obstacles such as wire fences and power lines have all contributed to its decline. But today the timeless art of the falconer is returning sick and injured birds to a new life in the wild.

Geography

Nov 11: The greening of the red zone

During the two devastating earthquakes of September 2010 and February 2011, land in the suburbs east of Christchurch sank by a metre. What’s a city to do when an apocalyptic landscape appears right on its doorstep?

Geography

Nov 10: The Phantom Menace

In a land where invaders are cinematically popularised as battle-clad Orcs thundering down a mountainside wielding spiked clubs, it’s ironic that Public Enemy No. 1 is a butterfly—an ephemeral being borne on alabaster wings, not dissimilar to an already well-established cousin. And yet, this phantom menace threatens to wipe out a large number of native plants and more than 230,000 hectares of commercial crops.

Travel & Adventure

Run for your life

In the 1960s, New Zealander Arthur Lydiard introduced the concept of jogging to the world and sparked a global revolution towards fitness and well-being. Running became the most popular participation sport on the planet, but also the cause of numerous preventable injuries. Now, new scientific evidence and an emerging movement of ‘natural running’ serve to reinforce Lydiard’s original vision of the sport—the ultimate regimen for “a healthy, vigorous life”.

Society

Nov 5: Street wise

Graffiti or street art? Virtuosity or urban menace? While arguments rage over the definition, clandestine art of every colour is changing the face of the Christchurch CBD.

Living World

Nov 4: A delicate balance

Deep in the Mackenzie Basin, the world’s rarest wading bird roams free in the wild, unaware that behind the scenes, a handful of people are trying to solve a problem: how to protect a species that refuses to be contained?

Society

Nov 3: No place like home

More than 30,000 New Zealanders lack a proper home, and live instead in cars, caravan parks, night shelters, boarding houses or on the street. It’s one of the most striking symptoms of a country in which people lead increasingly precarious lives.

Geography

Nov 1: Block busters

New Zealand’s forests were cleared at a record pace, and from this destruction, a sport arose: who can fell a tree the fastest? Competitive woodchopping transformed the labour of forestry into a community event. Now, 150 years on, a diminishing number of axemen and axewomen chop for top honours at A&P shows around the country.

Society

Oct 29: Three chords and a story

Country music resonated in 1940s rural New Zealand, and its legacy burns here still, no more so than at the annual Gold Guitar Awards in Gore.

Travel & Adventure

Oct 28: Blazing a trail

In 1994, the first Moonride mountain-bike race was held in Rotorua, an event which has followed the growing popularity and evolution of the sport.

Living World

Oct 27: Between two worlds

Hatched in rivers, mayflies rise to the surface and unfurl new wings, the final phase of their precarious and astonishing lifecycle.

Living World

Oct 25: Deep trouble

The world’s smallest, rarest dolphin lives in New Zealand. After the expansion of gill-netting in 1970, the population and range of Hector’s dolphin diminished rapidly. One extremely isolated subspecies, Māui dolphin, now numbers barely 100 individuals. Yet science has revealed that the species may yet recover, even from the brink of oblivion.

Oct 22: A tale of two currents

Morgan Gorge, a spectacular chasm on the South Island’s West Coast, is a showpiece of whitewater power. Although it has been paddled by fewer than a dozen people, it is the aspiration of kayakers here and around the world to tackle its supreme challenge. If the Minister of Conservation grants a concession to electricity company Westpower to build a hydro-generation scheme on the Waitaha River—as she says she intends to do—Morgan Gorge will become an emaciated trickle for much of the year. Opponents say this would be an environmental tragedy and a cultural loss, tantamount to building a windfarm on the summit of Aoraki/Mt Cook.

Society

Oct 21: Thick and thin

New Zealand’s economy was built on ‘the back of a sheep’, but in recent decades, the fortunes of wool have been largely eclipsed by the dairy industry. The twin strands of the fine- and coarse-wool industries have taken diverging paths, focusing on the economic challenge of adding value in New Zealand, rather than exporting the raw material. Will wool rebound?

