BirdCare Aotearoa Wildlife Hospital Tour and Bird First Aid

Location: Auckland

Date: 6th April 2025

Author: Carmen Chan

Participants: Carmen Chan, Calina Whitney, Katrina Sammons, Ethan Boersen, Raphael Powis, Jhanu Ragunathan, Maegan Lewis, Janelle Evans, Wanqian Bao, Grace X, Gloria Manggalagita, Tony Shaw, Emily Clark, Fiona Feng, Xusheng Feng, Yifan Xiang, Jonatan Tuvstedt, Maadesh Kumar, Sean Thomson, Nora Buessow, Amelie Weiler, Iris Toetenel, Farabi Kabir, Marcos Espinosa, Phoebe Lu

One sunny Sunday afternoon the 6th of April, twenty-eight AUTCers carpooled to BirdCare Aotearoa – New Zealand’s largest DOC sanctioned bird rescue and rehabilitation centre. As part of ECOFest 2025, this event was an opportunity to see where birds are rehabilitated as well as pick up on some first aid. Collectively, our enthusiastic group managed to raise $900 directly towards supporting BirdCare’s work and learnt a lot about birds and how rescues work! 

The rescue centre is located just a few minutes from the Waitakere ranges, and when we arrived we went up a long gravel driveway to a cosy looking green and white bungalow. The manager – Carl, somewhat shocked but also astounded at the size of our enthusiasm had given us permission to camp out on the lawn for lunch, and we started the trip with a good feed (via a short bakery stop!), before walking up to the house, and settling on picnic mats and chairs in the ‘outdoor classroom’. A flock of wild mallards flew right past the presenter as we started – almost as if in greeting!

Some key takeaway points about Bird First Aid:

• When seeing a wild grounded bird – ask yourself firstly: do they really need rescue? Sometimes observing them for 1h may be enough and many can fly off on their own.

• When making a transport carrier - a cardboard box covered with a towel is ideal. A traditional cat/dog cages with a wire grill can damage a bird’s beak. The towel is also a useful way to pick up a bird without damage to yourself, or the bird.

• Avoid trying to feed the bird food and water. Bread is bad for birds. Water (unless you put in stones/pebbles) often results in the bird accidentally getting hypothermic if they end up flailing in it (just like humans out bush!) and it’s best to bring them to BirdCare for proper hospital care (and often a subcutaneous drip for rehydration). 

After watching an enthusiastic presenter wrangle with a soft-toy kahu (once you’ve got the legs, it’s under control and they stop snapping!), we then went for a tour around the facilities, and saw where the birds were triaged (a small shed with medical equipment), and rehabilitated. It was Cook’s Petrol migratory season and the clinic’s ICU had over 32 birds that had been grounded in Auckland CBD from the increasing LED light exposure in town.

The day then finished off with us all driving 10 minutes down the road to Arataki Visitor’s centre at Janelle’s suggestion, and we all trooped off to the ice cream stall, and for a tramp around their Natura walk with Sean and Janelle giving the group an impromptu ecology tour on New Zealand’s native plants!