Fern Bird

Maori Name: Matata

Bowdleria punctata

The Fernbird is endemic to New Zealand and fully protected. Although numbers are not threatened, they are more common in certain parts of New Zealand – particularly in Northland and the South Island’s West Coast. There are 5 different subspecies; the North Island, the South Island, Stewart Island, Codfish, and the Snares varieties.

The Fernbird declined about the time of European settlement with loss of habitat through clearing and burning, and almost totally disappeared in the lower North Island and the East Coast of the South Island.  A weak flier, it was very prone to difficulty in escaping this kind of intervention. 

The Fernbird is heavily streaked in dark brown, with a chestnut forehead and crown, a white eyebrow stripe and brown spots on both the throat and breast.

Early settlers to New Zealand called it the "Swamp Sparrow" probably because of its similar dull colouring.

The tail feathers are distinctively thin, dark brown and frayed looking. The birds reach a length of 18 centimetres but almost half of that is tail. When they fly the tail droops.

Although Fernbirds are secretive and retiring, they are inquisitive and will poke their heads out from for a moment and then disappear again.

They do most of their travelling on foot but when they do fly it will be an occasional short flight of less than 15 metres. Flights of anything more than that are extremely uncommon.

The main habitat of the Fernbird is low dense ground vegetation interspersed with emergent growth, all of which stands no more than a metre high and which consists of wind shorn manuka, rata, tussock, flax, bracken, gorse and kie kie thickets, and raupo and rushes bordering swamps or tidal inlets.

Fernbirds tend to pair for life, with a breeding season that lasts from late August to January. Their territories will be established by late September and both birds will help build the nest. Egg-laying will commence in the period from mid-October till late February. They will usually lay two clutches of 2-4 eggs that are mauve-pink to purple-brown. Each egg laid gets successively paler.

Naked young will hatch after 12-16 days depending on the variety, and will need to be brooded constantly until they are mostly feathered at around 2 weeks.

It takes about 10 weeks for one brood to become independent, and the adults will not attempt to breed again until that is complete. At the end of the season they will then tend to stay together until the next breeding season begins.

Fern bird habitat on the West Coast has been much reduced through con version of wetlands and shrublands to dairy pasture in recent years. However, approximately 56,000 ha of c. 76,000 ha (75%) of the West Coasts remaining wetlands are protected within public conservation land. Habitat restoration and management of weeds is carried out within these areas which will consequently improve habitat for the fern bird. Communities along the West Coast are also working together with DOC to improve wetland habitat on private land.