Vets investigating yellow-eyed penguin deaths

Thursday, March 15, 2007

Vets investigating yellow-eyed penguin deaths

PALMERSTON NORTH – Veterinarians at the University’s Wildlife Ward are investigating the cause of death of the last of a population of endangered yellow-eyed penguins hatched on Stewart Island this breeding season.

Dr Andrew Hill, a wildlife vet in the Institute of Veterinary Animal and Biomedical Sciences, spent two weeks on Stewart Island earlier this year collecting blood samples, and another week on Southland’s Catlins Coast studying the population there.

He says although all of the 32 chicks in the island’s Anglim coast monitoring area died, the mainland population did not appear to be affected at this stage.

The last chick died of a blood parasite recently discovered on the island, but a number of diseases and environmental factors are believed to be involved in the overall mortality. Investigation is now being focused on the role of disease in Yellow-eyed penguin chicks and methods of reducign mortality.

The Yellow-Eyed Penguin Trust says this year’s breeding season is the worst since monitoring began four years ago, when the research programme into the island’s declining penguin population began.

ENDS

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