An interesting visit to this beautiful area with walks to Te Muri and Mitre Bay. Interesting to meet two young people flying a drone and after I had counted 54 Variable oystercatchers, 24 South Island pied oystercatchers and two NZ dotterels resting ( roosting) at high tide just a couple of hours earlier. on the beach. That's a very good number of Variable oystercatchers.
I was keen to chat with the pilots of the drone and ask them if they understood that the Regional parks are no fly zones. They quickly brought back the zone from a great height and that was the end of that. The Rangers do an extraordinary job keeping these reserves in such good order but I guess the behaviour of visitors is always unpredictable.
The following day it was great to meet with and chat to Cimino and I thank him for the link to the Mahurangi News magazine just passed on. Cimino is the editor of this magazine which is full of very interesting articles. I will settle down with a coffee to read this after my high tide shorebird count at Shoal estuary his morning.