Society

Oct 19: When worlds collide

Ihumātao, a west-facing peninsula on the shore of Auckland’s Manukau Harbour, is the city’s oldest settlement. In 1863, the land was illegally confiscated from Māori. Sacred hills were quarried, 800-year-old burial sites were demolished, archaeological remains were destroyed, a sewage-treatment plant was built over traditional fishing grounds, and a dye spill killed the local creek. Now Ihumātao has been designated a Special Housing Area, without public consultation, and a development of nearly 500 houses is in progress. But for some tangata whenua, enough is enough.

Living World

Oct 18: The hunting of the snipe

An unlikely crew is given the assignment of catching birds in butterfly nets on a weather-beaten subantarctic island.

Living World

Oct 15: Last chance to see

Twice the kākāriki karaka has returned from the dead. Orange-fronted parakeets were declared extinct in 1919 and again in 1965, but each time, the birds were concealed deep in the beech-forested valleys of Nelson and Canterbury. Now, the bird is approaching its third extinction, and this time, rangers have already scoured the valleys for hidden strongholds. This time, there isn’t a secret population waiting in the wings.

Science & Environment

Oct 14: No swimming

Five millimetres of rain in a day is not uncommon in Auckland, but it is enough to cause parts of the city’s wastewater network to overflow, spilling raw sewage into the sea and making beaches unsafe for swimming. This summer, permanent warning signs were posted at 10 locations where water quality is so bad that Auckland Council no longer monitors it. Why are Auckland’s beaches so frequently unswimmable? Is the solution better plumbing—or more enlightened thinking?

Society

Oct 13: A night at the Globe

When a 400-year-old play was brought to life in Auckland with Pasifika costume, dance, language and actors, audience numbers broke records.

Living World

Oct 12: A feeling for clay

That Earth's humblest materials can be transformed into sublime and beautiful objects is part of the romance of the potter's art. But it takes patience and strong hands to work such miracles. Barry Brickell, the doyen of Coromandel potters, has shaped clay dug on his property at Driving Creek for close to 40 ears. His trademark work are tall, sensuously curved sculptures, in which the clay has been laboriously kneaded and pressed into shape without the use of a potter's wheel. A single piece may take up three weeks to complete.

Society

Oct 11: The 147th year at Castlepoint

Freelance jockeys, keen spectators, farming families with station hacks and horse trainers with thoroughbreds descend on the Wairarapa every autumn to take part in one of New Zealand’s longest-running events.

Science & Environment

Oct 8: Eyes in the land

New Zealand is a global hotspot for dune lakes, and nowhere has more of these freshwater gems than Northland. It’s here, in our country’s northernmost reaches, that iwi are reconnecting with these taonga and the stories that surround them.

Travel & Adventure

Oct 7: Doing the Burt

For one fossil-fuelled week every summer, anyone can be an Invercargill motorcycling legend.

Society

Oct 6: Gold rush

Mānuka honey has exploded in value in recent years, and now it’s a high-stakes business, attracting hive thieves, counterfeit products, unscrupulous players—and triggering a race for the blossom every spring, wherever the trees are in flower.

History

Oct 5: Tupaia

No portraits exist of one of the most important people in Pacific history. Tupaia was a man of many talents: high priest, artist, diplomat, politician, orator and celestial navigator. After fleeing conflict on his home island of Ra’iātea for Tahiti, he befriended botanist Joseph Banks, and joined the onward voyage of James Cook’s Endeavour. Arriving in New Zealand in 1769, Tupaia discovered he could converse with Māori. He became an interpreter, cultural advisor and bringer of news from islands that Māori had left long ago. 250 years on, we are barely beginning to know who he was.

Living World

Oct 4: Track and trace

Most introduced mammals have had a devastating effect on native wildlife, but one species is bucking the trend. About 80 conservation dogs are deployed around the country, helping to protect vulnerable native species by leaping into action at a single command: Seek!

Geography

Oct 1: Wetlands

Dismissed as worthless, pestilent places, wetlands—where the water table is at or near the Earth’s surface—are anything but. They purify water, prevent floods and erosion, store carbon, provide resources like peat and flax, process nutrients, act as nurseries and offer recreation and aesthetic value.

