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Written By: Jessica Meehan, Logistics Coordinator
There is one thing that unites Denver Zoo Conservation Alliance (DZCA) staff and volunteers, and that is a passion for wildlife conservation. Our mission to Inspire Communities to Save Wildlife for Future Generations drives us to connect with those working to save species where they live, from breeding and releasing boreal toads in our local Rocky Mountain region to partnering with the grassroots NGO Forum Konservasi Leuser in Indonesia. Since 2018, DZCA has partnered with Kea Conservation Trust (KCT) by providing grant funding to support several important projects aimed at improving conservation outcomes for this endangered parrot species only found on the South Island of New Zealand.
One thing about being passionate about a species that lives across the world is that it is costly in terms of time, money, and carbon to participate in field conservation projects to support them. While I was lucky enough to visit New Zealand to help capture and band kea as part of the lead testing program in 2020, it is not practical to send DZCA staff to New Zealand regularly. Fortunately, while in New Zealand the connections I made led to conversations about how I could keep helping with kea conservation from across the world, and the Kea Database Project was born.
Fast forward several years, our database entries were complete and KCT had a new partnership to explore. The curious kea are notorious for causing damage to property as they investigate the buildings in their range, and KCT gets regular complaints about destructive behavior from property owners. Besides the damage, kea can be injured or ingest toxic materials like lead from old roofing nails, causing illness or even leading to death.
KCT has tried using motion-detection strobe light machines to deter kea from properties, but it was unclear if these were making any difference in kea behavior. For this naturally curious species, something novel like a strobe light might even attract kea! Field researchers had the idea to set up cameras to monitor the activities of kea at these properties. DZCA supplied a small grant to cover the cost of several new motion activated strobe lights equipped with an alarm sound, and cameras were deployed at several sites with and without a strobe light present to provide a control group. But researchers found that the cameras came back with thousands of files that needed to be reviewed in order to find any useful information. Many of the photos and videos were taken when the cameras were activated by the wind, people on the property, or other non-kea activities.
DZCA staff were happy to jump in again to take care of the tedious desk work so that field staff in New Zealand could spend their valuable time out in the field with kea. I recruited a new team of conservation-oriented Animal Care Specialists to create a coding system for analyzing the videos and photos, and we dove into the storage drive. Over the course of 25 work hours added up over 6 months our team coded over 27,500 pieces of media. Our spreadsheet allows field researchers to quickly find and view the videos and photos that are worth viewing to compile preliminary information to share with property owners, and we hope that when we add more data points there will be enough evidence to determine whether strobe lights are effective tools for deterring kea from damaging property. Since it’s been the winter and slow season down under in New Zealand, we’re currently waiting on more media to be available for analysis so we can jump in again once the cheeky groups of juvenile kea begin their antics in the villages of the Southern Alps.
Our partnership with the Kea Conservation Trust demonstrates that impactful conservation can happen from anywhere. While fieldwork in New Zealand is crucial, our behind-the-scenes efforts from Colorado are making a real difference for kea. We look forward to continuing this collaboration and supporting the conservation of this endangered species!
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