An ornithologist has congratulated one of Shane Griffin’s logging crews, which reported a falcon‘s nest in Wenita’s Brocks block.

The Griffin crew alerted Wenita staff, and we called in Parker Conservation who found the nest. We immediately suspended logging operations and moved the crew to another block. Harvesting will be on hold in the area with the nest until the new year, when the chicks have fledged.

It is common for falcons to nest on the edge of freshly harvested forest. The standing trees provide shelter and observation points for the birds to spot their prey and hunt in the cutover.

Parker Conservation’s Kalinka Rexer-Huber thanked the Griffin team for acting so promptly to pause its work when spotting the nest. The pair of kārearea have four eggs, and she thinks the nest was found at the start of the nesting period.

Parker Conservation will set up a camera to monitor the nest and record the eventual outcome.