Geography

Sep 30: The people’s fruit

Feijoas have become a New Zealand emblem. So how did they end up in Aotearoa, and how did we end up adoring them—to the point of obsession, for some—when feijoas have not really caught on anywhere else?

Geography

Sep 29: Treasure Island

Great Mercury was one of the first sites of human habitation in New Zealand. Last year, a radical new public-private partnership sought to rid the island of pests. It was a unique operation, and the results have been astonishing.

Geography

Sep 28: Making birds

What would happen if city suburbs as well as offshore islands enjoyed freedom from introduced predators? Is it possible for New Zealand to eliminate them all—stoats, ferrets, weasels, possums, and three species of rat?

Living World

Sep 27: The puzzle of pilot whales

They strand on our shores in greater numbers than any other species of whale. Scientists believe they know why, but there is much about these animals that remains an enigma, and the strandings continue to happen.

Science & Environment

Sep 24: The war on koi

Invasive koi carp now writhe through wetlands from Auckland to Marlborough, displacing native species and destroying freshwater habitats. For 25 years, bowhunters in Waikato have ministered their own brand of pest control, the World Koi Carp Classic, resulting in prizes, and 70 tonnes of puréed fish.

Living World

Sep 23: Hunting Kiwi

A year spent in search of kiwi among the ranges of the West Coast.

Geography

Sep 22: The weed eaters

Edible plants grow throughout our towns and cities: in verges, margins, berms, parks and empty sections, along driveways, pavements and hedgerows. The trick is knowing what to look for.

Travel & Adventure

Sep 21: First ascent: finding unclimbed walls in the Darrans

The Darran Mountains lie deep in the marrow of northern Fiordland—a chunky, perplexing range of diorites and sandstones, gneisses and granites. This is a land of extremes, with the country’s most remote summits, the greatest rainfall and the longest, hardest-to-climb alpine rock walls. Adventurers have been coming here since William Grave and Arthur Talbot in the late 1800s, to test themselves and forge new routes through this vertical landscape.

Science & Environment

Sep 20: Hauturu - Resting Place of the Wind

Mountainous, densely forested and bounded by cliffs and boulders,Little Barrier Island (Hauturu) crouches in the outer reaches of the Hauraki Gulf, a relic of a wild New Zealand now largely vanished. Set aside as a nature reserve over a century ago, the island houses a matchless cargo of wildlife inhabiting an unusual diversity of forest types.

Travel & Adventure

Sep 17: Have raft, will travel

Lightweight, inflatable boats are changing backcountry travel. Easier to paddle than a whitewater kayak, and more forgiving of mistakes, packrafts are opening up river sports to a wider audience.

History

Sep 16: Up the Creek (without a paddle)

Sometime in the mid-1950s a young boy asked “Would you like to come for a ride in my boat?”, and the world has been saying yes ever since. The jet boat’s unrivalled performance in the shallowest of rivers revolutionised water transport and remains a quintessential New Zealand invention, perhaps our greatest contribution to the world of engineering. And the man who perfected it, in a farm workshop of a remote high-country station, was our original “bloke in a shed”, an inspiration and a role model for generations of Kiwi tinkerers, inventors and innovators.

Society

Sep 15: Ward of the state

Chatham Islanders treasure their independence, but they have been forced to rely on the government to survive. Can they find a path to a self-sufficient economy?

Living World

Sep 14: In search of the Grey Ghost

The South Island kōkako is widely believed to have died out a half century ago, but some committed bird experts are convinced there are signs a few remain: disturbed moss, glimpses of grey wings and orange wattles, an occasional haunting call. Yet despite decades scouring southern forests, the kōkako has remained elusive—a single feather is the closest the searchers may have come to proving the bird still exists.

Geography

Sep 13: From taro to tourism

One of the world’s smallest nations is transforming its economy from subsistence to sustainability. Will Niue’s brave new plan work?

