New Zealand American Fiordland Expedition | |
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| Start | 9 January 1949  |
| End | May 1949 |
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The New Zealand American Fiordland Expedition was a research expedition organised by the Department of Internal Affairs in 1949 to undertake research into elk (wapiti) as well as other biodiversity, surveying and geology in the Fiordland National Park. [1] [2] [3]
In 1947, American Colonel John K. Howard participated in a preliminary reconnaissance survey of Fiordland, South Island, New Zealand for elk (wapiti). [3] Wapiti are not native to New Zealand; they were introduced in 1905 from the United States into Fiordland National Park. [3] After that study, Howard was interested in organising a comparative scientific study of wapiti and their habitat in their native United States and their established range in Fiordland. [3]
Fiordland is well-known for its isolation, steep mountainous terrain, and notoriously bad weather, so such an expedition would need good communication, several camps, a large and experienced team, and the support of several governmental departments. [3] [4] Howard first recruited the American expert on wapiti, Olaus Murie, to be scientific leader, and then set up a management committee to plan the expedition into Fiordland to study wapiti. [3] The expedition was funded by a grant in 1948 from the New Zealand Cabinet to the Department of Internal Affairs, which called it The New Zealand-American Fiordland Expedition. [3]
The main aim of the expedition was to study the wapiti population in its breeding grounds in Fiordland. However scientists from other fields of study would also study other aspects of zoology, botany, geology, forest survey, survey and photography. [3]
In addition to three American scientists, the vast majority of members of the large interdisciplinary team included New Zealand scientists, photographers, surveyors, and field personnel. Forty-nine people are listed as being "official personnel" on the expedition, but more than 60 took part in it. [3] Only one of the 49 official participants was a woman, the New Zealand botanist, Ruth Mason.
In early January 1949, Howard and the team of field personnel sailed on the MV Alert with most of the expedition gear from Bluff and Milford to a small camp that they set up at Caswell Sound. [3] They prepared for the arrival of the scientific teams by unloading and packing stores and equipment, establishing camps, and cutting tracks for the rest of the expedition party. [3] [10]
The base camp for the expedition was established on the banks of the Stillwater River, about 6 miles from the small beachhead camp at Caswell Sound, which had storage tents, a laboratory, a cookhouse, a wireless, and even electric lighting. [3] The field party hauled stores and equipment by land to Lake Marchant, and from there, prams with outboard motors were used to ship the gear to base camp. [3] Other smaller camps were established on the Stillwater River (two camps), Leslie Clearing (one), Glaisnock River (two), and Henry Saddle (one); the expedition also used several Ministry of Works' huts, including at George Sound, Lake Thomson and Lake Hankinson. [3]
Even though wapiti animals would be shot to make specimens of them, the expedition team only ate wapiti meat about six times, when a specimen happened to be shot near camp. [11] Additional camp stores therefore had to be replenished regularly. For the duration of the expedition from January through May 1949, stores were shipped via road from Invercargill using New Zealand Army trucks that transported them through the partially completed Homer Tunnel to Milford. From there, Alexander J. Black, captain of MV Alert, ran fortnightly trips by sea between Milford and the expedition's two main beachhead landing sites in Fiordland: Caswell Sound and George Sound. [3]
In early March, the expedition was also supplied by air drops from Queenstown to the upper Stillwater River camp. [12] For example on 5 March, packages weighing c. 35 pounds were dropped by parachute from aircraft, one package on each of five trips. [12] Some of the special supplies in each package that went above and beyond standard camp food included asparagus, coffee and Worcester sauce. [12] The main dates of the expedition were as follows: [3]
Other zoologists, botanists, foresters and geologists arrived later than 26 February, remained for shorter periods, and worked independently to the main expedition party. [3]
A survey of wapiti in the area covered by the expedition recorded 180 observations of wapiti, including 40 wapiti in the Charles Sound area, 75 in the Stillwater River area, 17 near George Sound, and 40 near Lake Te Anau. Based on these and other observations, the total number of wapiti in Fiordland was estimated to be between 500-1000 individuals. [3] [17] Red deer were found in similar or greater numbers [13] and hybrids between the two closely-related species, which do not co-occur or hybridise in their native range, were also found. [17] Murie noted that wapiti shifted their breeding season from September-October in the United States to March-April in New Zealand, they shifted their diet to a completely new flora, and there were several observations of accidental death of wapiti from falls or injuries in the rugged Fiordland terrain. [3]
About 45 wapiti specimens were collected during the expedition, and only the skin, a stomach sample and skull were collected from each animal. Preparator Lindsay boiled the skulls, cleaned and salted the skins, and sent the skulls "packed in moss" to the Dominion Museum, Wellington, and then on to Murie in the United States. [3] Te Papa has retained at least one of these specimens. [18]
The botanists on the expedition observed based on field evidence that the diet of wapiti and red deer in Fiordland comprised several preferred shrubs and trees, including Pseudopanax colensoi, Raukaua simplex, Griselinia littoralis, Coprosma foetidissima and Muehlenbeckia australis. [3] [13] Other shrubs, such as Schefflera digitata and Carmichaelia arborea were eliminated from all but inaccessible sites. [3] [13] Ruth Mason examined the stomach contents of 39 specimens from the expedition, which included "twigs, leaf fragments, and seeds", and found that there were between four and 21 different identifiable plants in each stomach sample. [3] Griselinia littoralis was the most frequent and abundant plant found, with Nothofagus menziesii in second place, but several other trees and shrubs, as well as ferns, grasses, sedges were also able to be identified from the stomach remains. [3]
