Jacques de Satgé has learned a lot during his three field seasons of surveying for banded rail in mangroves.
He has learned how to trap and GPS tag these cryptic birds. He has learned how to mark out quadrats in dense mangrove growth to survey for footprints, banded rail prey and vegetation. And he has also learned a lot about the different properties of mud!
Dense mangrove forests can be tricky to navigate! Photo: Supplied
Jacques is part of the Human-Wildlife Interaction Research Group at Massey University, led by Associate Professor Weihong Ji. His research work is aimed at starting to fill a knowledge gap about how native birds, such as the banded rail, use mangrove habitats.
Jacques de Satge Photo: RNZ / Claire Concannon
Aotearoa's native mangroves can be found in the north half of the North Island, on the shorelines and estuaries found between Ōhiwa on the east coast and Kawhia on the west. Right at the southern latitude limit of where mangroves can survive, in Aotearoa there is just one species of temperate mangrove (Avicennia marina subspecies australasica, known as Manawa).
While New Zealand's mangroves don't have any obligate bird species, that is, a bird that relies solely on mangrove habitat, there is evidence that some native birds do use mangroves for foraging and resting.
As native mangroves continue to expand in some shorelines and estuaries around New Zealand they come into conflict with communities who might prefer the more open sand flat habitats that they replace. But to make well-informed decisions of if, where and how to remove mangroves, we need to understand what services they provide to birds and other critters.
With hundreds of footprint surveys conducted at his four mangrove sites, coupled with GPS data from tagged banded rail, Jacques can now add what he has learned to the bigger picture of what we know about Aotearoa's temperate mangroves.
Jacques de Satgé's supervisory panel at Massey University is Associate Professor Weihong Ji, Associate Professor David Aguirre and Dr. Aaron Harmer. His research is part-funded by the Birds New Zealand Research Fund and the Royal Society Te Apārangi's Hutton Fund.