Geography

Sep 10: The power of Taupo

Lake Taupo lies in the caldera of an active supervolcano, the site of the world’s most violent eruption of the last 70,000 years. Just 10 km beneath it sits another lake of molten rock 50 km wide and 160 km long. With a growing need for alternative energy sources, plans for tapping this latent reservoir are hotting up.

Society

Sep 9: The Roaring Game

Curling requires perfect weather conditions for its national tournament, the bonspiel, to take place. For the first time in 84 years, the frosts aligned and New Zealand’s gathering of curlers returned to the Central Otago town where it all began in 1879—Naseby.

Society

Sep 8: Tiny houses

The idea of minimal living, an international fad, has fallen on fertile soil in New Zealand, thanks to our national housing crisis and shifting ideas about the way we want to live. For some people, a tiny house is the only home they will ever afford to own. Others are stepping off the treadmill of modern life to ask: How much space does a person really need?

Science & Environment

Sep 7: Under the Ice

Antarctica’s fragile ecosystem is a barometer for the warming and acidification of Earth’s oceans. Over the last decade, NIWA scientists have been diving under the ice as part of Project IceCUBE to gauge just how the ecosystem might cope with these threats.

Society

Sep 8: Tiny houses

Science & Environment

Sep 7: Under the Ice

Living World

Sep 6: The great retreat

Some species just like it cooler. Others have withdrawn little by little to higher altitudes, making new homes where it’s too cold for their enemies to follow. But warmer seasons allow predators and diseases to gain ground and advance above the bushline—meaning that the alpine zone is no longer the refuge it once was.

Society

Sep 3: Volunteer firefighters

Gaza, Beetle, Lily and Jaq, Inky, Tootle, Shrek and Skippy—every town and community has them. They style themselves as ordinary people but their lives and service are anything but ordinary. Unpaid and unheralded, they are our first line of rescue in 65,000 emergency calls a year, routinely saving the lives and assets of people they don’t know.

Science & Environment

Sep 2: Three feet high and rising

With predicted increases in sea level of a metre or more by the end of this century, present-day problems of coastal erosion, flooding and salt-water intrusion into groundwater are going to get much worse. As world leaders gather in Paris to seek a political solution to climate change, it’s timely to ask how we in New Zealand are responding to the challenge of rising seas.

Travel & Adventure

Sep 1: Rock stars

In the heart of the Waikato there’s a multimillion-dollar industry based on a gnat. Glowworms are big business, attracting well over half a million people a year to Waitomo and prompting some to shift from working the land above ground to commercialising the creatures below it. But keeping the caves and their thousands of tiny performance artists in good health requires round-the-clock care.

Living World

Aug 31: When birds get sick

Diseases can take a huge toll on wild animals and hasten rare species towards extinction. In New Zealand, scientists, vets and conservation volunteers are teaming up to try to beat the viruses, parasites and fungi threatening some of our rarest bird species.

Geography

Aug 30: Possum. An ecological nightmare.

Brushtail possums are a protected species in their native Australia. Across the Tasman, they have established themselves as New Zealand's most voracious and intractable pest, attacking simultaneously the beauty of our forests and the good name of our farming products.

Living World

Aug 26: Blood suckers

Lampreys have done without bones—even jaws—for 360 million years, making do instead with a mouthful of rasps designed for shredding. But those teeth are no match for a new and invisible enemy. Are pesticides killing the lampreys? Scientists are scrambling to find out.

Science & Environment

Aug 25: The underground forest

Buried in the soil are the lattices and networks of another kingdom of life, one that’s inextricably connected with what grows above the ground. Fungi determine the types of trees that thrive, and change the quality and health of soil. So, what exactly are they up to down there—and what powers do fungi have that humans could harness?

Living World

Aug 24: Where the seabirds go

During winter, dozens of seabird species take flight from New Zealand on epic migrations across the planet—and recent advances in tracking technology mean we can now follow them. What we’re learning has upended scientists’ ideas about the lengths animals will go to in order to raise a family.

Geography

Aug 23: Eight legs, two fangs and an attitude

Frequently feared, but mostly misunderstood, spiders have a dazzling repertoire of behaviour, and engineering skills which are unmatched in the animal world.

