Birds small and big. Maybe very big.

More birds today, finishing with a bold, rowdy kaka sitting on my arm like a falcon, greedy for peanuts. Don't tell Forest & Bird, DoC or any of the other conservation groups, but it's possible to get a tiny bit tired of these raucous parrots which seem to have so much spare time for hanging around talking, squabbling and screeching. Especially first thing in the morning, on the tin roof.

Much more welcome were the sternly frowning mollymawks (albatross to you and Monty Python) clustering round the boat this afternoon on the way to Ulva Island; and the yellow-eyed penguin ducking and diving around them to the astonishment of the crew. "So rare!" they gasped - but pft, that's the second rare avian visitor I've seen here in two days (yesterday it was a white heron that had two burly birders grabbing for their big lenses).

I'm astonished by how big the island is, and how untouched the vast majority of it is - so densely forested with virgin bush that no one can say for sure what's in there. Or what isn't. Nobody's actually claiming moa - but...