News & Tips

Whether they’re a welcome wild visitor or a fine flock kept for eggs and breeding, ducks are a pleasant addition to any backyard, lifestyle block or farm. For feeding backyard ducks, a good supplementary feed really is all it’s quacked up to be.

In fiction and film, mice are often clever and resourceful characters, and dogs are funny and loyal. Ducks, however, have often been presented by writers as grumpy and petulant. Here are some of our favourites…

We've been long-time fans of Project Island Song as the charitable endeavour aimed high and worked hard to replant, restore and replenish Ipipiri / eastern Bay of Islands. We recently formalised our support using the Soar Initiative, which gave us a good excuse to get back in touch with the legendary Richard Robbins.

It’s that time of the year when we are called upon to do our civic duty, electing a local representative to lead us confidently into the future. Yes – it’s Bird of the Year time!

We've got plenty of news on local bird populations, international wind turbine studies, NZ Fauna of the Year, international shipping route changes - and a delightful encounter between a labrador and a whale shark.

In order to follow a command, your dog must first learn how to pay attention. Read on to see how this fun game helps dogs focus long enough to listen to a command. 

In 2013, a community of crib owners at Gemmells Crossing banded together to replant and restore their special spot on the Kakanui River. The outcome? A thunderous symphony of birdsong that quite literally silenced the room during a recent AGM.

In 1910 one story caught the imagination of the United States – a tale of an Iowa man who lost sight in one eye after his prize-winning duck exploded. As we enter a summer of duck feeding it serves as precautionary tale for New Zealand.