Living World

Aug 20: The whales are back

Last century, southern right whales were hunted until there were none left—none that we could find. A small group of these whales, also called tohorā, hid from the harpoon. Deep in the subantarctic, the survivors birthed and nursed their young. Now, tohorā are returning to the coasts of New Zealand. Are we ready for them?

Living World

Aug 19: Blue Water Islands

A thousand kilometres north-east of the mainland, the Kermadec group basks in a subtropical environment and two decades of marine protection. In May this year, scientists scoured this untouched world to catalogue, collect and expand the list of species found there, and discovered an ecosystem unlike anything else in the country.

Living World

Aug 28: What happened on Stack H?

The Mokohinau stag beetle is one of the world’s most endangered species, occupying less than an acre of scrub on a rocky tower in the middle of the ocean. Its habitat is so precarious that Auckland Zoo and DOC are hoping to safeguard a population of beetles on the mainland as a form of insurance—that is, if there are any left.

Documentary

Sunday doco: Awesome Pawsome

Experience tigers in a completely new way as four cubs grow up to become part of a rare kind of family at Australian’s Dreamworld.

Society

Aug 27: Auckland's green heart

In 1845 Governor George Grey set aside 80 hectares of central Auckland for a park. On the crest of an ancient volcano, it is a memorial, a recreation space, a green heart for the city and its citizens.

Living World

Aug 26: Silence of the Fantails

The fantail is one of our commonest native birds, loved for its flamboyant tail, acrobatic flight and inquisitive friendliness. Yet life is no bed of roses for these charming little birds. Between August and February each year they pour their energy into reproduction, only to have almost all of their infant offspring devoured by rats and other predators.

Living World

Aug 25: Where are all the spotted shags?

Seabird scientists are creating a fake home for shags on the Noises, an island group off the coast of Auckland, in the hope that the Hauraki Gulf’s rapidly diminishing spotted shag population will be fooled into thinking it’s a great place to start a family.

History

Aug 24: The governor's island

In a succession of difficult postings—South Australia, New Zealand, South Africa—the energetic George Grey proved himself one of the British Empire's most able governors. Yet when he returned to New Zealand in 1861 for a second term, the magic was fading. The colony was on the brink of civil war, and local politicians were unwilling to allow Grey his former power. As an escape from the increasing pressure and frustration of public life, Grey purchased Kawau Island, building a grand house there amid exotic gardens and filling it with treasures. On the centenary of the death of Sir George Grey—soldier, statesman, explorer, philanthropist—we pay a lingering visit to Mansion House.

Science & Environment

Aug 21: Return of the ancients

Sea turtles survived a meteor that killed the dinosaurs, millions of years of predator attacks, even the slow warming of the seas, only to be threatened by nylon fishing lines and plastic bags. Those that wash up in New Zealand almost always need the help of humans.

Travel & Adventure

Aug 20: The Kiwi Bushman

Josh James reinvents adventure and manhood on the West Coast, with the world watching.

Living World

Aug 19: Bird Island

The spade brigade, as they were dubbed, planted 280,000 seedlings—a city of trees—into which a host of rare birds and reptiles were released. Within sight of New Zealand's largest city, Tiritiri Matangi is now a template for island restoration and endangered species management.

Living World

Velvet underground

It may look like a subterranean soft toy, but a prowling peripatus is anything but cuddly. The "velvet worm" is a voracious predator with a startling method of catching prey, and one of the forest's more unlikely denizens.

Living World

Aug 17: No Take Zone

Rolling a fresh cigarette, Bill Ballantine gives a sardonic laugh as he recalls the headline in the local newspaper when New Zealand’s first marine reserve was opened in 1977—“Nothing to do at Goat Island Bay any more.” He had fought for 12 years to protect five square kilometres of marine habitat on the Northland coast. That protection was finally in place. To Ballantine it was the start of a new era. To the newspaper, voicing community opposition, it was the end of one.

