Have been seeing a lot of blackbirds and chaffinches, but this one looks like a kakariki.
The tree lucerne's just starting to flower, and it's attracting the birds.
The photos are of one of two ongaonga I planted late last year in our garden, in out of the way places. I haven't seen any red admiral caterpillars on them yet.
The flowering banksia at Cashmere Primary School that's popular with the local bellbirds.
This is the only photo I got before it scuttled away into the grass. You can see a short section of the skink's tail right in the middle of the photo. It will be a common skink or a McCann's skink.
A rare plant in Christchurch gardens (ironically, I see it more often in gardens in Long Beach, California). It does make a nice looking ground cover though.
Planted in this forest restoration patch by the Heathcote River in the Wigram Retention Basin.
We went to Mahoe Reserve in Lincoln today, where, remarkably, a tui had been observed on Thursday and Friday. It showed up again, for about half an hour, and sang. See the movie.
It was unbanded, and Laura Molles didn't recognise its song, suggesting that it may have blown in from somewhere in the Southern Alps during the recent westerly storms, instead of being a Banks Peninsula bird.
Found whilst neighbour was mulching their pittosporum :(
One of three kereru feeding on Coprosma repens fruit in a garden.