In Pictures: Watching Whales in New Zealand

Thirty years ago, the picturesque community of Kaikoura was a down and out coastal town in the northern part of New Zealand’s south island.

Because so many young Maori leaving for towns that had work, a few people had the idea of starting whalewatching tours, so a number of Maori families mortgaged their home to start a Maori-run business—Kaikoura Whale Watching Tours.

Operations manager Kauahi Ngapora started working here about 14 years ago. His first job was to give tourists 'sick buckets' but he's risen to become operations manager.

Whale Watch Kaikoura has a 98% success rate in seeing whales. Every minute that the whales spend on the surface enable them to stay 5 or 6 minutes below water.

Once the whales show their tails, that’s it. They disappear below the surface for 40-60 minutes.

John Barrett runs an ecolodge on the island of Kapiti - which has been set up as a nature reserve. In the past New Zealand had no native mammals except bats. The result is that many birds - like the endangered kiwi - became land birds that no longer fly.

In 1996 the Department of Conservation cleared the island of pests - possums, rats and other mammals - so now the bird population and vegetation has started to explode.

This takahe was photographed just in front of John Barrett's house. There are only 280 of them left on the planet and 19 of these exist on Kapiti island. (Photos by Laura Hubber.)