Living World

Aug 13: Bryde's whales

In the Hauraki Gulf

Living World

August 13: Deep insight

Here we are, back in lockdown. But before we go out of our minds, let's delve into the many minds of the octopus.

Geography

May 16: Black Tide - the Rena accident and its implications

New Zealanders have become accustomed to sea freight slipping silently in and out of the country’s ports without incident. But on October 5, that impression of well-oiled efficiency foundered on Astrolabe Reef, and our coastlines suddenly seemed acutely exposed. What went wrong?

Travel & Adventure

May15: South by Kayak

Pushing through a field of brash ice, an intrepid New Zealand expedition closes in on the bottom of the world. Their goal: the Antarctic Circle. Their route: wherever wind, wave and ice permit a passage along the western shore of the Antarctic Peninsula. Their means: three fibreglass kayaks and a fair measure of grit.

Documentary - Raising Baby

May 14: Raising Baby - Gorilla

Enjoy the antics of two orphaned baby gorillas as they journey through their first year of life.

Science & Environment

May 13: A new day for solar power

The sun powers our planet and provides us life. It’s as simple as that—though the processes can be mysterious and the applications surprising. In December last year, a bunch of Kiwis with a budget of less than $40,000 proved that it was possible to drive the length of the country using nothing but sunlight.

Living World

May 12: Best in Show

New Zealanders boast one of the highest dog ownership rates in the world—one third of households own at least one dog and 300 kennel clubs across the country run hundreds of dog shows a year. The competition will always be fierce, but there can only be one Best in Show.

Documentary

May 11: Australia

The epic journey of the world’s most arid continent has driven the evolution of its bizarre pouched mammals, until Australia became the realm of marsupials.

Science & Environment

May 10: Shooting stars

For stargazers, the clear skies over Tekapō afford a remarkable view of the heavens.

Geography

May 8: Mana Island

In fading light, a fairy prion returns to its roost on Mana Island as a host of nocturnal creatures are just beginning their day. After concerted conservation efforts, the island is now a hive of activity after dark.

Documentary - Extreme Animal Babies

May 7: Fussy Eaters

In the world of Extreme Animals, meet the Babies! From the cute and the seemingly helpless, to the weird and sometimes downright creepy, get ready for a top ten countdown of the world’s most extreme animal infants.

Science & Environment

May 6: Waste not, want not

In our rush through modern life, we leave behind a mountain of rubbish that gets a little higher every year. The problem starts in our homes—so does the solution.

Living World

May 5: Deep space

By night, a menagerie of species rises to the surface of the ocean—rarely glimpsed, and in some cases never photographed.

Science & Environment

May 4: Citizen science

You don’t need a PhD to find a new species, unearth a rare fungus or name an asteroid. New Zealanders with no specialist training are contributing to scientific research by monitoring streams, spotting rare plants, counting the birds visiting their back gardens, and putting GPS trackers on their cats.

Documentary - Our Big Blue Backyard Season 2

May 3: Chatham Islands

Perched way out in the Pacific, Rangatira Island is pockmarked with thousands, maybe millions, of seabird burrows. Its forest remnants and rocky platforms also shelter some unique and critically endangered birds. But even endangered birds can make a tasty snack and, on a crowded island, there might not be enough room for everyone to rear their chicks.

Society

May 2: Kelly Tarlton

Although he is best remembered for the Underwater World on Auckland's waterfront which still carries his name 22 years after his death, that project was just the last in a life brimming with adventure, discovery, originality and zest.

Society

May 1: The leg shop

What happens when you lose a limb?

Documentary - Our Big Blue Backyard Season 2

Thu 30: Banks Peninsula: Mountains Meet the Sea

A drowned volcano, jutting out into the ocean, shelters one of the world’s tiniest marine dolphins. Fresh meltwater from Southern Alps rushes down braided rivers, washes food into the sea and percolates into wetlands that provide a home for the long lived and mysterious eels.

