Kakapo chicks!

BBC News: Big brood of rotund rare parrots.  The New Zealand kakapo are breeding!

One of the world's rarest birds, New Zealand's kakapo, is now not quite so rare thanks to the arrival of 34 kakapo chicks.  Those chicks, born over the past few months, take the world population of the flightless nocturnal parrot (Strigops habroptilus) to 125.  In 1995, kakapo numbers had dwindled to just 51.

The kakapo is the worlds heaviest parrot, it is flightless and nocturnal.  The average life expectancy for a kakapo is 95 years and they are vulnerable to introduced predators including cats, rats, and stoats.

Most of this crop of chicks are being hand-reared by conservationists, and Kakapo Recovery Programme officials have named every known bird.  One of their favourite foods is rimu fruit, which only appears every three to five years and can trigger breeding.  (My Majacraft Rose spinning wheel is made from rimu wood, which is a warm orange colour.)