Current kākāpō conservation

Basil the kākāpō is a survivor. When kākāpō were rediscovered on Stewart Island in 1977, in the Tin Range on the southern end of the island, the population was initially estimated to be between 100 and 200 birds. Most of these birds were found between the Pegasus River and an area known as Skyline, roughly halfway from the Robertson River to Seal Creek, largely in subalpine scrublands. They were divided into two arenas where male kākāpō boomed for females. However, several kilometres to the sout

Kākāpō are about to experience their biggest breeding season ever. All eighty five breeding age females are expected to participate in the breeding season. Kākāpō do not breed every year, in fact usually only every two to three years, and it typically takes five to eleven years for young females to join the breeding population. Based on previous seasons eighty to one hundred chicks could be produced, exceeding the seventy seven chicks produced in the 2019 breeding season and making it the larges