Science & Environment

Wed 29: Jellyfish

Drifting at any depth in all the world’s oceans, these creatures range from an Arctic species with a bell the size of a car, to a venomous microscopic Australian. Carnivorous predators, jellyfish swarm around our coasts and litter our beaches, yet we know surprisingly little about them. Some of the most recognisable species don’t even qualify as true jellyfish. One such, a Portuguese Man of War (Physalia physalis), its inflated bladder keeping it poised at the surface, is not even a single animal, but a sizeable colony containing four types of minute, highly modified polyps.

Science & Environment

Tue 28: Fields of Plenty

Look closer. The straggling plants on the riverbank, the so-called weeds in the garden, the insect-eaten leaves on the forest’s edge—often ploughed, sprayed or simply ignored—are finding their way back into the medicine chest. And Maori herbal remedies, once derided and outlawed by an act of Parliament, are revealing their curative power.

Documentary - Our Big Blue Backyard Season 2

Sun 26: The Kermadecs

Alone in the Pacific, halfway to Tonga, sit the Kermadec Islands. This remote archipelago is New Zealand’s northernmost frontier and our toehold on the tropics. Everything that lives on and around these young islands has travelled far to be here and a unique mix of creatures thrive in its warm waters. As a marine community the Kermadec is unrivalled in New Zealand waters.

Geography

Sat 25: Gallipoli—a hill too far

In the battle for Chunuk Bair, Imperial Britain’s campaign to occupy the Gallipoli peninsula reached its harsh climax, and fighting centre stage were the soldiers of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force. Artist Ion Brown’s re-creation of the scene—a sesquicentennial gift to the people of New Zealand from the country’s armed forces—celebrates the unquenchable resolve of the few in the face of a massive Turkish counter-assault.

Living World

Fri 23: Road to recovery

Takahē numbers are rising by 10 per cent a year. The problem now is where to put them.

Documentary - Our Big Blue Backyard

Thu 23: Open Bay Islands

On New Zealand’s remote Open Bay Islands, New Zealand fur seals protect their newborns from surging seas, starvation, and predation by great white sharks.

Geography

Wed 22: The glory of clouds

They are the supertankers of the sky, ferrying billions of tonnes of water vapour around the atmosphere and making possible life on land.

Living World

Tue 21: Signs of Life

Like a planet in space, a rainbow trout egg sparks and crackles as biological processes begin a miraculous transformation, the same that progresses silently in the inscrutable waters of New Zealand’s wild rivers every day. But even in clean rivers, the odds are stacked against this small vessel of life—only one in a thousand eggs will hatch and survive until adulthood.

Documentary - Our Big Blue Backyard

Mon 20: Poor Knights Islands

New Zealand’s Poor Knights Islands is considered one of the world’s top dive sites and for good reason, with a rich collection of extraordinary characters and bizarre behaviours, including a unique congregation of stingrays and sex-changing Sandager's wrasse.

Living World

Sun 19: The microscopic world of lichens

There is a slow war raging, under our noses.

Living World

Sat 18: Aquatic assassins

The secret life of fishing spiders

Documentary - Our Big Blue Backyard Season 2

Fri 17: Fiordland

In the cold, steep world of the fiords, tannins block out sunlight to the world below. The fiords are cold and inhospitable in winter, when they receive little light and freeze over at their extremes. In this unforgiving world there are no second chances

Artefact

Thu 16: Seven steps

An Otago man out for a walk made a significant palaeontological discovery.

Society

Wed 15: P class

Most of the stellar yachting careers of New Zealand’s America’s Cup sailors began in humble seven-foot boats—a class now a century old—designed by a Public Works employee who couldn’t swim, and who was too hard up to build anything larger.

Documentary - Our Big Blue Backyard Season 2

Tue 14: White Island

In the Bay of Plenty, New Zealand’s most active volcano fills the sky with plumes of white cloud. Sterile and inhospitable, the forces that built White Island influence the seas around it.

Science & Environment

Mon 13: Liquidation

Water, our most precious natural asset, offers amenity, a habitat for aquatic species and a focus for recreation. But it also turns the turbines of industry and powers New Zealand’s agricultural economy. Economic development and environmental integrity are at odds in a struggle for control over this great resource. Are we mortgaging our future for a little more economic growth?