Portal:New Zealand/Selected article/24
The kākāpō is a species of nocturnal parrot, endemic to New Zealand. It is notable for being the world's only flightless parrot, the heaviest parrot, and the only parrot to have a lek breeding system. It is also the only flightless lek bird and is possibly one of the world's longest-living birds. It is the only species in the genus Strigops and subfamily Strigopinae. Kākāpō are critically endangered, with only 244 living individuals known as of 2024. Prehistorically, the ancestral kākāpō migrated to the islands of New Zealand and, in the absence of mammalian predators, it lost the ability to fly. With Polynesian and European colonisation and the introduction of predators such as cats, rats, and stoats, almost all the kākāpō were wiped out. Conservation efforts began in the 1890s, but they were not very successful until the implementation of the Kākāpō Recovery Plan in the 1980s. All surviving kākāpō are kept on two predator-free islands, Chalky Island in south-west Fiordland and Codfish Island / Whenua Hou near Stewart Island / Rakiura, where they are closely monitored. (Full article...)