Natural history curator Dr Colin Miskelly completed Te Araroa Trail a year ago today. His epic mission was to count every individual bird seen and heard along the 3,257 km trail, from Cape Reinga to Bluff. He has now completed another marathon – analysing, writing-up and publishing his findings as a scientific paper. ‘Birds of Te Araroa Trail – Aotearoa New Zealand’s long pathway’ was published in the March 2025 issue of the journal Notornis, just xx days ago. Colin shares the main findings here.Read more

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Two people are standing in a carved out ditch that surrounds a piece of earth they are digging carefully on.

Welcome to a blog series that introduces places, people, methods, and species that are important to palaeontological research at Te Papa and beyond. Curators Felix Marx and Alan Tennyson, along with researchers William Baker and Collection Manager Hazel Richards, start us off with a summary of what palaeontology is and how it works…Read more

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A new species of orchid, the elegant leek orchid, has recently been described and named by botanists from Te Papa and Ōtari Native Botanic Garden. The elegant leek orchid is found from the central North Island south to the Auckland Islands but is very uncommon and classified as threatened. Curator Botany Carlos Lehnebach and Science Researcher Lara Shepherd introduce us to the new species.Read more

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Last year a Te Papa curator approached the library team with an intriguing question. Could we help them find more information about the story that in the 19th century whales in the Wellington Harbour were so noisy that they kept people awake at night? The curator couldn’t find any first-hand contemporary accounts, known as primary sources, from the 1800s to confirm the tale and hoped the library team might be able to help. Cataloguing and Acquisitions Librarian Kim McClintock talks about her discoveries.Read more

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A line-drawn map of a garden plan in front of a large building.

Nancy Adams was a key player in the early decades of the Dominion Museum (predecessor to Te Papa), making substantial curatorial contributions to collections spanning from colonial history to botany and producing illustrations, now a valuable part of the Te Papa Art collection. As Lucia Adams and Margo Montes de Oca discovered during their summer research this year, traces of her influence and curatorial eye can be found not only in Te Papa’s archives but also in the outside world, specifically in the gardens by the old Dominion Museum building in Buckle Street.Read more

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Many of New Zealand’s native orchids need our help to secure their long-term survival, but it is hard to help when we know so little about them. Master’s student Rebecca Greenwood (recipient of Te Papa Foundation Orchid Conservation Scholarship) is embarking on research to explore the pollinators and fungal-root interactions of a small group of spider orchids from south Auckland. Read more

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The warmer months are, in many respects, the ideal time for enjoying nature, including connecting with the amazing diversity of plants around us. This time last year, Curator Botany Leon Perrie was traversing the country to get the final photos for the fern guidebook he co-authored with Patrick Brownsey.Read more

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With our small size and population, Aotearoa New Zealand doesn’t often top global charts. However, in 2024, a discovery from our country became the most popular observation on the iNaturalist platform, outshining over 50 million other observations made that year! Te Papa Scientist Lara Shepherd discusses a few of New Zealand’s most notable iNaturalist findings of the last year.Read more

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Te Papa vertebrates curator Colin Miskelly recently spent 3 days on Mana Island following a conservation dog searching for well-concealed petrels in the lush vegetation. He kindly agreed to share a ‘blog with a dog’ with us. Miro is a 4-year-old German short-haired pointer cross. He is one of theRead more

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