Council has taken the banded dotterel, Pohowera, under its wing in this year’s Bird of the Year competition and is encouraging Ashburton district residents to vote for it.

The banded dotterel is on the endangered bird list but has found a stable breeding habitat at Wakanui Beach, which is being restored as a native biodiversity area.

Wakanui Beach was important to Maori in the early days and was part of a network of settlements along the coastline.

Ashburton District Council together with Wakanui Crew, Wakanui School students, farmers in the area and others, is enhancing the space with native plantings; rare plants and endangered birds are hard to spot though.

Nests of the banded dotterel are difficult to distinguish and eggs are often at the mercy of predators as well as unseeing humans and their vehicles. Another breeding population of banded dotterels is found at the Ashburton Rivermouth, with the highest abundance of native birds in Canterbury.

Community Services Group Manager Steve Fabish said the banded dotterel had a chestnut coloured breast band and preferred coastal shingle habitats and riverbeds.

“It’s good that these birds have called Ashburton home just like all of us and we are so lucky to have a group committed to enhancing Wakanui Beach. Hopefully in years to come, these birds will be seen more commonly again. We need to do as much as we can to safeguard their nests.

“So if you’re voting in Bird of the Year, then banded dotterels have to be top of your list. Feel free to tick the boxes for wrybills and black-fronted terns too, as these birds are also in our patch.”

Banded dotterels breed throughout New Zealand on sandy coasts, shingle and braided riverbeds, or sometimes farmland. Some migrate to Australia once nesting is complete, others to the northern North Island’s harbours and estuaries. Forest and Bird member, Val Clemens, is currently working with landowners at Wakanui Beach to ensure the fledging chicks along the coast are not disturbed.

“As well as enhancing Wakanui Beach for banded dotterels and other threatened birds, it’s really important that people know they exist because human disturbance, by vehicle or foot, damages nests and kills fledging chicks,” Mr Fabish said.

Go to www.birdoftheyear.org.nz to see all the birds. Voting closes 31 October.