The land surveyors carried out a major triangulation of the study area of c. 100 square miles, but they could only use the theodolite on fine days, when the weather was clear. [4] During the five months of the expedition, the team had only 15 [4] (or possibly 17 [17] ) fine days, yet they still managed to "provide height and position control for detailed mapping form aerial photographs". [4] They ascended most of the prominent peaks in the study area - sometimes twice - many of which had not likely been climbed before, and at one point they spent 5 weeks surveying without returning to base camp. [4] Their efforts would greatly improved the detail of maps in Fiordland. [19]
Additional reports on the following topics were also written up: geology, climate, botany (including a list of plants observed and their abundance), [13] forests, small introduced mammals (possums, rats, mice and mustelids), invertebrates, fish (freshwater and marine), birds, land survey, and opportunities for tourism. [3] A number of scientific specimens was collected by the expedition scientists; for example, there are over 200 plant specimens at Manaaki Whenua - Landcare Research Allan Herbarium (labelled "N.Z. – American Fiordland Expedition"). [20] Notable finds by the expedition included a cache of Māori adzes, [21] [22] two kākāpō, twelve species of Opiliones (of which most were new species), and up to twenty new species of spiders. [17]
The holotype specimen of a new species of wētā, Zealandosandrus fiordensis (now called Hemiandrus fiordensis ) was collected by Richard Dell on this expedition and described by John Salmon in 1950. [23] [24]
Cameramen from the National Film Unit spent 10 days on the expedition making an eleven-minute film entitled, "Fiordland Expedition, 1949", which was released in late May 1949. [25] [26] [27] The 16mm film was said to be 1000 feet long, "includes a sequence of scenic shots and others on camp life", [25] and is stored in Te Papa's archive. [28]
Richard Kenneth Dell was a New Zealand malacologist.
Lionel Jack Dumbleton was a New Zealand entomologist. He was born in Hampden, New Zealand and was a founding member of the Entomological Society of New Zealand. Dumbleton was one of the entomologists studying insects on the 1949 New Zealand American Fiordland Expedition.
Walter Reginald Brook Oliver was a New Zealand naturalist, ornithologist, malacologist, and museum curator.
Sir Robert Alexander Falla was a New Zealand museum administrator and ornithologist.
Victor Dmitrievich Zotov was a New Zealand botanist.
Raymond Robert Forster was a New Zealand arachnologist and museum director. He was a Fellow of the Entomological Society of New Zealand.
Count Kazimierz Antoni von Granöw Wodzicki was a Polish-born New Zealand mammalogist and ornithologist. He served as a Consul-General to the Polish government-in-exile in New Zealand towards the end of the Second World War and aided numerous Polish refugees to settle there.
Olaus Johan Murie, called the "father of modern elk management", was a naturalist, author, and wildlife biologist who did groundbreaking field research on a variety of large northern mammals. Rather than conducting empirical experiments, Murie practiced a more observational-based science.
David Alexander Brown was a geologist who played an important role in developing the study of Geology in Australia. He was born on 8 February 1916 in Scotland. His father fought and died at Gallipoli in World War I. His mother took him to New Zealand when he was four years old.
Jacqueline Nancy Mary Adams was a New Zealand botanical illustrator, botanical collector, phycologist and museum curator. Throughout her career (1943–1987), she worked at DSIR and later at the Dominion Museum in different roles as technician, artist and assistant curator of botany. Largely self-taught, Adams collected over 3300 botanical specimens in New Zealand, illustrated nearly forty publications on algae and other native plants, and authored numerous scientific publications. Her major work, Seaweeds of New Zealand – An Illustrated Guide, was published in 1994.
Sir Joseph Holmes Miller was a notable New Zealand surveyor, Antarctic explorer and conservationist. He was born in Waimate, New Zealand, on 12 February 1919.
Ruth Mason was a New Zealand botanist specialising in the taxonomy and ecology of freshwater plants. She was employed at the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research for 35 years undertaking research into aquatic plants, pioneering new techniques for plant preservation and collecting over 13,000 plant specimens in the field. She was awarded life membership by the New Zealand Ecological Society.
John Thorpe Holloway was a New Zealand alpine explorer and forest ecologist. He was born in Oxford, New Zealand, on 15 November 1914. He was the only child of Margaret Brenda North and husband John Ernest Holloway, a vicar in the Anglican Church.
Harry Howard Barton Allan was a New Zealand teacher, botanist, scientific administrator, and writer. Despite never receiving a formal education in botany, he became an eminent scientist, publishing over 100 scientific papers, three introductory handbooks on New Zealand plants, and completing the first volume of a flora in his lifetime.
Alick Lindsay Poole was a New Zealand botanist and forester.
Taitetimu / Caswell Sound is a fiord of the South Island of New Zealand. It is one of the fiords that form the coast of Fiordland.
The Three Kings Islands expedition was a research expedition organised by the entomological section of the New Zealand Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (DSIR) to research into the fauna and flora of the Manawatāwhi / Three Kings Islands. The expedition took place in November 1970.
The 1972–1973 Auckland Islands Expedition was a research expedition undertaken between November 1972 and March 1973 to research the biodiversity of the Auckland Islands.
The 1954 Chatham Islands expedition was a research expedition organised by George Knox of the University of Canterbury to explore the distribution of benthic and pelagic marine fauna living between the Chatham Islands / Rēkohu and the eastern coast of New Zealand.
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