August brought remarkable snowfalls to parts of the country. In Christchurch, still coping with earthquake damage and power outages, the snow compared with historic falls in 1992 and 1945 although, ...

In March of this year, a special courier arrived in Wellington from France carrying a rather unimpos­ing stuffed lizard for dis­play at the National Museum. This specimen ­described by one ...

A 10-year study by the Northland Totara Working Group, led by scientist David Bergin, looked at the way totara trees grow in pasture in Northland—a region where totara regeneration on farms is so ...

The last 50 years has seen a focus on cleaning up environmental messes—in policy jargon, mitigating the effects of human activities. This approach has led to the creation worldwide of institutions ...

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 ...

Travel down State Highway 5 and it’s hard to miss Tirau. The township’s big sheep and matching dog cause many a visitor to do a double take. Those tourists alighting for photo opportunities find a ...

New Zealand’s forests were once the home of the largest eagle in the world. This enormous bird had claws as big as a tiger’s, and could strike its prey with the force of a concrete block dropped from ...

What would the beach be without red-billed gulls? We may be about to find out. Two huge colonies have already gone under and the next biggest, in Kaikōura, is failing fast. In December 2023, ...

What would have happened to this country’s place names if the British hadn’t claimed these isles? French colonisers, spying the land through their portholes last century, would dearly have liked to ...

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 ...

The planting of Russell lupins as sheep feed in the Canterbury high country is triggering a clash between farming and conservation values. In early summer, photographers jostle for space on the ...

This hardy endemic shrub is very common throughout New Zealand in shrubland and open forest. It usually grows about one metre tall, and is divaricate: it has tough, spiky shoots with tightly ...