Living in New Zealand: Little Blue (Don't Call Them Fairy) Penguins

The biggest tourist attraction in Oamaru is the little blue penguin colony at the end of Friendly Bay, but you find little penguins all around New Zealand. NZ has three types of penguin. The yellow-eyed penguin/hoiho (endangered, with numbers crashing, possibly due to fishing activities), the Fiordland crested penguin/tawaki and this little penguin/kororā.

I used to volunteer as a penguin guide at the breakwater in St Kilda when I lived in Melbourne, so I saw plenty of little penguins there too. I still have a scar on my lip as a souvenir of an up close and personal encounter (when I was holding a penguin for the penguin researchers to measure). So I wasn't prepared to pay to go and see the penguins in Oamaru, but since I knew the type of place penguins like to nest, I walked to the beach in the evening and found plenty wandering around.

Illustrated Epistle Extract: Things That Will Kill You in New Zealand

Since we have been back in Lyttleton, we've had a few small tremors (3-ish on the Richter scale) and a larger jolt (4-ish) and I'm glad our house is timber and that the chimneys were taken down after the two big Christchurch earthquakes in 2010 and 2011. We live on a hill and there are some large rocks above us, but there are also large trees and buildings in between us and those rocks, so having those rocks come tumbling down in an earthquake is less of a worry than in some other places. A 7.8 earthquake in Kaikoura in 2016 caused massive landslips that closed Highway 1 (Yes the major road connecting New Zealand's north to its south) for over a year, so being protected from slips and rockfalls is a something you have to consider.

At least being on a hill there is less risk of tsunami. In 1868, a tsunami drained Lyttelton Harbour and then ran up 3 metres above sea level, causing damage to wharves, jetties and boats, inundating paddocks and drowning sheep. It was due to an 8.5-9.0 earthquake that happened in what was then Peru (see Te Ara entry). Our house is about 40 metres above sea level, which puts us at low risk of tsunami damage, unless we are down at the pub on London Street, though even there it would have to be massive.

Click to see options for using the image

---

This is an extract of my Illustrated Epistle, which goes out in the middle of the month. It is a behind-the-scenes look at the life of a cartoonist (specifically, mine). I'd love it if you signed up at the bottom of this page, or here:

http://eepurl.com/cCOOeD

New Zealand Garden Diary: Planting an Olive Tree in Hope of Olives in the Not too Distant Future

I planted this leccino olive tree in a big hole filled with compost and leaf mould, backfilled with soil, watered and then mulched. It is supposed to be a variety suited to most of New Zealand and cold tolerant (we don’t get heavy frosts here in Lyttelton, but it can get below zero on a few nights in winter). It is often used to produce oil, but I’d be happy to get a few olives I could brine. Some day.

Click to see options for using the image

New Zealand Garden Diary: Planting a Feijoa Tree

Feijoas are an iconic New Zealand fruit tree, even though they are native to South America. The fruit looks a little like a kiwi, but tastes more floral, perfumey even. I love to add one to an apple crumble, as they are quite potent. They are great to chop up and add to kombucha in the secondary fermentation. I’m also looking forward to using them in smoothies.

As for the fig tree, I dug a big hole, added compost and leaf mould, planted Fiona the feijoa, back filled with soil and watered. She shouldn’t get as big as a fig tree, so I didn’t line this hole with anything.

Click to see options for using the image