Stories by Alison Ballance

The Kopuatai peat bog on the Hauraki Plains is a natural laboratory to study how the planet breathes and uses carbon.

Four Palmerston North households have had their rubbish and recycling under a spotlight as part of a waste minimisation study

Rowi are New Zealand's rarest kiwi, and 'egg rescues' that see chicks hatched and raised in captivity have resulted in a big increase in the bird's numbers

UAVs are being used to collect spatial data for ecological research after frustrations with satellite photos being obscured by cloud cover

Conservation groups such as the Matukituki Trust prepare for a predator explosion following a mast year.

Moa Point on Wellington's south coast is a hotspot for common skinks and common geckos.

Start-up company BioLumic is built on basic research into the effect of UV light on plant growth.

The development of a cow urine sensor is leading to a better understanding of where nitrogen is deposited in paddocks

The Classifynder, developed at Massey University, is automating pollen identification and counting

Greater Wellington tests water quality at selected river and coastal sites during the summer months

Eyesight tests for 'mosquito terminator' jumping spiders show they have a clear mental picture of what a mosquito looks like.

The Australian community of Lord Howe Island is considering an ambitious plan to eradicate rats and mice.

The Spitfire trap is being developed to accurately deliver a single dose of a fast-acting toxin that is specific to stoats.

Stoat trapping by the Arthur's Pass Wildlife Trust is good news for a thriving population of great spotted kiwi.

Earthquake engineers at the University of Canterbury are world-leaders in designing buildings that will be better able to withstand earthquake shaking.

The hi-tech TASCAM buoy collects information on local marine conditions and radios them back to base every hour

Spotted shags gather at a Golden Bay beach in large numbers at dawn to bathe, and to swallow and regurgitate stones

The Cawthron Institute is trying to breed oysters that are resistant to the ostreid herpes virus

Honeybees can be trained to react to particular odours such as those emitted by caterpillar-infested apple trees

The NZ Virtual Herbarium is an online version of the data from 11 different herbaria

Microbes can be sources of natural colours and flavours, and their growth can be manipulated when they are exposed to sound

Sooty shearwaters are great ocean travellers, and seabird scientists are using geolocators to record their journeys

A new book on butterflies of the South Pacific by father and son lepidopterists is a great guide to NZ butterflies

Using an articulograph to study how we process food in our mouths while we eat will help in smarter food innovation

Volatile compounds in breath may allow researchers - and bees - to make diagnoses of diseases such as TB