KAKAPO - NOT WORTH SAVING?

A bloodless scientist in Aussie has done are very interesting thing. He has developed an index that assesses the worth of saving threatened and endangered species purely on fact and logic.

As a result the big lazy parrot we call the Kakapo is deemed not worth saving. That may well be true. Comalco has chucked a million dollars at the recovery programme for about 20 years so thats $20 m for starters and then its safe to assume DOC has stumped up the same amount so thats about $40million so far and what have we to show for it? Another 70 birds. Thats about $750k each.

Now don't get me wrong - Kakapo are the embodiment of innocence as we have blogged before and anyone who gets up close and personal to one cannot help but be affected by them.

However we have to fess. The mere smell of them sent our saliva glands into overdrive. They awoke some ancient Maori predilection for Parrot hangi.

Thats the problem with Kakapo - they are our forests village idiots. They never adapted. They cant fly their way out of trouble and the desire to breed is predicated on a seed that only flourishes every now and then.

Even so, we get the argument and a tool designed to triage the species that will best benefit from intervention is very useful.

However it does not take into account our nations love of charismatic fauna. If its cute we are more inclined to save it. The yellow eyed penguin is probably worthy of more resource but its an ugly bloody thing.

But small birds like the Black Robin take our fancy.

So while logic should dictate - it wont. Cute will always win the bucks and our verdant parrot will get all the love and attention it probably doesn't deserve.

KAKAPO

If you are in the South next Saturday - go and check out the Kakapo in Invercargill. If you are a rich bugger - Take a special trip. They are going to be on public display for a very short time.
They will change the way you see things. They truly are innocence personified. Yip they are dumb, they have not adapted fast enough to survive with out millions of dollars and assisted breeding programmes. They would have tasted fantastic as well. But all jokes aside they are one of the most amazing birds you will ever see.

And the pic is taken by Barry Harcourt - one of this countries finest snappers.

YUM

We are one of only a few New Zealanders who have had opportunity to handle a kakapo. We dribbled. We did not cry as the rest of the party of VIP's did, we just dribbled. Dribbled as we dreamed of gently roasted parrot with piko piko and vogels ancient grain stuffing basted in port laced with titoki berries, served on a bed of maori spud mash surrounded by sauted porchini mushrooms. All washed down with a bottle of Olssen's Jackson Barry Pinot Noir.

You see we reckoned the reason the buggers died out is because they were the finest tasting flying protein to ever grace Aotearoa. So while we think that they should be saved its because we think they should be cloned and bred for eating.

They would rival Bluff oysters as an iconic dish.

Its taken ten years and millions and millions of dollars to get to 100 of the fat delectable, succulent parrots that are big enough to feed four people.

However, unless they are cloned we think that they are doomed. They are picky about shagging, picky about what they eat and picky about where they live. The only thing we are picky about is the meat on their bones.