Thousands of New Zealanders have their pencils sharpened and at the ready for the start of the New Zealand Garden Bird Survey | Te Tatauranga o ngā Manu Māra o Aotearoa on Saturday.

Now in its 17th year, the Garden Bird Survey performs an invaluable role in helping our scientists understand how birds are affected by environmental changes.

Once submitted and analysed, the huge amounts of raw data – more than 70,000 surveys since 2007 – help researchers show how bird counts are changing across Aotearoa over two timeframes – the past 5 and past 10 years.

Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research Senior Researcher Dr Angela Brandt says it’s vital that the research continues to confirm the trends.

“It’s especially beneficial to have higher participation for detecting when a regional trend is different to the national trend,” says Dr Brandt.

“It’s especially important this year as we’ve noticed house sparrows, goldfinches and chaffinches are actually declining from a moderate to a rapid rate over the five-year period. Adding another year of data will help us understand if this trend is continuing, or if 2023 was an anomalous year for bird counts.”

Goldfinch are among a few bird species showing declines in numbers nationally. Photo credit Manaaki Whenua/Tom Marshall.

Now is the perfect time to create a birding memory, especially if you’ve never done the Survey before.

The NZ Garden Bird Survey website has a whole host of bird identification pages, bird song examples, and tips on how to get the best out of your Survey experience.

We have several competitions running, including our perennial favourite the children’s colouring-in competition, and the chance to win a new OM System OM-5 camera from Rubber Monkey for the best bird photo taken during the Survey.

For the first time, teachers are invited to be part of the Survey action through a set of resources created with the Science Learning Hub that explores learning about birds through a te ao Māori cultural lens.

Kairangahau Māori Yvonne Taura says the purpose was to engage kura Māori in manu education and show they have a role to play in protecting their local environment.

Amy Boyce caught a brilliant shot of a song thrush that was chosen as the winner of the NZ Garden Bird photo competition in 2023 and graced the cover of the State of NZ Garden Birds | Te āhua o ngā manu o te kāri i Aotearoa 2023 report. Photo credit Manaaki Whenua/Amy Boyce.

“We developed a curriculum that scaffold both cultural and environmental learning opportunities within the classroom. By showing manu in the environment and how they are impacted by urban development, we can encourage kaitiakitanga and an understanding of our manu taonga,” says Yvonne.

Teachers can win resources for their school through taking part in the Survey.

The results from the State of NZ Garden Birds | Te Āhua o ngā Manu o te Kāri i Aotearoa 2023 had good and bad news for four of our native species. While there has been an increase in kererū, fantail and tūī counts, the long-term shallow decline in silvereye (tauhou) counts continues.

“If bird populations are changing significantly, it’s an alert that something is either working, for instance predator control, or something might be going wrong. There could be an increase in predators or changing temperatures could be reducing food and shelter,” says Dr Brandt.

Because there is such a wealth of data now, Manaaki Whenua has begun uploading the yearly data to the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, GBIF, to promote wider use of the NZGBS data for research and monitoring purpose.

Tūī are increasing in numbers in Canterbury – Photo credit Manaaki Whenua/Ken Nicol.

There are now 5 years of data that are publicly available (2018–2022) with the 2023 data to be added soon.

These datasets have already contributed to 13 scientific journal articles and been downloaded more than 4,000 times globally in the two years since they were shared to GBIF. it’s easy to take part in the Survey:

1. Visit the NZ Garden Bird Survey website to get started.

2. Select a garden or a local park

3. Choose any ONE day between 29 June and 7 July.

4. Look and listen for birds on that day for ONE hour.

5. For each species, record the HIGHEST number seen or heard at one time.  

6. Submit the results online at the NZ Garden Bird Survey website