A Precarious Encounter with New Zealand's Feisty Bird

The Australia Letter is a weekly newsletter from the Australia bureau. This week's issue is written by Pete McKenzie, a reporter based in Auckland, New Zealand.

Capturing a kiwi is more challenging than expected. Despite standing just two feet tall, an adult bird is armed with piston-like legs and razor-sharp claws. According to Will Kahu, a ranger with the conservation group Save the Kiwi, "They're surprisingly feisty." He recalled one standoff that ended with a kiwi leaping through the air, kicking him in the chest and sprinting off while he tumbled to the ground.

The author found himself squatting safely atop a fallen tree in Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari, a fenced-in nature reserve on New Zealand's North Island. Mr. Kahu and several volunteers were extracting a bird from its burrow in the rotting trunk beneath him.

"One leg, two legs — got it," Dave Laithwaite, a volunteer at the sanctuary, said while groping around in the mud in the kiwi's narrow den. He pulled the writhing bird out, then calmed it by cradling it like a baby.