Kauris But No Kiwis

The Kauri tree is, after California's giant sequoia, the largest of all living things. The North Island had many Kauri forests until Europeans, that is, the British, showed up in the 19th century and began hacking them all down. There are pockets here and there now, and, of course, they are protected. We stopped at the Trounson Kauri and Kiwi Preserve, one of the pockets of Kauri forest, toured the little forest by day, and then walked much of it again by night in hopes of viewing a kiwi.

New Zealanders, well, their Department of Conservation, are
nearly fanatical about protection and preservation of both
natural and cultural resources; when you visit a DOC Kauri
preserve, you disinfect your boots both coming and going...

At Trounson, much of the trail is on board-
walk--to protect the trees' roots--so there are
few opportunities for photos with humans
or other perspective-lending objects; suffice
to say, these trees are very large 

Thus

And thus

Perhaps the largest at Trounson

And thus

More

After dark, we wrapped red cellophane around our headlamp
lenses--kiwis supposedly don't see the red bit of the
spectrum--and headed out in search of the rare birds--we
heard their distinctive "eek, eek, eek" cries but never saw
one (we think we've seen others elsewhere); we did see rats
scurrying about in the trees and attempted to photo them;
ick

Next day we drove on to another big preserve
and saw Tane Mahuta, Lord of the Forest, the
largest remaining Kauri; it's impossibly huge....

Click to enlarge...worth reading